#OKAY DIRECTORS COMMENTARY IN THE TAGS TIME:

[coldshrugs]

see you in the morning

pairing: io laithe / estinien varlineau word count: 2k note: endwalker spoilers. io is not handling things well :') you'll never guess who goes to comfort her :o)

Old Sharlayan holds its breath.

Most nights, the chilly island city continues its quiet bustling straight through to morning. Scholars drift from early-evening lectures to late-night research clubs or public laboratories, babbling excitedly about the latest research, innovation, or gossip. Those with less rigid schedules wander to the nearest patch of grass or unused table at the Last Stand with a pile of books in tow. Structured or lax, their perpetual search for knowledge is the very heartbeat of the city. But tonight, the pulse has all but stopped.

The lack of bubbling chatter and foot traffic casts an eerie pall over the city. It reaches all the way down to Scholars’ Harbour, where Io sits alone, on one of the long stone piers reaching out into the sea.

Thousands of people huddle in their homes with friends and loved ones as they wait for daylight, and for the Ragnarok’s first–and only–flight.

The weight of their expectation is suffocating.

Waves murmur against the stone below, the only sound save the few foreign sailors on the next pier over, bound to their work regardless of the state of the world. Neither is loud enough to distract her racing mind.

Io pulls her knees to her chest, cursing the inability to become as small as she feels. Every soul on this star, whether they know it or not, is now her responsibility, an obligation that echoes back to a time beyond time. And she chose it. Before she even knew it was her burden to carry, she chose it. She chooses it, because who else would? Who else could bear it? Is it not enough that her loved ones must sacrifice so much due to proximity and circumstance? It has to be her, for she would not wish this on anyone else.

If only she could curl into herself completely. Tightly enough to blink out of existence, like a dark singularity.

She’d take everything else with her.

There’s no resolution in that line of thinking.

Somewhere out there, in the expanse, is the replication of a little girl with a very human soul–perhaps not fractured, as the souls of those on the Source and its shards, but something that was never allowed to be whole. Why wouldn’t annihilation be Meteion’s answer to dead world after dead world? It must seem like kindness to a being who has never experienced adversity. 

Tears, injury, death: Io has suffered through–and dealt–her fair share of them all. What pain has Meteion seen that Io has not lived?

Her hands ball into fists, nails digging into her palms. She feels manic, unable to rein in the oscillation between anger, guilt, and fear. There is the urge to scream, or cry, or drop into the frigid water below and swim and swim and swim.

But a figure moves at the edge of her vision, walking briskly in her direction.

Now another feeling begs to be acknowledged. Relief? Endearment? A mixture of both at being found, and by him, perhaps.

Still, against her threadbare senses, this feels like an ambush.

Estinien says nothing as he approaches. His steps slow as if trying not to scare a wounded animal. He offers an awkward smile. Io tries to mirror it, hoping he sees a shred of warmth in the tight purse of her lips.

He is handsome in this light, in his half-laced boots and untucked shirt billowing in the chilly coastal wind. The world is ending, and she can’t help noticing his beauty. It’s ludicrous.

“Who sent you?”

His short huff resembles a laugh. “I need a motive to check on you?” When she doesn’t answer, he sighs. “Y’shtola saw you down here from the Annex. She and Thancred thought to come, but I asked them to stay. Everyone’s turning in for the night. I thought you might appreciate the less intrusive option.”

“By all means, intrude. Once the solitude is broken, it hardly matters by whom.”

His brow knits as he studies the carved stones that make up the pier. He turns, shifting his weight. She can feel him wondering if this was unwise.

“I’m sorry, that was unkind. I’m just… overwhelmed–” Io takes a deep breath, embarrassed by the confession before she makes it– “and afraid. Please don’t go.”

Estinien sways in her periphery, stepping closer before squatting beside her. He looks out into the quiet marina, carefully avoiding her half-slumped form. False privacy, but she’ll take the small mercy.

“You needed to get away. I can understand that.”

“I couldn’t breathe in there. Everyone is watching me. They look at me like I’m dying, or like I’m killing them myself.”

“For every person placing blame at your feet, ten others believe in this asinine plan. As I do.”

“You think we can do it? Truly?” she asks, looking up into the great expanse. The stars blink against the endless blue, and for once, the sight makes her feel cold instead of curious. “What if I–”

“You have to, Io.” His tone invites no debate, but there is a melancholy that matches her own. “You will figure it out no matter the cost, because you must.”

Io nods. Her eyes sting. She closes them to keep the tears at bay as long as possible. He is right, of course. Somewhere deep in her soul, the flame of her faith–in herself, in her friends, and in those who paved this way for her–burns as brightly as ever. She has to save them.

“But you will not be alone. We are with you, of course. We’ll give our all to see it through, if that’s what it takes.”

“Gambling your lives for a promise I made, for my mistakes… I can’t bear to think about losing them.” She risks a glance in Estinien’s direction, but his eyes never leave the gently rolling sea. “Or losing you.”

The barest of smiles, one of the little ones he tries to hide with a bowed head. He rubs the back of his neck, sending a cascade of loose hair over his shoulder.

Her chest clenches.

The well of affection she holds for him is muddy these days; for years, they’ve operated with platonic, amiable ease, flitting in and out of each other’s lives but always reuniting as the closest of friends. But since her time in the First, they have been nearly inseparable.

Estinien is her family, but unlike what she feels for Thancred, Urianger, or G’raha, he is not her brother. He evokes a distinct tenderness, gives life to a long-dormant, selfish hope within her heart, and he does it without trying.

“If we don’t try, all is lost.” He falls against the stone with a quiet groan and nudges her with an elbow. “This pessimism doesn’t become you. I have seen you stand against tremendous odds time and time again. I’ve heard tales of more things than I’ve seen. You may not always get it right, I may not always agree, but you do the impossible. What makes this any different?”

Io reflects on the past year (gods, has it been that long?). The burning skies, the horrible transformations, and the aether-depleted souls who will never see another lifetime on this beautiful star, all because she fell for a madman’s power play. She condemned them to this fate. 

She reaches further into her memory, to the unsure adventurer stepping foot into the Waking Sands, and her induction into the inner circle of these secretive upstarts she’s grown to call family. She’s been nothing more than a curse upon them. Thancred’s aether, Y’shtola’s sight, Urianger’s conscience, Minfilia’s life. What might they have avoided without her?

Haurchefant would be alive if she had stayed out of his life.

Since the day she left Dalmasca, death and destruction have been her shadow. As ruinous and loyal as Dalamud, a black dog she pretends she can abandon if only it would forget her scent.

She watches Estinien again, silver in the moonlight. His hands are clasped, hanging between long legs that dangle close to the water below. Like the water, he looks relaxed on the surface. Like the water, there is an undercurrent only the experienced can see.

His thumb worries a circle into the palm of his other hand. His shoulders are tense, hidden by his slightly curved posture. If anyone could understand why this is different, it’s him. For all his courage, he has seen the black dog too.

“It’s different,” Io swallows, “because it’s everything.”

Estinien looks back. His stare is hard. “And so are you.”

Once more, he leaves no room for debate. He speaks as if stating the obvious, citing a fact she should already know.

Io blinks, so awestruck by his candor, she has to look away. Her tumultuous thoughts now spin in his direction, unable to focus on more than this sudden vulnerability. What does it mean that sharing these doubts with him is the most comfortable she’s felt in days? What does it mean that she aches to reach for his hand?

His eyes dart over her face, never lingering on one feature too long. There is something overly controlled about it. Lately, she has employed the same tactic when trying not to stare at his lips…

If she leaned over and kissed him, would he push her away? Could they still be friends?

A selfish hope indeed. But a small thing in her mind whispers, “maybe after…”

If there is an “after” to be had.

She releases her bundled limbs and stands, stretching to relieve the long-ignored ache in her back.

“Come on,” she beckons. “We should at least try to rest before we travel to the edge of space and time.”

Io’s tension deflates as they walk to the annex, pressed under the weight of her exhaustion. They go in comfortable silence, half an arm’s length apart. There is something between them she longs to touch, but doesn’t dare. She has the moonlight in his hair, his half-smile, and his steadfast faith in her. That is enough.

That is more than enough.

The Baldesion Annex is dark, like the rest of the city. The lobby is empty. Not an Annex attendant, not a Scion. Estinien does not share her surprise. How persuasive must he have been to ensure no one disturbed her return? Io watches him move across the room with deliberate steps. He holds open the door that leads to the nap rooms and gestures with his head for her to go ahead of him. The little smile is back.

She returns it, and this time it’s genuine.

They pass Estinien’s door. Io’s room is around the corner and down the next corridor, and he makes the full journey.

They pause at her door.

“Thank you for keeping my head on straight.”

“Someone must. You would not hesitate to do the same for me.” He shrugs. And then his hand is on her upper arm, giving a reassuring squeeze. He pulls her into his space.

Her arms thread under his, hands pressing into his back. She rests her cheek on his shoulder, breathes him in. The sharp edge of her anxiety sloughs away, lost in the steady pressure of his arms around her.

They have never hugged like this. They have never been this close.

Io closes her eyes, squeezes him more tightly, and smiles when she can feel his erratic heartbeat through the firm press of their chests. In this moment, with his hands resting at her neck and waist, with his chin against her neck, skin to skin, she cannot imagine his denial. Perhaps it isn't a stretch to assume he feels this too.

The corridor lights grow dim around them. Io pays them no mind, content to stand in the dark until morning, held by the man she yearns for, the man she never thought she would.

But she yawns, and he steps away, hands on her shoulders. Another squeeze. Another scan of her face before his grey eyes focus on hers, like he's making a final decision.

“Tomorrow,” Estinien says. The single word is a promise. Whatever happens, whatever they find, he will make sure Io gets it done.

“Tomorrow.” She nods, slipping into the room as the memory of his touch crystallizes in her mind. Her limbs are heavy as she climbs into the too-small bed, but the weight has lifted.

She can breathe.

#azia writes #io laithe #io/estinien #this had me in a chokehold #i could not stop thinking about them having a stress hug there at the end of endwalker #a moment where things *could've* started but didn't #because they're both scared of what's to come and scared of the other not fully reciprocating #then after... io is injured and getting over everything that happened in UT. it's not the time. the moment is gone #they are so patient!!! they could've kissed right here but they want to be sure! they mean too much to each other to get it wrong! #while estinien has been 100% in it since in from the cold i think this is the moment he's like 'okay it's not just me and i'm sure of that' #like they're not flirting they're not joking. that's his girl!! and he just needs to be there for her #io is still in her 'lmao i'm unlovable and this is probably in my head' phase #maybe i'll tackle that next lmao #i'm sorry i can't write a fic and leave it without a director's commentary in the tags dslafkjsald #anyway go listen to Lost by dermot kennedy bc that's the vibe here

[david-talks-sw]

Doylist outlook on the Anakin & Council scenes during "The Phantom Menace"

About 4 years ago, I'm talking to an older friend of mine who grew up with the Original Trilogy.

He tells me that one of the disappointments of the Prequels, for him, is that the Jedi Knights had been built as these "Knights of the Round Table" and, instead, what his generation got was "monks who'll pick on a 9-year-old for being afraid".

Which makes sense in a story about their corruption and downfall, but he'd have preferred to root for them, see them in their heyday.

And, like, I agreed.

I didn't necessarily feel they were picking on him when I watched the scene as a child, my takeaway from that scene was the "fear leads to anger" part. But when I was thinking back on it as an adult, what my friend said seemed to track, and it was in-line with the "Jedi are corrupt" prism through which a lot of people see the Prequels, 2018-me included.

But nowadays - having read a whole bunch of George Lucas quotes and rewatched the scene - I don't think that it's meant to be perceived that way.

I've briefly touched on this last year, but if we look at this scene from a Doylian perspective, rather than a Watsonian one, it's clear to me that the point of this scene is three-fold.

1) Moving the story along, making sure Anakin is present in the third act.

"This was a little tricky, when writing the script, in that I didn’t want Anakin to become a Jedi yet, cuz I’m saving that for the end of the movie. But at the same time I still had to have him tag along. (laughs) And I was able to use, really, the device of the fact that Anakin had been put in Qui-Gon’s care and that he had promised his mother that he would take care of him as a way of allowing him to take the boy along with him on this trek… to the next third of the movie. But one of the difficulties of writing a script with lots and lots of characters is rationalize why everybody’s along." - The Phantom Menace, Director’s Commentary, 1999

This one's pretty simple to follow.

We need Anakin in the third act so he can blow up the big ship at the end. So the Council doesn't take Anakin in, but let's Qui-Gon keep him as a ward until a more definitive decision can be made.

2) Foreshadowing Anakin's inevitable downfall.

"We have the little testing scene which is really designed to allow him to be accepted as a Jedi, eventually. Because he has the powers… but as Yoda points out, there’s a lot of fear in him, and anger. That’s why they actually deny him the chance to become a Jedi. But it’s also - when they relent later on - it’s the thing that ultimately begins to describe some of his downfall". - The Phantom Menace, Commentary Track #2, 1999

Also straightforward. Anakin will become Vader, so let's hint at this.

The Jedi are clairvoyant wizards, they see all the red flags but must also admit that his future is clouded. In doubt, they'd rather err on the side of caution and not train him.

As George explained in Cut Magazine, in 1999, both the Council's prediction and Qui-Gon's decision are ultimately correct and wrong; Darth Vader does plunge the galaxy in darkness, but he will also bring back balance to the Force.

3) Illustrating the Jedi's principles by injecting his own values into their teachings.

"Ideas don't come into a story that easily. A lot of the time the characters have to say what you mean, and to do that the characters usually have to have differing opinions about the idea so they can discuss it." - (collected in The Star Wars Archives: 1999-2005), 1996

This is where things get tricky. What did George mean?

Well, there's plenty of quotes where he says Jedi can feel emotions, namely love... what does he say about fear, specifically?

Okay, so that sounds a helluva lot like what Yoda says. Or rather, Yoda sounds a helluva lot like George.

If we go by the idea that the Jedi are, "dunking on Anakin and chastising him for being afraid because they've lost their way and now repress their emotions"... then it's inconsistent with what George Lucas was saying in the above quotes, because he clearly agrees with Yoda and uses the character as a vector to get his own ideas across.

It'd also wouldn't track with what we see in The Gathering, during The Clone Wars, in which we see that to gain their kyber crystal, a Jedi must overcome their weaknesses - including facing their fears.

So either George wanted us to think the Jedi Council collectively decided, on that specific day, to say "to hell with everything we stand for: fuck this kid in particular, just because"... or that's not how we're meant to read the scene.

I'd say the only reading that is consistent with everything George said is the following:

Anakin is afraid, he misses his mom. Which is normal.

The Jedi sense this and ask him how he feels, hoping he'll have the sense of admitting to this feeling (first step towards solving a problem is acknowledging there is one).

Anakin refuses to admit he's afraid, even after they explain that they know he is. He doesn't see what him being afraid has to do with anything.

Yoda explains the dangers of unchecked fear. If you don’t address or overcome it, it'll eventually lead to suffering and the Dark Side.

So Anakin being afraid isn’t the issue in itself, it’s that he won’t even acknowledge that that fear is there. Which, again, is completely normal, but a Jedi is supposed to be above that... and Anakin's age makes it so that he'll have a hard time learning this.

Hence why they initially decide he won't be trained.

So Lucas was clearly going for a classic Yoda moment, like "do or do not" in Empire Strikes Back… but to most people, the way the scene is written makes the Council seems cold, unfeeling, and dunking on a 9-year-old and makes Qui-Gon look like the reasonable one.

Could George have conveyed his intent more clearly?

Now, another writer might have decided to illustrate this philosophical lesson about unchecked fear differently, in a way that makes the Jedi seem kinder, less detached and more relatable. Lucas will be the first to admit that he’s not that writer.

"I'd be the first person to say I can't write dialogue. My dialogue is very utilitarian and is designed to move things forward. I'm not Shakespeare. It's not designed to be poetic. It's not designed to have a clever turn of phrase. [...] Dialogue isn't my strength. I use it as a device. I don't particularly like dialogue which is part of the problem." - EMPIRE, 1999

He writes dialog that takes you from point A to point B. The bottom line is Anakin's got too much fear and that he's too old? He'll stick to that bottom line.

It also doesn't help that, well, we're only shown Anakin as a sweet child, without being shown the traits that make the Council go "hmmm maybe not".

Like, the more explicit way would be to show the Council having a vision of death and destruction and Anakin standing in the middle of it... but you wouldn't even need to go that far.

Originally the scene went on for just a tad longer, with the Council prodding Anakin more and the latter screaming "I'M NOT AFRAID!" in anger.

Thus proving Yoda's point, that there's some unchecked fear and anger in him which - due to his age - will be difficult for him to master.

This was cut from the final movie, but was kept in printed editions of the script and the novelizations.

Interestingly, there was also this other deleted scene, where Anakin gets in a fight with a young Greedo, after the latter accused him of cheating at the Boonta Eve race.

According to this commentary, the scene was cut (to Rick McCallum's dismay) because George felt that - while it showed Anakin had a temper - it didn't really establish his character one way or the other, in the scope of The Phantom Menace.

And therein lies the issue, right?

George isn't building a cinematic universe, he's not making a TV series: he's making 3 movies, each about 2 hours long.

There's a short amount of time and a looot of stuff he'd like to say about how a good kid becomes a bad man and how a democracy becomes a dictatorship, and all the other subplots regarding symbiosis etc... that's a lot of things for a movie.

So when he's structuring how the Prequels explore the first theme, it's done as such:

First movie: Show Anakin was a sweet kid, hint at his fear.

Second movie: Show Anakin's other flaws, his love for Padmé & Shmi's death, which will eventually increase his fear and mark the first step toward his fall to the Dark Side.

Third movie: Anakin's fear of losing Padmé causes his fall.

And that's it. Nothing happens outside these movies.

A project with a larger scope (or one that only focused on Anakin's rise and fall) might've explored how Anakin felt growing up in the Temple alongside other already-trained Jedi, his trauma from his days as a slave, his anger issues, whether he ever asked the Jedi to go back and rescue his Mom, more details on his friendship with Obi-Wan, how Palpatine manipulated him from day one...

In that project, you'd put those deleted scenes and lines back in.

But this ain't that project. This is the space equivalent of a fairy tale.

So, to Lucas, none of the above factor into the story about Anakin's downfall, by virtue of not being in the movies.

Which makes it unrealistic to a majority of viewers. But George (indie experimental filmmaker with a vision) had a very specific thesis he was going for:

So at some point we're left with two choices.

1. "Death of the Author"

If George's thesis wasn't conveyed clearly enough, or executed well enough and what you saw killed your suspension of disbelief, or if you plainly disagree with George's view on fear... then obviously, go to town with heacanons, go with the "Jedi are dunking on Anakin 'cause they lost their way" interpretation.

Sure, it's not what George Lucas was going for, but as my friend who I mentioned at the start said to me more recently: "Who cares? Either the Jedi are intentionally meant to be seen as arrogant, emotionless a-holes, or the Prequels are bad movies."

Which I disagree with, but hey :D

2. Seeing the scene the way it was originally intended.

This is the one I'm going with. If you still like George's thesis and see it clearly when you watch the Prequels, then great.

In that moment, Qui-Gon - while ultimately correct about Anakin being the Chosen One - is being rash and trying to force Anakin in a mold the Council and Obi-Wan know he'll struggle to fit in. In that moment, they're in the right, he's in the wrong, and Anakin is caught in the middle. And that's pretty much it.

In the end, the most important part of that whole scene is the message "fear leads to anger, hate and suffering". And these are movies for kids. And as a kid... I got the message.

So the scene did its job with high scores, as far as I'm concerned.

#I already touched on this scene before a couple of times so I thought I'd put all my thoughts in one post #jedi #attachment #anakin #george lucas #sw meta #bts tidbits #star wars #tpm #the phantom menace #jedi order #meta #anakin skywalker #long post #this has been in my drafts for months ffs #need to find the time to complete this stuff

[quickhacked]

– SHIP SONGS.

TAGGED BY: @morvaris & @devilbrakers, thank you so much!! TAGGING: @reaperkiller, @steelport, @arklay, @aartyom, @swordcoasts, @faarkas, @cultistbase, @liurnia, @girlbosselrond, @katsigian, @dickytwister, @shellibisshe, @adelaidedrubman, @henbased, @phillipsgraves, @strafethesesinners and YOU!

vincent x vitali || mikhail + vincent || mikhail + vitali

cwjbhn - jake scott, josie dunne mikhail & vitali, teen years

even if it doesn't work out, even if it doesn't make sense // and you never see me again, can we just be happy now

and all that i know is here in this moment // sun is still setting over the ocean // here in this light the green in your eyes is all that i see // i'm right where i wanna be

director's commentary: this song is specifically what i have in mind for their last evening together before mikhail moves to the other side of town. i added the second bit because that's literally what they spent their evening doing; watching the sunset on the docks together, and vitali gifted mikhail a necklace nadya had given him to one day give to his significant other. vitali believed he would never find someone so he wanted mikhail to have it instead

i don't want to watch the world end with someone else - clinton kane mikhail & vitali, years apart [vitali pov]

but i've, i've finally realized // if this is our last goodbye until we're gone // who cares about the wrongs we've caused ourselves // 'cause i don't wanna watch the world end with someone else

falling deeper, deeper into hopeless thinking // remember when you pulled me out // wishing you would come around again // when the room goes quiet // i'm hit with my regret like a riot // reminds me what i really want // but have i waited for too long?

director's commentary: vitali loses his phone and with that loses contact with mikhail for six years. he believes he's never going to see him again and most of his bad decisions during their years apart are a direct result of mikhail's absence

i don't wanna be okay without you - charlie burg mikhail & vitali, years apart [mikhail pov]

now i can't find the words to say // that'll be the perfect balance between loud and clear // and i can hear so well, your lovely voice inside my head // saying you love me, oh // but i only think of you, will we be together soon? // i'm thrown to the wayside, you're planted in my mind // but i don't wanna be okay without you

director's commentary: mikhail is also not handling losing vitali well. he believes it's his own fault- thinks he didn't make enough effort to keep in touch with vitali and now he's ignoring him because of it. mikhail is trying a bit harder to move on, mainly because he has to focus on school a lot; but he can't help but keep thinking about vitali and wondering if he will ever see him again

anyway - noah kahan mikhail & vitali, reunited at arasaka

today you looked older than me // hair in your face, it fills the space between your teeth // and all of your falling, does it get exhausting? have you gotten sleep? // you said you were sorry that you hadn't called me in over a week // and i said, always, i'll wait

director's commentary: when mikhail and vitali reunite at arasaka, they move on very quickly from everything that happened mainly because they no longer want to think about it. but both of them realize that things are different now; and they worry about each other, not used to each other's new habits and quirks and especially mikhail worries a lot about vitali. but he also stays patient with him. they have all the time in the world now

boy who has everything - annika bennett vincent & vitali, late 2076 [vincent pov]

what do you give to the boy who has everything? // his world is almost too good to be true // what do you say when he's starting to let you in // and you see he's better off without you?

director's commentary: when vincent and vitali meet, vincent falls in love very quickly but also worries that because of their differences vitali will never be interested in him like that. his self-confidence at that point is basically below rock bottom and all of it together causes him to be very anxious about being in love at first

higher - blanks mikhail & vincent, early 2077

sun is going down, we go look for adventure // both a little scared, but it's better together // maybe it's the way that you looked in my eyes // i haven't been able to get you off my mind // driving through the valley, got your hands in my hair // tell me where you wanna go and i'll take you there

director's commentary: vincent and mikhail take a while to become friends because vincent is at first intimidated by mikhail, while mikhail just struggles making new friends in general. they're both essentially stepping out of their comfort zone a bit to befriend each other and because of it get a fresh new start and it's all worth it in the end, and that's the vibes this song gives me

meteor showers - andy kong vincent & vitali, early 2077 [vitali pov]

tell me it's love that i'm feeling // if it's not then i'm afraid my heart cannot take much more // you're staring up // i can't take my eyes off you // 'cause i realize the reason why i'm here tonight and what i breathe for // and i found love while dreaming of meteor showers

director's commentary: vitali has been with many men in the past but none of them have made him feel quite as vincent does. he also falls in love relatively fast but at first tries to just shrug it off, feeling like he should just focus on his professional life- but it's impossible to get vincent out of his head and he is very deeply in love with him now and it's too late to back out of that

tongue tied - grouplove mikhail & vincent, 2077

take me to your best friend's house // i loved you then and i love you now // don't take me tongue tied // don't wave no goodbye

director's commentary: another song that's just a bit more fun, mikhail and vincent's dynamics are just very fun and they love each other so much by now. it's interesting how they both started out very shy and nervous around each other but at the same time didn't want the other to walk away; some of that still lingers now, but they're enjoying the time they have together anyway

i don't wanna know - goldhouse, mokita all three of them, 2077+

if the sky's about to fall or if we lose it all // if we make it or we don't, i don't wanna know // if the music starts to fade and this feeling slips away // don't wake me when you go, 'cause i don't wanna know

director's commentary: despite the fact only vincent and vitali are actually together, they do all three live together and have become such an important part of each other's lives that they all can't go too long without each other. all three of them often worry that they'll still end up alone somehow; but they will in fact spend the rest of their days together, as long as they live

#tag games #ask:mikhail #ask:vincent #ask:vitali #anyway. how are we all feeling about this #sorry i couldn't settle on one dynamic so i just grabbed all three of them. sue me #feeling very normal in this chili's tonight #i hope i tagged everyone also sorry if i missed you i'm a wreck of a man. and if you already did this feel free to kill me #songs are in chronological order also i'm so fucking sorry for being a freak like that #i'm genuinely not normal about these three guys that live in my brain #something about the titles of the songs for mikhail and vitali in their years apart. there's something there. mein gott #AND!!! the facking. mood of the songs circling back to the first song when vincent shows up. normal about that too #anyway hii if you read all of this. please marry me

[anderstrevelyan]

Hiii! In case you accept single lines for the Director's commentary: “He’s been studying death,” Feron says flatly.

(I love this part. It haunts me)

(for the fanfic writer's director's cut)

I'm definitely accepting single lines! Thank you! And poor Feron here.

On the surface he's referring to Valas's newfound faith in Kelemvor, how his son's been devoting himself to becoming a cleric, the reason he's been collecting the shelf of dead things Jaheira's asking about. But it's the first reference to it—the reader doesn't know exactly what he means like she doesn't, so it feels more ominous.

It's also Feron dropping his mask: he's been pretending everything is fine for the start of his friend's visit, but now that he's getting closer to confessing he's really not okay, that flatness in his voice comes through. (I'm trying to show that physically in the house at the same time: the outer room is clean and cared for, but the further they walk in things are in disarray.)

He is proud of Valas's studies in this direction—especially seeing some of his late mother in him, a cleric who turned to her faith in the face of loss, too—but he's having a rough time of things. He's barely sleeping, hearing Bhaal again when he does, is feeling the old stirring of bloodlust he's fighting to ignore. While at the same time he's consumed by his deepest worry, the central worry to the chapter: what if Valas is studying death because he feels drawn to causing it, too?

I try to use adverbs in my dialogue tags sparingly and with intention, but I really meant this one!

#asks #thank you!! #valas devir #feron devir #talking about my writing

[corneliushickey]

dear @shinelikethunder tagged me to post eight tv shows to get to know me ~

under a cut because a) i did this with director’s commentary and b) i got too into this and it’s embarrassing

this exercise also made me wish that the tag was about eight movies because i really struggled to think of eight tv shows... i have definitely WATCHED more than eight tv shows in my lifetime, but it’s hard to name eight that have had a significant enough impact on me that i would show them to someone as a get to know me exercise, whereas i can think of like a dozen movies off hand that like, showing them to someone else feels like cutting my chest open and letting them root around in between my organs

okay, on to the tag! it’s organized by year the tv show came out because i am incapable of ranking things by how much i like them/they mean to me

good omens (2019); amazon

do you know how embarrassing this is to admit? 

i fully didn’t like the majority of this show because newt and anathema mean nothing to me and i hate being made to look at children

but crowley and aziraphale did something to me, man. on a molecular level. i got got. extremely got. i’m moving this week and tonight had the pleasure of taking everything down off my walls and a solid 30% of my wall space (which is a full coverage collage of stuff) is aziraphale and crowley prints... they inprinted on me in a way that i simply cannot justify nor explain. i have watched the intro to episode 3 more times than i can even attempt to count. it’s heinous. i’m serious.

the terror, season 1 (2018); amc

says tumblr user cornelius hickey...

the terror is a show i feel very comfortable telling people about because while i love it dearly and it means a lot to me, it’s a great example of craft and technical accomplishment, but it doesn’t hit any raw emotional wounds the way a lot of my most cherished media does. it’s just so technically well executed, an absolute masterclass of horror. it says and does so much in such a tight run. it is emotionally devastating and brilliantly written. it is hopeless and painful and dense.

i have a 3ft x 5ft print of an oil painting of cornelius hickey custom framed in my room. its haunting eyes will likely be moving to my office in the new place. he is a character that like very singularly stands out to me as one of the most incredible combinations of writing and performance i have ever seen on film.

i want this url buried with me when i die like digitally encoded onto my corpse

mindhunter (2017); netflix

this is another example where the show is just really really technically well crafted. beautifully written, acted, and filmed. i loooove a period piece and this one really captures a very specific time and place. plus it scratches my thomas harris itch because hannibalverse made me fond of quanitco stories at a young age

bill/holden is a whole ‘nother level

i want to study holden like a bug, and in fact i have!! the fic i’m most proud of is an intense play by play pov of his psychosexual hangups and while i only got halfway through writing it before the hyperfixation left me forever... i am still very proud of its concept and execution

true detective, season 1 (2014); hbo

another absolutely incredible example of television as a craft

this one though does get a little personal so while i recommend it to people often i am needlessly touchy about how people receive it because it hurts my feelings if they’re stupid about it

rust cohle you will always be famous!!

seven of its eight episodes really really really satisfy my need for hopeless, nihilistic media that wallows in its own despair and then episode eight always comes and bites through both my kneecaps with the blinding light of hope, the beatific face of god, the soul barring power of faith

hannibal (2013 - 2016); nbc

what is there to say, really?

if i loved it less i could talk about it more

the borgias (2011 - 2013); showtime

i literally almost didn’t submit my college applications because i was in a horrific depression hole watching and rewatching this show alone in my room in the dark for weeks on end. 

another show i watched at a very delicate time in my life but i have rewatched it since then and it 20000000% holds up, once again, as an exercise in the craft of television

a lot of the themes in this show really helped shape my own interests in media going forward

micheletto corella is really really really precious to me and the one thing i will never forgive this show for is how they handled his and cesare’s divorce because it is thematically inconsistent that cesare’s reaction to finding out micheletto was keeping a long line of secret curly haired brunette boyfriends half his age was anything other than scathing jealousy and extremely loud protest. like it’s just unrealistic that his reaction would have been anything but “why have you been fucking me by proxy when i have been desperate to fuck you for years” and the fight would’ve been really ugly and cesare would have lost because he’s not very good at fighting and then, well :) then 

house m.d (2004 - 2012); fox

absolutely humiliating

i was nine when this show premiered and watched it at a very delicate time in my development

the fucking unreal levels of 2000s homophobia did a psychological number on me as a very very gay child living in a violently homophobic environment

literally one of the worst shows ever put to television, and also, of course, one of the best

hugh laurie can still hit me up whenever

the twilight zone (1959 - 1964)

obviously didn’t watch this one while it aired lmao but back when it was on netflix in its entirety i watched it a few times start to finish

one of the all-time greats of american tv and a lovely comforting thing to have on in the background

rod serling is also welcome to hit my line

this show is still very much a cornerstone of how a lot of sci-fi and horror that came after it are done, and for good reason! being as those are two of my favorite genres, this is of course a staple of my tv loves

i tag @vincentpriceofficial @thegleamoftheknife @daemons @coweyed @awildwickedslip @voxceleste @intomyth @coffeeandorange

#roach.txt

[versegm]

OH FUCK I meant to send you a Director's Commentary thing when you reblogged it BUT I FORGOT anyway how about the deets on "And the Audience Clapped"? (If you're still in the mood)

For you? Always <3

The actual fic has a trigger warning for uh. Everything? The base premise of the fic is "Guda has incredibly disturbing intrusive thoughts and does not react well to them" so even if I don't think I'll get into details in my play by play, tw for thoughts of sexual violence, onscreen self-harm and suicide attempts, and overall blorbo from my show spiralling bad.

My primarily goal when writing this was "I want to see how fucking worse I can make Guda." But I'm a weenie I actually like bad endings so my secondary goal was "but I want it to end well."

I have absolutely no idea if I succeeded. I feel like I chickened out too much tbh (<- squicked out by sexual violence) and as for the ending I'm often told that what I qualify as a "good/okay ending" is often "fucking horrifying" to other people. Still I like the final result so that's everyone else's problem. This was however a nightmare to tag which is why I just went the "choose not to use archive warnings/fuck around and find out" route, because if I tagged everything it would be WAY too long.

Anyways. "What if the player was an outer god." I post about it a lot in a comedic tone over here. I wrote it as self indulgent porn somewhere else. But I really wanted to take it in a more... realistic? Direction I guess? What if things weren't automatically fine and ok because the story demanded it. What if it was in fact an incredibly distressing situation to be in. I don't like writing monsters are villains (not my vibe) but that does not mean the monster loving you & having good intentions should always be an instant smooth sailing. Which really means that Guda will be stuck in intrusive thoughts central for nearly 6k.

Now for a more specific play by play of the fic:

The problem with writing the POV character being possessed is that it is incredibly hard to showcase when "this is something normal from the character" vs "this is someone else speaking through the character" (doubly so when the character themself does not realize the possession is happening) So I was at times less than subtle about it. In case it wasn't clear, this is the player being worried about Guda, and Guda misinterpreting the feeling because "this is someone else's thought" is not typically the first conclusion people would draw. Anytime in the fic where you see Guda having conflicting emotions, or being confused about their own feelings, that was a case of player feelings interfering with their owns.

Outer gods are basically eldritch gods in Fate lore. As such I don't think they really have like. A body the way humans consider it. That's why the fics have various instances of weird fascination towards flesh and how it functions. From the perspective of a god, it'd be like suddenly figuring out how an ancient watch works.

When you're being possessed by someone who is 1) incredibly not fucking normal about your bestie and 2) does not know the difference between intimacy love and violence. Bottom text.

Also a lot of people initially assumed that I picked Castoria in this specific scenario because I, too, am not normal about her. And I mean. That is partially true (tho not to that extent lmao) but also Castoria IS canonically one of the closest people to Guda (& the most likely to realize that something is wrong.) It's not just "I'm having horrible thoughts about some random aquaintances" it's "I love this person with all my heart and I want to give them the world, but I can't even give myself to them because my existence is poison." So double the agony.

This was inspired by one specific scene from Mairimashita!Iruma-Kun, available on mangadex and probably crunchyroll please for the love of god read that manga it fucks SO hard.

When you're an Outer God with only a very vague knowledge of humans and what they look like so instead of focusing on eye color or haircuts you're just fascinated by the fact that this lil one has thirty-two teeth. Bottom text.

This whole section is meant to be "all the times Guda died before the player rebooted the games," so I picked all the hardest boss fights I could think of. There's someone in the comments who asked me months ago if they should pick up a guide for the Cernunnos fight because I brought it up like five times in that paragraph alone. My guy if you are following my blog, yes, you should. You really fucking should.

Also I use second person a lot when writing Guda fic because it's easier (they/them can be confusing when you're writing multiple characters in one setting) but ofc for this fic this also gave me the opportunity to write some moments where the player is directly talking to Guda (or at Guda, rather.)

I wanted to show that while the player was at their most Not Normal about Castoria, they do love everyone in Chaldea, which is why Guda is being more affectionate than usual here.

I'm just really proud of "You imagine lapping at her open wounds, lapping at her wet cunt." Intimacy and violence but also holes and fluids you know how it is.

My bitch Guda who wouldn't wish to bother others & show any weakness if they had a gun to their head.

Christ I can't summarize MHXX's lore concisely, but she is repeatedly compared to a character from a sitcom, hence why her first comparison is to tv shows.

This is meant to be a call-back to that bit earlier where they wonder how hard they'd have to bite to make Castoria bleed.

To lb6 players out there: I was thinking of Gareth writing this line.

I don't remember if I told you, but Castoria has Fairy Eyes, ie is capable of perceiving lies (tho the exact mechanics are unclear.) That's why Guda is being extra stubborn. They can't deny that they're fine because she'll know it's false, so they're trying to dodge the entire conversation.

My bitch Guda who is taking the entire situation soooo well (casually deshumanize themself & considers being dead in the same sentence)

[Castoria voice] why don't you get into bdsm and then maybe you'll feel better.

Anyways, that was blorbo from my game having the worst life of their life! I think I could have done worse, and will endeavor to do so soon. Still damn proud of it tho!

#characteroulette #ask

[twopoppies]

I posted 26,289 times in 2022

14,767 posts created (56%)

11,522 posts reblogged (44%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@twopoppies

@daisiesonafield-blog

@ameryth74

@lovingstheantidote

@skepticalarrie

I tagged 17,035 of my posts in 2022

Only 35% of my posts had no tags

#stunts - 1,270 posts

#holivia - 1,159 posts

#my policeman - 558 posts

#lost and found - 522 posts

#don’t worry darling - 357 posts

#you are home - 312 posts

#q - 308 posts

#fitf promo - 261 posts

#as it was - 208 posts

#hs3 - 206 posts

Longest Tag: 120 characters

#i mean if youre gonna write an open letter somewhere just stick to tumblr where your echo chamber can maybe validate you

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

I’m honestly still processing the video and the song, but the first coherent thought that came into my head was whether there was a red pill/blue pill reference.

The terms "red pill" and "blue pill" refer to a choice between the willingness to learn a potentially unsettling or life-changing truth by taking the red pill or remaining in contented ignorance with the blue pill. The terms refer to a scene in the 1999 film The Matrix.

939 notes - Posted March 31, 2022

#4

My Policeman Screening - Part 1

Let me start by saying these are comments from a friend who attended tonight’s screening. I haven’t seen the film. I’m just going to give you their commentary as they gave it to me. This is their initial message to me when the came out of the theater:

The movie just finished. IT’S FUCKING GORGEOUS I’m like shaking, it was so beautiful. I’m SO PROUD!! That’s what a performance with a competent director and supportive costars looks like, holy shit!!!

And DAVID FUCKING DAWSON!! EMMA!! And they kept Julia 😭😭😭

Just know I heard people being asked by staff what they thought and EVERYONE around me said EXCELLENT.

This is LONG. So long I have to split it into at least two posts. I’ll put everything under the cut for those who don’t want to see spoilers. And when I say spoilers, I mean it. This is pretty much scene by scene.

Harry gets the first billing on his own. So it opens on a beautiful shot of the water then it his name and then the title of the movie. 🥺🥺🥺 A true leading man!! I was already so proud to see that. Then everyone else gets billing during the opening shots of Patrick arriving.

Okay, from what I can remember in order: It opens with the older Tom and Marion at their home just as Patrick is being brought in from his assisted living facility. Older Tom immediately takes their dog out for a walk while Marion adjusts everything for Patrick in his new room.

She places a picture of her and Tom from their wedding day on a dresser facing the bed so Patrick sees it when he first lies down. Cue the first scream from these girls in the audience who would not stop their constant talking and  giggling because we saw a picture of Harry and Emma posed. 🙄🙄🙄

So it does begin with the older versions of the three. The difference from the book is that Marion is not writing a letter. A box of Patrick’s old things gets delivered and his diary is included. So she actually finds the diary and that’s what initiates a lot of the flashback sequences.

Tom is off walking the dog, Marion is trying to make Patrick comfortable. And then the first flashback is the scene on the beach with where Harry was wearing the blue shorts and vest.

Marion is sitting with Sylvie when Tom comes over. Sylvie’s part is drastically cut from the novel, so you don’t see her getting pregnant or married. She doesn’t tell Marion (or hint rather) that he’s gay like she does in the novel. You only see her in that opening scene to introduce the younger selves and then she teases Marion and tells Tom she doesn’t know how to swim.

Then Sylvie runs off with her boyfriend but we never see her again, she’s just referenced one other time.

They changed this bit from the novel too. Tom tells Marion he’ll teach her but he takes her to a public swimming pool full of families. So it’s a very cute and light scene with up tempo 50s music included. There’s a brief slow mo shot of Tom swimming and Marion being infatuated of course, to imply she’s already falling for him. The parents from the novel are cut too, no scenes with them. When Marion and Tom meet on the beach, he tells her there he just got back from the service and he’s already a Policeman. And she’s already a teacher.

Like the novel, they get to know each other by the swimming lessons and Tom says she must love books if she’s a teacher. He asks her if she knows about Art, she says a bit and there’s a sweet scene where she takes him to a library and they just sit in silence while he’s earnestly reading about an artist he found out about.

He asks her if he’d like to go to a museum since he knows someone that she can talk to about art. Enter younger Patrick.

And omg…when I tell you David Dawson was perfect. EVERYONE was perfect, especially the younger trio. But when I tell you the younger three has the BEST chemistry. And David instantly captivated me. What a presence!

So this is where Tom introduces Marion and Patrick for the first time.

Patrick asks if they would like to attend a play and Marion says sure. But as they’re walking out, Marion says something about attending (I didn’t catch it) but Tom says they can decline Patrick’s offer if she really doesn’t want to go. Marion says no, they should go since she doesn’t want to hurt Patrick’s feelings.

So this is when they go on their first outing as a group. And omg, they’re all so lovely together. If I didn’t know what was coming, I could’ve just watched them be silly as sing together while in a bar. David and Emma both have BEAUTIFUL voices!!

There’s a montage of the three in a bar, then driving together into the countryside for a picnic. Harry sings along with them but (and maybe this was a deliberate decision by the filmmakers) but you hear David and Emma’s voices over his. This montage of their outings is when you start to see the dynamic play out. In the theater, they sit MARION, PATRICK, TOM In the bar, Tom and Patrick grab each other to sign before Marion joins them. In the car going into the country, she’s sitting in the back while Patrick is driving and Tom is sitting up from with him 😭😭😭

Between the younger flashbacks, it did go back to the present. Older Tom stays away from older Patrick completely. Older Marion gives older Patrick his bath/meals/pills and reads his diary (unbeknownst to him).

As in the novel, older Patrick’s his mobility and speech are severely impaired. Rupert Everett gave a wonderful but heartbreaking performance.

The first entry Marion reads is the night Tom went to Patrick’s apartment to have his portrait drawn. So this differed from the novel too!

Those photos we got of Harry in costume with a bag and smoking a cigarette sitting on the beach happen right before he goes to Patrick’s apartment for the drawing session. His uniform is in the bag and, like the novel, he tells Patrick he brought it in case he wants him to wear it for the portrait. Patrick says yes, tells him to change they start.

See the full post

1,226 notes - Posted March 7, 2022

#3

https://twitter.com/lexceloml/status/1566853990880509955?s=21&t=fVgCXpnnUnQzTDqniAGLbQ

In the video of him sitting down and ignoring Olivia, Harry appears to spit on Chris Pine? literally where is the behind the scenes tell-all

I-

x

He clearly doesn’t spit. But it looks like he coughed and something landed on Chris. 😬

1,301 notes - Posted September 5, 2022

#2

I think every larrie everywhere is the person screaming “What the fuck?!?!?!” in this video. 😅😅😅

See the full post

1,456 notes - Posted February 11, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

You're not embarrassed being an old woman and being in tumblr? I would rather die that my grannies have an actual account on tumblr for celebrities rho

Why would I be embarrassed for having interests I enjoy? My guess is that you’re really, really young. And that maybe you don’t actually have solid relationships with adults who have lives outside of parenting or work. But I hope for you that when you’re my age you have hobbies that bring you happiness. And that by that point you realize that trying to shame someone for being an adult only makes you look too immature to be in adult spaces, which Tumblr is.

When I was 20, I loved music, making art, writing and reading good stories, fashion, talking about popular culture, making friends, going to concerts… You’d be surprised how little changes when you’re my age. I just have way more money and time to enjoy those things now. I’m only 55. I’m not dead. I’m also not a “granny”, but even if I was, I’d probably still like all of those things.

Ageism isn’t cute, love. And I sure don’t ever see people telling men they shouldn’t go to football games or have their little “fantasy football leagues” or wear their favorite player’s merch. For every comment you guys like to say is misogynistic (but isn’t), this is one that really reeks of it.

16,126 notes - Posted November 5, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

#tumblr2022 #year in review #my 2022 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review #i'm literally cackling about me reblogging myself the most #probably because of my fic posts #and clearly holivia took up so much space on my blog this year #i cannot WAIT for it to not be anywhere in 2023

[tickle-bugs]

Can we get directors commentary on not a house but a home and strange exhilaration please? They stories are so cute and so well written I’d love to hear your thoughts on them

Yes omg!! Sorry this took a bit to answer, I got sidetracked. Thank you for asking!!! Putting these under a cut so i can go ham LOL

Ask for more director's commentary here!

Not a House, But a Home

AHHHH ok ok this was SO fun to write because it's pre-musical Maitlands!! As someone with a deep love for technical theatre, it was fun trying to imagine what the house would be like before the events of the musical. Scenic design is a fun hobby of mine and I love what a set will say about the characters that interact with it!!

Okay so usually when I'm first encountering a prompt/idea, I get clear image of like...the center of the fic? or at least one very specific scene that I can sort of stretch like taffy and build on. The one for this fic was Barbara with the wallpaper! The very first decision I made was that they'd be fixing up the house a bit. It felt in character to me for the Maitlands to literally fix every goddamn thing they could think of instead of like...confronting their mortality LMAO so I wanted to go to a period of their life that felt new and fresh! Also I really love the pastel green wallpaper that they use on the set for the show and I thought it would be sweet if Barbara was the one to put that up. Something something she wears green the house is green something something good luck charm

Then of course the JOKES!! I'm a dad joke connoisseur myself, so it was really fun getting to pick ones for Adam to use. All the jokes in the fic are ones I've used myself, but I looked them up online for specific phrasing. It was really fun getting to play with Adam's delivery actually! To me, Adam has absolutely zero doubt that he's hilarious and will just keep on truckin' until he makes someone laugh. He's so fun to write! He's mischievous and loving and so very white, bless his heart.

I think the core of their relationship is 100% that Barbara and Adam are each other's best friends, y'know? They feel like high school or college sweethearts, or the result of a meet-cute--something sweet and forever-binding. They can't leave Target without buying a million useless things and they take turns either pretending the baby section isn't there or going in and cooing over the little onesies. They slow dance in the kitchen with no music. They have loud, dramatic sing-alongs in the minivan. I think part of that comes from being married/together, but a lot of it is just loving each other's quirks and company.

Also I wrote this in the tags of the og post but I kept making myself laugh writing it by imagining Beetlejuice like...in their walls commenting on the events and such. He's such a wretched little creature I love him dearly. During Ready Set, Not Yet when you see it live, he's bopping around and scatting with 3-D glasses and popcorn literally waiting for them to die it's so fucking funny

Strange Exhilaration

baby's first wicked fic! Wicked will always have a special place in my heart tbh and it was fun bringing back those memories.

This fic was a gift that I whipped up in a couple days, so I didn't sit with it as long as I do some of my other prompts. It was actually nice to do that. It forced me not to overthink what I was doing.

Writing Glinda was a challenge but a welcome one? She speaks in such a specific way but because the show's been running so long, it's basically a new role each time a new actress steps in. I've only ever seen it live once and that was four or five years ago? So it wasn't super fresh in my mind. It was fun trying to reconcile what I remember with what I needed from Glinda. Her vocabulary is everything to me. I stole 'seriosity' (which is a real word but hasn't been used in ages) from Newsies because I had literally just seen it, but the rest were sorta off the cuff!!

okay so first: girlies. jot that down. I love Glinda and Elphaba's friendship and all the tropes that they encompass both together and apart. Whether or not you actually ship it, I do think it's important to write them as if they're a little in love with each other...because they are! I approach the center of their dynamic like this (and I write a lot of deep friendships this way) and it really makes their intimate moments shine ;w;

Elphaba having ticklish hands and Glinda being a teasy sunshine ler were both happy accidents but so fun to write. RIP Elphaba, me too buddy. Hands are mean. But I think it speaks back to their friendship in a sweet way? Elphaba being startled and embarassed by her own softness and Glinda being genuinely 100% delighted by it is so wholesome and true to them, I think. Then of course the reverse of Elphaba allowing herself to be playful and mischievous and Glinda clearly having the time of her life. Ahhhh I love them!!!!

I was fighting for my LIFE not to use 'wicked' or 'bubbly' as adjectives in case it was corny...I think I only did it once or twice each though. I'm so brave.

#director's commentary #SCREEEE #sorry again for the delay but this was so fun i love talking about these things ;w;

[dire-kumori]

Okay I'm probably gonna send you another of these once I get around to reading the latest chapter of Ever After, but until then: behind the scenes commentary on the scene where Evan "dies" the first time, triggering the time loop?

Also,, hiiiiii, not-so-casual reminder that I think you're the coolest and I'm so glad that we started talking <3

Take a flower! 🌻

Unusual Fic-Specific Asks for Authors

I'm excited to see how you like chapter eight! Unfortunately tumblr was being a bit of a dick when I tried to put the director's commentary directly in this answer, so I put it in a new post you can find here. Danke shcoen for sending something in, I really enjoyed having an excuse to ramble.

Also, holy shit, you're gonna kill me with kindness.

I'm not gonna lie, I had a mini-freak out when you read and responded to my tags in that first Dire Consequences reblog, before it was called Dire Consequences. In a 'holy shit, a cool person noticed me' kinda way. Then I freaked out again when you proposed the name. I can't begin to tell you how much I've enjoyed bouncing back and forth AU ideas and talking angst.

Danke shcoen for the asks, the flower, and the angst! A flower for you as well, for each of the above!💐

#ask #lonelyfreddles #unusual fic specific asks for authors meme

[bustyasianbeautiespod]

Episode 51 Transcript: Music Killed My Grandma!

G: Hellooo everyone. 

C: Heyyy people. Guess what day it is.

G: We're doing a cold open because it's…

C: It's Spotify Wrapped Day.

G: Spotify Wrapped. And we want you to inform us about your Spotify Wrapped this year. Only if–

C: But just the podcast part, I don't really care about your top song. [G laughs] Well, I kinda do, let me know. 

G: Only if- I think it's fun if we find out, like, people who have us as their top podcast, what music they listen to. So we only care about your Spotify Wrapped if you also listen to BABPod.

C: This is true.

G: Yeah. Yeah. We know there is 69 of you [C laughs] who have us as their top 1 podcast.

C: Yeah, that is the stat Spotify gave us. 69 of you.

G: So all 69 of you should tell us. [laughs] 69. I love that number, and I'm very grateful that there's 69 [C laughs] of you guys out there who have us as their top 1.

C: You have to stop saying 69. [G laughs]

G: I think it's so funny!

C: It's really good.

G: This cold open is going on for way too long.

C: Yeah, just tag us on Tumblr and we'll love you forever, thank you.

G: Yeah, Tumblr, Twitter, email?

C: Sure.

G: You can do it. Yeah. Anyway, that's it. Let's get on with the episode!

C: Yeah, have a good episode.

-

[intro guitar music]

G: Hello! My name is Grey.

C: And my name is Crystal.

G: And this is Busty Asian Beauties, a Supernatural commentary podcast where I, someone who has seen this show several times.

C: And I, someone who only knows the show through social media, discuss every single episode of Supernatural from start to finish. Also, we are both Asian.

G: Both Asian! For today's episode [C groans], I still have not pulled out- I have pulled out- what's the name of this episode and who's the director?

C: Who have you not pulled out yet of? [laughs]

G: Wait, don't say "pulled out" independently like that. It sounds weird. What's the name of this episode?

C: "Fresh Blood."

G: Fresh! I was looking up "true blood," and apparently, there's a TV show called True Blood, so-

C: Yeah. Yeah, there is.

G: Okay. So today, we're talking about Season 3, Episode 7: "Fresh Blood," written by Sera Gamble, directed by Kim Manners.

C: Death to Sera Gamble. [G laughs] Um, I can't finish the second part of that because he did die. [laughs]

G: Noo! Noo! We're horrible people.

C: You can cut that out, if you want.

G: No, it's funny. I'm putting it in.

So what are our pre-episode thoughts?

C: Hatred, biting, killing, which are all things that do happen in this episode. [G laughs]

G: Yeah. We had- I don't know. You know, like, sometimes, you watch an episode of a show, and you're like, "Okay." And then that's your only reaction. [laughs]

C: Yeah.

G: That's kind of how I felt about this episode. They were trying to do a lot of things, and the only thing that actually affected me emotionally was the very last thing that they did, the one with the car.

C: Yeah, where Dean is showing Sam how to fix up the car. Yeah, that was a nice scene in an otherwise horrific episode.

G: Yeah, I mean, at this point, is this a horrific episode, or is this just an episode of Supernatural? Maybe Supernatural in and of itself is horrific, and we need to accept this fact.

C: Yeah, to contextualize like, where I'm at, like, since watching this episode, the media that I have consumed are all of season 1 of the Interview With the Vampire (2022) show [G laughs], Little Women, directed by Greta Gerwig, and The Farewell, directed by Lulu Wang. So at the end of that, my main thought about Supernatural is, "Why am I still watching it?" [G laughs] There's a limited amount of time in my life, and perhaps every single thing I could watch other than Supernatural would be better than Supernatural.

G: Yeah, I've been saying since, like, last episode, that I've been playing and actually finished playing The Great Ace Attorney [overlapping] and it's such- it's such good media. It like, it is such a good story, and everything, and it's like, why am I watching Supernatural? There are moments when I was saying The Great Ace Attorney, ‘cause like, a major theme of that game is like, "the people you look up to are not always going to be good," you know, shit like that. And I was like, thinking, they were also trying to do this in Supernatural and it was not this good! [both laughing]

C: Yeah, they try to do a lot of things in Supernatural. And it was not that good.

G: Yeah. So what did you know about this episode before watching it?

C: Gordon escapes from jail, gets turned into a vampire, goes all bloodlusty, and then gets murdered horrifically.

G: Yeah. Good summary.

C: Yeah.

G: We can end the episode now! [laughs]

C: [laughs] Okay, goodbye everyone, see you next week for "A Very Supernatural Christmas." Email us at- okay, anyway. But yeah, I also knew about what Sterling K. Brown, the actor for Gordon, said about this episode, like, I'd seen the excerpt from the interview that he had. Should we just read that now?

G: Sure. Yeah. Go on.

C: Okay. Yeah. So okay, the interviewer asks him, “In Season 3's ‘Fresh Blood.’ Gordon is transformed into a vampire. How did that sit with you?” And he says, “That was really hard. I called Eric Kripke when I first got the script and realized I was going to be expiring. I wasn't so bummed about expiring, because all good things must come to an end. The thing that was horrific for me is that Gordon turns an innocent girl into a vampire. That was hard because his sister was turned, and he had to take her out. That began his career as a hunter. So I know Gordon does a lot of jack things, and isn't the most righteous individual. But did he have to do this? Eric was like, ‘We talked about it for a long time, but now that he's a monster and operates off instinct, he is not so logical, when the bloodlust comes on and you have the desire to feed, it is huge, and your strategy does not take into consideration collateral damage. His endgame is to kill Sam, and anyone else who has to experience detrimental effects because of that is not a concern of his.’ That was tough for me to process and get on board with.” Sorry, Sterling K. Brown! You went to Juilliard for this!

G: Sorry, dude. It's like, when the whole time Gordon was, you know, doing his thing, all I could think of was like, “This should be more emotional for him because of his backstory,” like, that was- Sera Gamble also wrote that episode, so like, why did she forget?

C: Yeah. Yeah, I don't think she forgot. I think she just assumed that he doesn't have feelings?

G: Doesn't care. Yeah, which is weird, given that they were trying to do the whole “monsters can have feelings too” thing for like, God knows how long.

C: Right. Yeah, like, she did the episode with the good vampires that have feelings. But as soon as the vampire is not the pastiest white woman that ever did live, no more feelings.

-

G: So to start, we have Gordon talking to Bela like, in the middle of a road. 

C: Yeah. I do enjoy this interaction. They're good characters to face off.

G: Yeah, because, like, Gordon is like, so dictated by what he deems is good, and you know, stuff like that. And then Bela is an all-money person. It's like, fun!

C: [laughs] It is fun.

G: Yeah, so at first, Bela doesn't know who this guy is, and he says, “I'm Gordon Walker,” and she looks a little bit alarmed, and she's like, “Oh, I know who you are. I've heard about you,” and they start talking, and Gordon has a gun pointed at her, and is basically saying, “Tell me where Sam and Dean is, or I'll shoot you.” And they even do this thing where Bela’s like, “Well, you can negotiate with me,” and then he puts down the gun, and is like, “Well, in exchange for telling me where Sam and Dean is, you get to stay alive,” you know, and stuff like that. [laughs] It’s honestly super fun! I like this scene.

C: It is fun.

G: And eventually what happened is, Gordon is like, “I can give you $3K.” And then she goes, “I don't wake up for $3K.” And…but she sees the little hex bag- they call it something in the show. 

C: A mojo bag. 

G: Yeah, a mojo bag. [laughs] I find it hard to believe that Bela would say ‘mojo bag’ but like, ‘mojo’ is an actual word?

C: Yeah, I think it's a hoodoo thing. It's like, specifically a bag that has powers that derive from hoodoo.

G: Ah, so it's Dean who's using it wrong.

C: Wrong. Yeah. [laughs]

G: Yeah. Okay. So she sees the mojo bag, and she's like, “Oh, that's priceless. If you give it to me, you'll find the Winchester brothers,” and Gordon eventually does, and Bela calls Dean and goes [British accent] “Hey, Dean, where are you?” [both laugh]

C: God, she's so real for this.

G: Yeah.

C: Also Dean picks up like, right away. This man is dickmatized for real.

G: This man is smitten. 

C: It was good to see Bela. I didn't know that she was gonna be in this episode. Oh yeah, also, I think in this scene Gordon calls Sam Winchester the [both] Antichrist, which is very fun. Love that name for Sam. Also, the last time Bela saw Sam was Sam getting sexually harassed by an old woman, so I feel like this is a strange thing for Bela to be hearing.

-

C: So okay, Sam and Dean. They're like, working a case. They're like, near some warehouse, something in the dark. And there's a man who is bleeding out on the ground, and Sam’s doing the whole, like, “Don't worry. We're getting an ambulance for you,” while Dean's doing the [yelling] “Where is she? Where's the vampire?” at this poor, dying man. [G laughs] So Dean runs off. And he does this thing that I've seen gifsetted a lot by people who want to fuck Dean Winchester, where- right, so he tries to lure the vampire out by, like, making a cut across his forearm. He goes like, “Smell that? Come and get it!” And he says, “I smell good, don't I? I taste even better.” [laughs] Okay. And a woman who has her face covered in blood comes over and like, tries to bite his neck, does bite his neck, and then he injects dead man's blood into her, and she passes out. Sam comes over and tells Dean, like, “Hey, that was kind of a risky play there,” which is something that continues throughout the episode.

G: [laughs] Ugh. I hate it here.

C: They've done this for so long. We've done this for so long. 

G: I know! It's been seven episodes. Like, I mean, I get that the main conflict of the season is that Dean is dying. But have we considered that we can have other conflicts in this season? I mean, I guess Sam being- trying to be killed by Gordon is conflict, but like, it's ended now. 

C: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that one ended pretty fast. Also, I feel like- I find it strange that we haven't seen Ruby for a little while, because they've pushed the whole “Dean's deal” thing as a subplot so hard in this episode and some of the previous episodes, and I feel like we never really resolved Ruby saying that she could get him out of it. But, you know. Whatevs.

G: Whatevs!

-

G: So back in the…motel room. No, are they in a motel room? The transcript says it’s a motel room.

C: Yeah, but it looks sort of like they're squatting.

G: [overlapping] Yeah, it seems like it's just a house. Anyway, there's the girl from earlier, she’s tied up to a chair, and she wakes up, and she is very confused, and like, almost crying, you know. She's miserable, and Sam and Dean are doing their bit of like, “Where's your nest?” And she's like, “I don't know what you're talking about!” And they're like, “Ha. Nice try, bitch. But where is your nest?” You know, stuff like that. Eventually-

C: Yeah. Also, she's very tits out, which I guess we find out later because she was turned at a club, but like, ugh. Do we have to do this? Do we have to? Also she’s blonde, which is relevant.

G: She's wearing a corset, which is- Yeah, she is blonde, and that's gonna be a thing. [laughs]

C: Jesus Christ!

G: Love that. 

C: Love that. 

G: I don't know why that's making me laugh. I'm sorry, blonde women. You’ve been through enough. 

C: Yeah, I’m sorry, blonde women. You have a lot of privileges in life, but one of your not-privileges is that every serial killer wants you. So yeah, F to you.

G: Yeah. So, the vampire, the vampire lady is saying that she took something, and that kind of alarms Sam, and he's like, “Wait. You took something?” and she mentions- it's so fascinating to me that they never say the word “drug” in this episode.

C: [laughs] Yeah.

G: ‘Cause what happened was, she was like, in the club, and then a guy came up to her who was the dealer, and he said, like, “I can give you something that you've never experienced before.” And then he put it in her drink, and then she became like this, and by “like this,” like, she can hear heartbeats from a block away. Lights and sunlight and sounds and everything are so intense, the smells, everything. Stuff like that. And what she's saying is basically, she can't come down. Like, it's fascinating to me also that they never say the word “high.” It's so funny! Like, she's like, “Oh, I took something, and it was from a dealer." But like, never say the word drugs. But then she keeps on saying, “I want to come down. I want to come down. I just want to come down.” And then Sam and Dean like, go to the other room to talk it out. 

C: Yeah. They also ask what the guy looks like, and she says, “He was old. Like, thirty.”

G: Thirty! [C laughing] Wonderful.

C: How old is she supposed to be? Because, like, the actress, like, I would say, is like, 25 to 30 years old. How old is she supposed to be?

G: The guy looks like, 26, you know, and she looks like, 30.

C: [overlapping] Yeah, and she looks 25.

G: So like, what's happening? What's going on?

C: "He was old. Like 30." [both laugh] Do they think only teenagers watch Supernatural?

G: This woman is operating on K-pop age standards, you know, how like-

C: I was gonna say she's operating off of like, queer elder standards. [G laughs]

G: If you were on Tumblr when Superwholock was big, you are a queer elder. [C laughs]

So Sam and Dean go to the other room to talk about it, and they're like, “We have no choice. We have no choice.” And Dean goes back to cut her head off. And, like, I was a bit uncomfortable by the fact that there was no, like, any push back anywhere.

C: Yeah! Uh-huh. Like, we know that vampires can subsist off of animal blood. Like, they met Lenore like, last season, so it would be possible to just inform her of the situation, and then tell her that she has to feed on cattle. When the werewolf-

G: Yeah, why couldn't they hand her off to Lenore?

C: Right. They don't have a Lenore’s contact info, because like, she ran off-

G: Eh, maybe they do.

C: But yeah, they should have gotten Lenore’s contact info. When Maddy got turned, they called Bobby to ask if there was a way to unturn a werewolf.

G: Yeah!

C: They did not bother here.

G: I'm sorry I keep interrupting. But with Maddy, it's because Sam was in love with her, or whatever they had going on. But like, this poor woman, because Sam did not feel an ounce of affection for her, just gets to die?

C: Yeah. And especially because they deceived her earlier-

G: Yeah, and it's so prominent-

C: They were like, "If you tell us what happened, we'll let her go." Like, ugh!

G: Yeah. Also, like, it's made even more prominent, like, the Madison and this girl comparison by the fact that the shot where Dean is like, cutting her head off is pretty similar to like, how the Madison's episode ends, you know what I mean?

C: Right, 'cause it's Sam's face and-

G: It's Sam's face only, and then you hear it. Yeah. So it really takes you back to that episode, and you're like, "Why didn't they try to do literally anything?"

C: Yeah. Yeah. It sucks. It sucks so bad. Ugh.

-

C: So we cut to a hospital room, and the guy that was bleeding out because of the vampire that they just killed, he's there, and Gordon and Kubrick, baby, are here.

G: Jesus man is back! Jesus guy is back.

C: Jesus man is back.

G: And is it just me, [laughs] or is Jesus Guy and Gordon- do they have a little something going on?

C: Oh, they definitely have a little something going on.

G: They have a little something going on. And I love that!

C: They didn't have that much going on last time. I feel like since Kubrick helped Gordon escape, they've had a few stray hookups, so. [G laughs]

G: I mean, spoiler, but Jesus man dies this episode, and the death scene was so like- like, it was like Hannibal, the scene where Hannibal guts Will type of situation. [C laughs] I'm right, though. I'm right, though.

C: Yeah, no, you're right. And that is what romance is. So yeah. You are right.

So right, the two of them are questioning him. They're FBI agents. Oh, I didn't manage to pause and see what the name on Gordon's badge was. I don't know if it was there. It'd be fun if he also did like, rock stars. [G laughs]

G: What do you think would uh Gordon have as his name?

C: Like, what do I think Gordon's Spotify playlist looks like? I have no idea.

G: Do you think it's like, a rule in hunter culture that you should go with a pop culture reference, or do you think that's just Sam and Dean? And if so, what do the others do?

C: I think Sam and Dean are just losers.

G: What do the others do, then? Just use random-ass names.

C: Actually like, try to look up an actual FBI agent and take their name.

G: Oh, that's smart. [laughs] Yeah. Just like what Dean did that episode where he turned out to be like-

C: Oh, when the cop was Black, yes.

G: "I've got that Michael Jackson disease." [both laugh]

C: Just like that.

G: Yeah.

C: So yeah, Gordon asks about the person who attacked the man, and he was like, “Yeah, it was some woman who bit me in the neck,” and they asked, “Did any of her blood get inside of you?” And he was like, “No,” and Gordon says, “Well, that's good, because we would have had to kill you.” And he just stares the guy down afterwards. The guys like, “Haha! Good joke.” And Gordon just unblinkingly looks at him. Is Gordon usually this bad at being an FBI agent?

G: I mean...

C: Like, he's considered a very good hunter. Like, he should probably be better at this.

G: Yeah. But you know, this episode, they were trying to do something, I guess.

C: Yeah, they're like, "He's so scary and evil." So yeah. Whatever.

And the man mentions, “Oh, like, these two guys rescued me,” and Gordon's like, “Huh. What did they look like?” And the guy was like, “Oh, one of them was really tall.” [G laughs]

G: Okay, if you were a witness to Sam and Dean’s shenanigans, how would you describe them? Two white guys...

C: Two white guys, lumberjack look. Yeah, I don't know.

G: I think I would- I have never met a person who was six feet tall. Like, that's my basis of like- that's my-

C: Wait, really? Not even six feet?

G: I don't think so. Like, I don't think so. Because, like, the average height of Filipino men are like 5’8”, something like that, and like, for women, it's like, five foot. So like, I don't-

C: Average?

G: Let's look at the average height for men. "Average height men Philippines." Okay. Average height for a Filipino man is five feet, 4.25 inches tall. Average Filipino-

C: Wait, 5'4"?

G: Yeah. [laughs] Short king. And for women, it's 4’10”.

C: Wait, 4’10”? No. That can be right! For real?

G: Yeah. I'm 5’3”, and I'm the tallest person in my friend group.

C: Wow.

G: If I'm in the train, and we're standing, I'm towering over everyone.

C: Huh! I always assumed you lived your life as a short person. [G laughs] But okay.

G: I'm only a short person in comparison to you, and also, like, every single girl I've dated. [C laughs]

C: Good for you.

G: Thank you. Yeah.

So I think I would be like, “Oh my god, they're super tall,” because, you know, my basis for height is quite short.

-

C: They're leaving Spider, which is the club that the earlier woman said she was at, and they reveal exposition-wise that apparently, all the people who have gone missing have been blonde women, and three of them have gone missing from here. And then they see this guy with a blonde woman like, going around into an alley, so they follow them.

G: It's so weird that they were like, “One guy’s going out with one girl. That must be the vampire.” And they were right. [C laughs] Like, that's the amazing thing. They were right.

C: Yeah. Good for them. So the guy, he has this like, eyedropper sort of thing, and there's blood in it. I- okay, don't you have to- I thought you had to bite them and then feed them your blood. You can just feed them your blood, and that's enough?

G: I think so. Because like, if it's in the mouth, right-?

C: In Interview With the Vampire, they had to.

G: Well, Interview in the Vampire- With the Vampire. I don't know. What is it called? It's IWTV, so it's "with the vampire"- and Supernatural run in very different leagues, so.

C: They actually mention that decapitation is a way to kill a vampire in Interview With the Vampire, though, and dead man's blood is a thing, too.

G: Wow!

C: So they should be consistent, lorewise. And, you know, since Interview With the Vampire’s the better piece of media, then its lore is the one that should be respected.

G: For the very real creature that is the vampire,

C: Exactly. This is the more scientifically-backed show.

So yeah, he is about to put some of his blood in her mouth. Do people in clubs really just take drugs from random people? Like, I know that they do. But like, do they really?

G: I don't know. I'm not the type to like, know anything about drugs so like, don't ask me.

C: That's fair, yeah.

So before the blood can get into her mouth, Dean like, starts beating up the guy. Sam pulls her away and tells her to run. And there's a bit of a fight. The vampire runs off. But you know who is there is Gordon and Kubrick.

G: [laughs] I love that.

C: Yeah.

G: They literally just showed up and like, it's such a bad timing, bro. It's such a bad timing. Because what happens next is, there was a fight scene, and, as you know, I do not know how to describe fight scenes. But basically, they're just fighting. [laughs]

C: Yeah. [laughs] True. They sure are.

G: And then Gordon gets cornered by the vampire. I have no idea how this happens. Like, the logic did not flow for me when I was watching the scene.

C: Yeah, right. Sam and Dean- well, Dean does a thing where he like, decides to like, let Sam escape by distracting Gordon and Kubrick by like, jumping around on cars as they shoot at him. [laughs]

G: Yeah, like, it's a very big deal because it's like, "He's jumping into the line of fire!"

C: Yeah, blah blah blah, he's being so reckless. Subwaysurfersnatural is real, though. [G laughs]

G: Anyway, and Gordon is like, attacked by the vampire. I don't know why the vampire- oh, okay, I get it like. I was wondering like, “Why is the vampire attacking Gordon? Didn't he technically help him?” But like, he knows Gordon.

C: Yeah, 'cause Gordon killed his sister.

G: [laughing] It's literally like "music killed my grandma," but like, “Gordon killed my daughter” or something.

C: Wait, who killed her? Who killed whose grandma?

G: In Trolls?

C: In Trolls?

G: Yeah.

C: [laughing] I haven't watched Trolls.

G: It's the funniest thing! Like, there's this one guy, and like, the trolls love to sing and scrapbook and stuff like that. And then this one guy is like, “I don't want to sing,” and then they give his backstory, and the backstory is like, he was singing, and then his grandma- [both laughing] died.

C: Oh, god, you you know how the Cruella live action movie, Dalmatians killed Cruella de Ville's mother? [laughing] Like, a bunch of Dalmations ran her mother off of a cliff and her mom died?

G: "Dalmations killed my grandma," “music killed my grandma,” “Gordon killed my daughter.”

C: Yeah. [laughs]

-

G: Anyway, back in the motel room, we just have Sam, because, like, Dean is still out and, you know, getting shot at. And when Dean enters, Sam’s like, “Oh, thank god! Where have you been? What took you so long?” And then Dean makes a joke that's like, “Oh, yeah, I got some pie” or something. Good for him! It's a joke, right? Like, he didn't actually like, go out for a slice, or-

C: I don't know. Maybe he did.

G: You never know with this guy. Yeah. [both laugh] And then Sam berates him for doing the whole "go in front of the weapons." And then they start talking about Gordon and the fact that he's out of jail, and Sam asks, “How did he find us?” And Dean stops in his tracks and goes. “Oh my god!” And then he calls Bela.

C: Yeah! Bela!

G: And basically, Bela is like, super laughy like, “Ahaha, yeah, I gave your location to Gordon Walker. It's fine. For money.” And he's like, “Oh, you terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad person.” [C laughs] And then Bela says, like, “Oh, I mean, I was gonna call. I just got sidetracked. And also like, he's just one guy.” And Dean goes, “There were two of them,” and you could see Bela's face fall, which I thought was surprising. Like, does she actually care about the Winchester brothers? Who would've thought? I mean, they did save her life.

C: Yeah, it’s quite cute. Especially because, like, when she says, “Oh, yeah, I sold your location for money,” like, Dean doesn't seem that mad. But what she's like, “What was I supposed to do?” like, he seems mad that, like, she didn't call to warn him. Oh, well, she says, "He had a gun on me,” and like, Dean’s like, “Okay, that's fair enough. You should have just given us a heads-up.”

G: Yeah, anyway, Dean says that like, “If we make it out of this alive, the first thing I'm gonna do is kill you." And Bela’s like, “You're not serious,” and Dean goes, “Listen to my voice and tell me if I'm serious.”

C: What a fucking loser.

G: Like, he's really bumping down on her. And you know what? Something I realized in this scene: maybe I am a Bela apologist. [laughs]

C: Yeah, who's not a Bela apologist?

G: I don't know. People of IMDb are not.

C: That's true.

G: But I am, and this is a girlboss moment for her. And she redeems herself! So like, it's fine. Who cares? I am willing to admit all the mistakes-

C: Were we supposed to be mad at her for selling that information? It was literally fine, and she should have done it more.

G: I know. I'm willing to forgive Bela for her mistakes, which are nothing. She has never done anything wrong.

C: Yeah, exactly. Also, she looks genuinely scared after, like, Dean threatens her life. Which like, I don't know, honestly seemed a little excessive to me. Like, is Bela really that scared of the Winchesters? Maybe a little, but I don't know.

G: Maybe a little, but also, she should have known that they're not going to kill a human being.

C: I mean, they've threatened to-

G: A white girl. A white woman. [laughs]

C: - kill her once every two minutes that they've been around her. But yeah.

G: No, but were they actually trying to kill her?

C: No, but I feel like they would not- I mean they were going to kill her by omission by like, refusing their help.

G: Yeah, refusing to help, yeah.

C: So yeah.

-

C: So we cut to a warehouse where the vampire we saw earlier, who I don't think gets a- oh, no, wait, he has a name. It's like, Dixon, or something, right? Whatever. Who cares? So he's in the warehouse. Gordon is there, he's tied up, and what he sees around him: There's like, two young, attractive, blonde women who are like, chained up by their wrists. And yeah, it's just  such a stereotypical like, horror serial killer den. And I'm very sorry to these blonde women.

G: Yeah.

C: So right, the vampire comes in, and he starts feeding them blood. And yeah, Gordon talks with the vampire a bit. The vampire says that he considers these women family, and “I do what I have to. We're a dying breed.” I wasn't sure throughout this episode if we were supposed to feel sympathy for this guy. Because he has a whole monologue later, too.

G: Yeah, I don't think- We're supposed to see in him, in his desperation, the desperation Dean had when he sold his soul for Sam. Like, stuff like that.

C: Oh, interesting. I did not catch that.

G: Like, later, later he's like-

C: That's true, no that's true, very- Yeah, he was like, “I was desperate. Have you ever felt desperate before, Dean Winchester, when you sold your soul to save Sam?" [laughs] God, it's so fucking funny.

G: Yeah, that's what I was referring to. Yeah, oh my god.

C: Yeah. I just feel like if they wanted him to be sympathetic, like, they didn't have to have him specifically go after hot blonde women he clearly wanted to fuck. [laughs]

G: Yeah. [laughs]

C: Yeah. So right, he says, like, “I know you, Gordon, because you're like, one of the most prolific vampire hunters out there. Like, we're going extinct because of you.” And the whole time, Gordon's like, insulting him and insulting vampires. Yeah, the vampire does the whole like. “Oh, right like, we're so much worse than you, I'm sure, even though you guys killed a bunch of people, too.” Honestly, I'm getting a little bit tired of every single antagonist in an episode, being like, “You think we're so bad. But you are also just as bad.” It's just silly at this point.

G: Yeah, it's repetitive. But also, what if- consider this. A villain who was just bad, just because. And it wasn't like. “Oh, I'm bad, because you're bad, too, and we're bad together." Like, why can't you just accept that maybe you're an evil person, and then stop at that?

C: Yeah. [laughs] Yeah, like, why can't you just be like, “Yeah, I am bloodthirsty. Isn't that fun?”

So he reveals that Gordon, I think, probably apparently killed his daughter. Or like, just hunters in general killed his daughter, and I don't even know if Gordon was one of them.

G: [laughs] Yeah.

C: Yeah. And this guy refers to the blonde women he has chained up as his "new daughters," which again, very weird, because they're clearly like, the sexiest blondes he can find at this club.

G: Also, it's like, the, you know, we we saw him with that one blonde woman earlier, and that was not a daughter. [laughs]

C: Yeah, no. They were about to start humping each other.

So yeah, Gordon is also reluctant to believe this, but he calls these women “fangwhores.” So that's great. [both laugh]

Gordon, yeah, there's just more Gordon insulting vampires. He says something about like, how they spread their filthy disease on pure base instinct, which I feel connects to the way I feel like a lot of vampire media connects to serophobia. But yeah, the vampire is like, “Huh. Well, I've decided, because you're being so vampirephobic, that I am not going to kill you. I am going to do something that you will find worse.” And he turns Gordon into a vampire by like, pressing cuts on their arms together. And yeah, Gordon struggles and yells. He's not having a good time. But, alas! It has happened.

G: Yeah, his scream- like, he's screaming, “Noo!” And then it cuts to like, a whirring sound, to Dean sharpening his machete.

C: Yeah. That was-

G: How do you pronounce muh-sheh-tay? Is it like that?

C: It's muh-sheh-dee, I think.

G: Machete? [gayer voice] Machete. That's such a gay way to pronounce it. [C laughs] I think in Filipino, it's muh-sheh-tay, so like, I'm confused. But he's sharpening that. And I thought that transition was super cool. Like, I liked it.

C: Oh, yeah, it was. Yeah.

G: And Sam and Dean are trying to figure out what to do. Because the vampire is out there, but, like, Gordon, is also out there, so they can't kill the vampire if someone's out to kill them.

So Dean starts saying, like, “Well, if we find Gordon, you do know he's not giving us much of a choice, isn't he?" And Dean is like, “Yeah, let's go kill him."

C: Sam. Sam was like, “Yeah, let's go kill him."

G: Oh, yeah, Sam goes "Yeah, let's go kill him." [C groans] And Dean goes, "Oh, really? I thought you were gonna be- you would have been like-" and then he puts on a voice! Very Greycore. Very Greycore. He puts on a voice, and he's like, “I thought you were gonna be like, [higher-pitched] ‘No, we can't. He's human, it's wrong!’” [laughs] I found this so amusing. Good for him.

C: Yeah. I do find it annoying that they show Gordon being turned into a vampire before this scene happens because-

G: So like, you as the audience, you're like, “It's okay if they kill him because he's a vampire now!” But like, they didn't know that.

C: Yeah, they didn't know that, that's true. So it is still a moral decision that they have made, which is a bad one.

G: Yeah.

C: But I feel like we forgive- they did this so that the audience would forgive them faster because we know that he's not human anymore.

G: Anyway, Dean’s phone rings. It's Bela, and Bela is saying that she doesn't like it when she is being threatened by people. So she found Gordon's location. And how she did this by like, channeling someone, I think, or like a ouija board situation, right?

C: Yeah, uh-huh.

G: Where she like, connected with someone from the dead, and the person from the dead found out where Gordon is, which I thought was super fun. And she gives a location, kind of. A vague location, and like, some street signs or something. And then she said that the spirit also said, “Don't come for Gordon, no matter what." I found this so weird. Like, why would the spirit say that? What's the point?

C: I don't know. Maybe the spirit was like, “He's a vampire now, and it'll be hard for you to fight him”?

G: Why would the spirit care at all?

C: Yeah, I don't know who this spirit is.

G: Yeah. Maybe it's John Winchester. [both laugh]

C: At this point, the blonde women who were turned into vampires recently are still alive, right? So it's not their spirit. I get if it was their spirit, they'd be like, “This guy literally just gnawed my head off. Like, you should run.” But yeah, I don't think that's the spirit she channels. So I don't know.

G: Yeah, 'cause they're still alive at this point. Yeah. "Don't come for Gordon Walker."

C: Yeah, it was just to build suspense in the episode.

G: Yeah. And like, here, like, Gordon- we're back to the warehouse, and Gordon wakes up, and he's changed- chained, just like the other girls. And-

C: He's not like other girls. But he is like other girls.

G: He is like other girls in this situation. He's tied up, and there is like, a beating heart, and like, rushing of blood sound effect that's playing over the scene. So like, you're supposed to be in his consciousness, right? And he's like, struggling through the chains, and then he finally rips it out, and he starts to walk away when one of the girl goes, “Help us, help us.” And he- well.

C: It cuts.

G: It's a suspense, what happens. It cuts right after that.

But he goes out, into the street, and, like, we see him look at some lights, like, a street light, a neon sign, and it's like, way too bright. Way too bright. And then a car passes by, which I thought was like, Sam and Dean, but it's not. It's just some random-ass person. And those lights are too bright, and then he like, looks over to one side of the street, and there's a guy like, fixing a tire. And he like, looks at him with bloodlust, and like, repressed hunger.

C: Also, his eyes are really bloodshot in this scene. He does not look like he's slept well. And I feel like we didn't really see that with the other vampires.

G: I don't know.

C: Yeah, but maybe it's just a side effect of the light? Sensory overload king.

G: Yeah. And what he does is, he hops into the car of that guy, and then, when the guy finishes with the tire and hops into the car, he bites him and kills him. My thought here was like, "Why make him finish the tire?" [both laugh] Like, spare him the misery of changing a tire by killing him instantly.

C: Maybe Gordon took the car to drive to the RV?

G: That's a wonderful idea. And probably true.

C: Mm. But yeah, okay, like, I guess I sort of- like, I know that when you’re first turned, your hunger is very severe, so I guess I can excuse this first killing. But I do feel like Gordon would try very hard to have more control than he is having right now.

G: Yeah.

C: Yeah. I don't know. It's odd.

-

C: So we cut to the warehouse. Sam and Dean go in, and we see what happened to those two new vampires, 'cause their heads are gone, and original vampire guy’s on the ground crying and shit, and he's like, “Go ahead, just kill me.”

G: Yeah. I like the reveal of the of the beheaded girls.

C: Yeah.

G: I thought the the special- is it special effects? What's it called? Practical effects? Were very good this episode.

C: Yeah.

G: So, and I mean, the practical effects of Supernatural, especially in these early ones, are like, mostly good most of the time. It's the visual special effects that are like, “Well, that sucks.” But like, these ones are pretty good. So hats off again to the selling- I don't know. What the department is this? I guess this is the practical effects department .The props department, yeah.

C: Yeah. Though yeah, I do think that one thing to mention is that Gordon's like, victims throughout his arcs have been-

G: Yeah. Are white women.

C: - like, young, attractive white women, and that's like, a very specific thing like, Black men menacing a white woman is like, an image, used a lot of white supremacist literature and such. So yeah, I feel like the reveal was like, very fun in a suspense way, but like, they also did it like that to up the horror of Gordon.

G: Yeah.

C: So yeah, the vampire’s like, “Oh my god! Gordon was here, and he killed my daughters. I should have never brought a hunter here. Like, he killed my family.” And then Dean's like, “Oh, yeah, you're such a family man.”

G: And then it's the beginning of the most contrived monologue to ever exist [C laughing]. Most in your face monologue to ever exist.

C: [laughing] Yeah. Oh my god. Yeah, he's like, “No, you don't understand. I was desperate. Have you ever felt desperate?” And it cuts to Dean's face. “I've lost everyone I ever loved! I'm gonna like, live my whole eternity alone!” Cuts to Dean's face. [both laugh] Like, Jesus Christ.

Maybe this guy was like, “I've watched Supernatural, and I know the only way to maybe make it through an episode is to be a Sam or Dean mirror. [G laughs] So I'm gonna act my vampussy off trying to do this.”

Yeah, the vampire's like, “Just kill me. I don't care anymore. Like, I'm in hell. I'm in the worst. hell." Dean's like, "Well, the worst hell is the actual Hell that I'm going to because I felt desperate, lost everyone I ever loved, and stared down eternity alone." But yeah. And then Sam notices that for the bodies in the warehouse, the heads were ripped off with bare hands and not cut off, which means that Gordon suddenly has a lot more strength than he did before. And he goes, like, “Dixon, what did you do to Gordon?” And it cuts, and we never find out if they actually did kill Dixon, but like, they probably did, it just wasn't important to Sam and Dean's journey.

G: They probably did, yeah.

-

G: The next scene is [laughs] the Hannibal scene.

C: Yeah.

G: It's so good! I was watching it, and I was like, "They really acted in this scene. They were Acting, capital A." But basically, Kubrick is in the RV, where we saw him also, I think, [laughs] flirt with another guy a couple of episodes back. So there is a pattern with this guy. Too bad he's dead.

C: He has a Jesus painting next to him, of course.

G: Yeah. And then what happened was, he hears a sound outside, so he peeks out the window, but then he turns around, and Gordon is there, and he's like, “What happened to you? I thought they killed you.” Gordon says, like, “They did something worse. They turned me.” And they're so near each other! [laughs]

C: They're so fucking close.

G: They're so near each other. And Kubrick goes like, “I'm sorry about that, and you know what that means, right?"

C: He puts his hand on Gordon’s shoulder when he says, “I'm sorry.”

G: Yeah. And Gordon is like, “Yeah, it means you have to kill me, but not yet, because I still need to kill Sam Winchester.” And Kubrick is like, “Gordon. Come on, man, like, we can't do that. I can't let you walk out of here.” And Gordon insists that like, “This is the one last thing that I can do good in the world.” Ah, that sentence is not correct. “This is the one last time I can do a good thing for the world.” There we go. And throughout this, Gordon is like, looking at the crucifix [laughs], which is so funny! But he's looking at the crucifix, and he's like, “Yeah, I'm trying to do a good thing.” And then Kubrick is like, walking in the back, and he grabs a muh-sheh-tay. [gayer voice] Muh-sheh-tay. Muh-sheh-tay? Muh-sheh-tee. Machete. And he like, slowly paces to Gordon, and he's like, “Yeah, you're right. Yeah, it's one last good thing. I agree with you.” And we go to Gordon's  perspective where he hears the heartbeat and all that stuff. And then right as he's about to slice Gordon’s head off, Gordon turns around and inserts his hand through his heart.

C: Yeah. So good.

G: Wild. It's so good, and it's like, the way Kubrick dies is like, [laughing] they stare at each other for a little while.

C: Yeah. And he falls onto Gordon's shoulder.

G: And he falls onto Gordon's shoulder. And Gordon like, kisses his forehead, right?

C: He does?

G: Or did he turns his head in a way that made me think, like, "He's kissing his forehead!" And I was like, “Wow! Wow! Good for them." One of them is dead, but good for them.

C: And he goes like, "Sorry."

G: Yeah, he says.

C: Yeah, no. This is truly romance. What- like, Hannibal ate like, part- what part of Will did Hannibal eat?

G: I have no idea. I don't think that's true. I don't think he ate any part of him.

C: I thought there was a time when he, like, dug one of Will's organs out and ate it.

G: No! [laughs] No.

C: Maybe that's not true. I think he just force-fed Will their daughter's ear. Never mind. That's different.

G: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

C: Okay, yeah, anyway, Romance.

G: But this was literally reminiscent of the gutting scene from "Mizumono," which is the last episode of season 2 in Hannibal. Have you seen that?

C: I have not seen Hannibal.

G: You never watched, right? Yeah. Because it's too brutal for you.

C: I just like- they just don't seem very nice, you know? They don't seem like nice people. [both laughing]

G: Maybe Hannibal the cannibal is not a nice person. Have we considered that? [C laughs]

C: I just don't like that he killed their daughter. I just think that if you have a found family, you should be nice to each other. You can kill other people, but you should be nice to each other.

-

C: So they're back in the motel room. Sam and Dean are around, and Dean hasn't been able to find Gordon yet, and Sam goes like, “Hey, give me your phone, because if Gordon knows our numbers, then he can track us down.” And then it it looks like he's just going to take the SIM cards out. But actually he's just stomping on the phones. [both laughing]

G: Stomping with his giant foot on the phone.

C: Yup. And Dean comes back with the Colt, and he's like, “Sam. You stay here, and I'm just gonna go out and get Gordon.” And Sam goes like, “Uh, no, you're not going to do that alone, because you are going to die.” And Sam starts going worked up. He's like, "Oh, you're just acting like you have nothing to lose because you think you're already dead. [G laughs] I'm sick and tired of your kamikaze trip.” Yeah, Dean says, “I'm more like a ninja.” And Sam says, "That's not funny," and he's right. It's not a good joke. So yeah, Dean's all like, “What do you want me to do? I'm just gonna sit around and write sad poems?” And Sam goes like, “Dean, like, stop joking about everything and stop trying to act like you're not afraid, because I can see right through you.”

G: [laughing] And then, the corniest music starts playing-

C: [overlapping] It's some fucking sad piano music. I feel like if there wasn't this music, I might actually be a little tiny bit touched by this scene. [G laughs] But as soon as the music came in, I was like, "This is the silliest thing I have ever seen on the screen with my own two eyes.”

G: It literally is. It literally is.

C: It's sad piano music.

G: So silly!

C: And Sam goes, [dramatically] “I've been following you my entire life! I've been looking up to you since I was four, studying you, trying to be just like my big brother.” Sam would not fucking say that. Yeah, so he says, “I know you better than anyone in the entire world. And this is exactly how you act when you're terrified.” And he goes like, “I wish you would drop the show and just be my brother again.” And he starts tearing up a bit, and he says, like, "'Cause... just 'cause." And the puppy eyes have worked.

G: Yeah. Like, when he was saying like, "Just 'cause," I was thinking like, he said, like, "Because," and then, like, in my mind, my mind filled up the rest of the sentence with like, "We just have like, less than a year together." And so like, when he continued, like, "Just 'cause," and I was like, "Oh, he stopped himself from saying that." [laughs] Good for him.

C: Yeah. So Dean's like, "Okay, fine. We'll stay here." I- has Sam been looking up to Dean since he was four, wanting to be just like his big brother?

G: I mean, maybe.

C: I- yeah, I mean, I guess I'm the oldest, the older sibling, so I guess I don't understand Sam's position in the family as well, but-

G: I've never looked up to a sibling ever. [laughs] I don't know.

C: Yeah, I think my sister has looked up to me before a bit, but I think that was more our parents doing the whole like, "Why can't you be like Crystal?" thing. So.

G: Yeah, I don't know.

C: Do you think John ever did a "Why can't you be like Dean?" thing to Sam?

G: Yeah, maybe like, "Why can't you just be like, obedient just like Dean, the most obedient child in the world?"

C: Yeah. But I don't really think that's what Sam's saying here. Yeah, I don't know. But yeah, I did like these lines. Just, the music was so bad. Like, I don't know. I feel like we often think that the brothers don't like each other very much, and they probably don't, but they do know each other.

G: Yeah, maybe.

C: Maybe.

G: Do you think they know each other? [laughs] Do you think that's true? I think like, knowing someone is-

C: Well, growing up with someone means you sort of have to.

G: Yeah, but like, you know, like, who you are in front of people you differs, so like, I think there's still room for surprises in the both of them.

C: Oh, yeah, I agree.

G: Because they've only been interacting with each other for so long for like, for long periods of time, I think they know each other around each other. But I doubt that they know each other in terms of, you know, like, "What are you like when you're with somebody else?"

C: Yeah.

G: Which I think is also an important part of your personhood.

C: Yeah. I agree. I think maybe I'm having this reaction because I'm annoyed by like, the Deanfan posts that are like, "Sam will never understand Dean because when Dean's around Sam, all he does is like, act to try to be the perfect parent figure to Sam," blah blah blah.

G: That's untrue. [laughs] "The perfect parent figure for Sam." Sure. Why not.

C: Blah blah blah. Yeah, like, I feel like- first, Dean does not do that. I don't think he does. Second like, you can't spend like, 18 years with someone, like, every single day-

G: Pretending, yeah.

C: - and not, yeah, not trip up, like, at least like, ten-ish times. So, you know.

G: And also like, every single time you are a person, you are a real person.

C: Mm.

G: So like, even if you're like, faking it, you're still real in the faking. You know what I mean? So like, I think it's unfair to be like, "He's always faking." 'Cause like, if you're always faking, then that's just who you are.

C: Yeah.

G: So like, the argument doesn't fly. I support my idea better, which is "We're different people in front of different people," so like, you know, like, they know each other around each other. Like, for example, like, with Charlie later on, Dean is like, you know, very sweet and loving with Charlie in a different way than he is with Sam. So it's like, maybe Sam is surprised by that. You know, stuff like that. Because- blahblahblahblah. I got tired of explaining myself halfway through.

C: Well, yeah, I got it. You're right. Yeah. Also, I feel like is this sort of is a tiny bit of a reveal on like, for Dean, because I feel like we've like, we've seen him talking to Casey, for example, and he said that, like, you know, he's not really that scared because he's just tired. And I feel like we were supposed to think during "Sin City" that like, since he's not talking to Sam, he is being honest with this demon that he's just met. But, like, Sam knows that Dean is terrified. And maybe Dean thought he was being truthful when he was talking to Casey. But like, this is like, confirmation that he is definitely scared, whether or not he knows it.

G: Mm-hm. Yeah.

C: Yeah.

So Dean gets a call, and it's Gordon. And apparently, Gordon tracked them down- or he got the number because he could smell Dean over at the cell phone store because Dean bought a new phone after Sam smashed theirs. And Gordon says like, "You have to come to me because I have a woman who I have held hostage. And you have to come here in twenty minutes, or the girl will die." And Dean goes like, “Gordon, don't do this. You don't kill innocent people. You're still a hunter.” And Gordon goes, “No, I'm a monster.” And- [laughs] okay. [G laughs] This was the thing that Sterling K. Brown did not like. And Sterling K. Brown was right.

-

G: We have Sam and Dean going to the place/warehouse/factory/whatever it is. And they untie the lady, and they carry her out, and Dean is like, “Sam, stay close to me." And then, while they're walking out, Sam’s like, lagging behind, like, maybe three steps, max. And the moment Dean steps out of this, like, one room, the door from, like, you know, like, the thing they used to close up stores, it falls down and locks Sam inside and Dean outside. And all I could think of was-

C: What was Gordon's plan if Sam wasn't walking behind?

G: The thing I thought of was like, "How are they able to lock this?" Like, is it like, an automatic mechanism? Because it's so funny to me that they were like, "Oh my god, it fell! Let's try to kick it down." Like, why don't you try lifting it up? [laughs]

C: Yeah. [laughs] I don't know.

G: But they were having this time of their lives trying to kick down this metal door. Obviously, it's not working. So Dean is like, freaking out like, "Be careful, Sam! Be careful, Sam!" And then on Sam's side, the lights turn out. And Gordon starts speaking in like, the middle of the dark.

C: Yeah, he's so real for this. He's like, watched so many horror movies in preparation to make this as dramatic and cool as possible.

G: Yeah, it's like, Sam is like, "Get out of here, Gordon. I know you're here!" And Gordon's like, "I'm here," and then, like, Sam tries to swing the knife at him, and he's like, "Hahahaha!" Like, Gordon literally went, "Hahahaha." [both laugh] And yeah. So this is just what's happening. And basically, Gordon is saying, like, "I sacrificed everything to be here in front of you right now and like, get the chance to kill you." Gordon calls Sam like, "not human." And then Sam goes like, "Look who's talking." And then Gordon is like, "Well, I'm a bloodthirsty killer. But I guess that's one thing in common for the both of us." And he- and Sam says like, "You're not a bloodthirsty killer by instinct. You are by choice because you didn't attack that poor woman." And Gordon, says, "I didn't. I did something much worse." And then we cut back to Dean, who is fighting for his life, trying to open the door, and the girl has turned into a vampire and is trying to attack him. And he shoots her with the Colt?

C: Yeah.

G: Which feels very like, "I don't want to deal with this. I don't want the extra gore. Let's just use the Colt." That's something Sera Gamble said. She literally said it. She put it in the script. "I don't want the extra gore. Let's just use the Colt."

C: Yeah, or maybe the props team was like, "We've made too many corpses for this episode. I don't like, want to do another headless body. Can we just shoot her?"

G: Exactly. And Gordon says like, "I know you, Sam. I can see right through you. We're the same. And it's too bad, because you won't do the right thing, which is kill yourself." [both laugh]

C: Gordon's on a Reddit forum replying, "Kill yourself" to Sam Winchester.

G: He's flooding Sam Winchester's messages so much right now. "Kys kys kys." [C laughs] Yeah. And he says like, basically, "It's what I'm gonna do after I'm done with you. It's a shame that you wouldn't do it for yourself, so now I have to be the one to do it."

And then, we start seeing, like, the place from Gordon's perspective. So it's like, red tint, 'cause it's like, dark, right? So like, for Sam, it's just dark, and for Gordon it's like, red, and like, he sees Sam clearly, and then he attacks. And they fall out of the wall? Like, the wall collapses?

C: Yeah. Something.

G: The wall collapses, and they're fighting for their lives. And Dean comes in and starts attacking Gordon, and Gordon like, actually bites Dean, so Dean is all bloody. And then I don't know what happens next. But what eventually happens is Sam- ties a cord around Gordon's neck, and it's such a long scene.

C: Yeah.

G: This is such a long scene. He like, pulls the cord to opposite directions and like, strangles Gordon, until the head gets cut off.

C: Yeah, it's pretty excruciating.

G: Yeah, and like, I'll finish this scene first and then we'll talk about it. And then Dean like, recovers from his neck biting situation, and he's like, "Wow! You just killed a super vamped-up Gordon with no weapons." And then he like, cracks a little bit of a, "That's a bit reckless, huh?"

C: It's such a stupid joke.

G: So stupid.

C: Sam did not choose to be in that situation. Right, also, I feel- after Sam kills Gordon, like, they put in like, extra shots of like, Gordon's headless body; Gordon, like, Gordon's head on the ground, letting out a last breath. And it's like, it's not good to look at.

G: Yeah, here's the thing. I- actuall,y me and Crystal. We're talking about this earlier. [laughs] Why am I suddenly talking about you like you're not here? But we were talking about this earlier, and I said like, "Something I find-" 'cause a part of this scene that you're supposed to feel is, "Oh, Sam is vicious. Sam, like, maybe he is different." Like, that's something that I think you're- not, even though it's not explicitly said, it's something you're supposed to think. I just find it fascinating- and by fascinating, I mean, "Oh my god, Supernatural," that like, they keep on doing this specifically to Black men. Like, it's always like, "Sam is vicious. Sam is like, a different person." But every single time, like, the victim is Black men. Like, they do it with- what's his name?

C: Jake.

G: They do it with Jake, and now they're doing it with Gordon, and it's like, both of these deaths are so visceral and so violent in comparison to a lot of other deaths in the show. And it's just like- Crystal, say the thing that you said to me after I said this earlier.

C: Oh, it was- yeah. They were like, "Well, we have to show that Sam's going off the deep end, but we can't make him irredeemable. So let's just have him kill a Black man!" Ugh.

G: Yeah, it very much has that vibe? And it's quite frustrating.

And also, let's talk about- because this is the last we see of Gordon. Obviously, he's dead. But I think we've already said before that like, his characterization, you know, a lot of people have said it probably better than we will, but, like, his characterization, is like, racist.

C: Yeah. [laughs]

G: But, like, specifically, the way the arc ended. What are your thoughts on it?

C: I feel like- I do feel like a lot of the stuff that I'm bothered with with Gordon come from earlier. The way that they set him up to be like- "he's fantasy racist in this world without real racism, or this world where we've refused to acknowledge actual racism." And the way that like, they set him up to be like, this evil, vicious hunter in order to make Sam and Dean look better, which is fucking annoying. And yeah, I guess I was thinking in the shower earlier today, like, in the world where, like, Gordon is the main character of Supernatural like, he like, would get a season where you know he's shown as this badass hunter, but he's like, not very- he doesn't really distinguish between like, creatures that can or can't control themselves, and like, stop hurting people. And then, like, him being turned into a vampire would be an opportunity for him to go through character growth by like, understanding how hard it is to resist the bloodlust, but also understanding the amount of like, reason and sentience he still has, and like, I don't know. I feel like if they wanted to turn Gordon into a vampire, they didn't- but they did it here, just so that they could kill him without feeling bad about it.

G: Exactly.

C: Even when there were like, a lot of narrative opportunities to develop him as a character, they just did it so they could get rid of him

G: Exactly. Like, that's the crux of it. They turned him into a vampire so that they can excuse murdering him. That's literally it. And the thing is, again, like, you said, like, a lot of the things that I don't like about Gordon, what happens to Gordon in this episode are actually like, considerably very little things. Like, for example, like, if you are going to turn him into a vampire, why not acknowledge his backstory? Like, we've said this before, like, it's such an integral part of his character, and it's one of the very first things we learn about him. So why not bring it up now? And it's like, it's frustrating in that way. Because if they really wanted it to end this way, then, fine, you know? It started on a bad note. If they want to like, cut it off- I mean like, the story and the character, then, like, okay, fine. But you could have done it better, and you could have like, acknowledged that he is so person with like, a backstory that you already gave him. Like, you're not even inventing a new one. You've already given it to him. And you can have him- just have, like, very little character growth, you know?

C: Yeah.

G: And it's frustrating that they were like, "No, we just want to get rid of him, and we don't want the audience to think much about it that like, maybe that's wrong of us."

C: All his dialogue is like, "I'm incapable of change, and I'm a monster, and you should definitely come kill me." Like, okay. Cool.

-

C: So we're at the epilogue, which is a pretty good scene, but unfortunately happens in this episode.

G: Completely disconnected.

C: Yeah, no total tone shift. Like, it starts with them just like, chilling out, and Sam just like, getting a beer out of a cooler. Like, neither of them seem to feel that they have committed a brutal act of murder like, five minutes ago.

Yeah, so Dean has the Impala's hood open, and he's poking around in there, and he asks Sam to pass him a wrench, and then he thinks for a second, and he goes like, "Sam. Like, come over here for a second." And he starts sort of like, teaching Sam on how to fix the Impala. Like, he's saying, "These are the things that could be causing the rattle. Here are like, the parts. Look, that's a valve cover."

G: Wow.

C: Yeah, he quizzes Sam a little bit about what the parts' names are. It's quite sweet. And then Sam goes like, "Hey, like, why are you like, teaching me auto shop?" And Dean like, hands the wrench over and tells Sam that, "Hey, like, you should be the one to fix it." And Sam is surprised at this because he says, "Dean, you barely let me drive this thing," which is a new development! [G laughs] In season 1, Sam was allowed to drive the fucking Impala, but whatever.

G: Yeah. But only in relevant moments where he gets to stop the car in the middle of the road and storm out.

C: Yeah, he's so real for that. Next time, he should take the keys as he does it. [G laughs]

G: To leave Dean stranded? So real.

C: Yeah. And Dean goes, "Well, like, it's time. You should know how to fix it, because you should know these things for the future." So they both sort of pause and feel emotions, and then he goes, "And besides, it's my job to show my little brother the ropes." And I feel like you sort of expect Sam to argue or like, say something else about the deal.

G: But he doesn't!

C: Yeah, he doesn't. He just nods, and he starts fixing up the car. And yeah. There they are. End ep.

G: Okay. Ep ends in that note.

-

G: Okay, I have a question for you. Do you think all this like, fanfare about "Dean is going to Hell," and the fact that we have it for one whole fucking season... Maybe- I'm trying to think positive. Maybe this is like, a good thing, because, like, when Dean gets resurrected from Hell, it feels like an even bigger deal.

C: Right.

G: Have we considered that? [laughs]

C: That's true. It does make Cas cooler.

G: Yeah, it makes Cas cooler. Because, yeah. That's- yeah.

C: I do think that it's helpful in the lead-up to season 4 as well because you sort of understand how much grief Sam is going through right now, and how much he would have gone through during the summer when Ruby came over-

G: Yeah, okay.

C: - and just led him into hot demon blood land. [G laughs] Yeah. But also, you know, it'd be nice to have a different B-plot conversation sometimes. [G laughs]

G: Yeah. It's fascinating, because, like, literally in season 2, they just dip regarding plot, and then they resurface the plot. And now it's like, "Here's the plot of the episode. And now, here's the plot of the show." And it's just, "Okay, cool." Sometimes, though, I miss the monster of the week that's just- that's good, you know? I feel like there's no good monsters of the week this season 3 so far.

C: Well, I liked the changelings.

G: Oh, that's right! That is a monster of the week. Yeah. I think you're right, that one is good. But it feels so far away now. It feels so long gone.

C: Yeah.

G: Yeah. So, Best Line/Worst Line.

C: Oh, geez.

G: I think my worst line is like, the daughter line. [C laughs] Like, "They're my daughters." I was like, "Okay, bro."

C: Yeah. [laughs] Yeah. Alright, buddy.

Right, I guess maybe my worst line is like, "I was desperate. Have you ever been desperate?" [both laughing]

G: "Have you ever been desperate?" Yeah.

C: Yeah. But also didn't like Gordon's like, "No, I'm not a hunter anymore. I'm a monster!" Like, okay, bro. Okay. And by "bro," I mean Sera Gamble.

G: I think my best line is probably- should I go the gay route and say that it was the "sorry" when Gordon killed-

C: That was pretty gay. That was pretty good.

G: Yeah. What's his name, even? [laughs] I've forgotten Kubrick's name. Kubrick. So yeah. I like, that line because it like, you know, it's nice. Good for them. Somebody just died.

Also, I want to point out, I forgot to say it earlier, but like, in the scene where Gordon is calling Dean, he lifts his fingers- his hands is lifted up, right? And you can see that his fingers are like- you know how like, when you get manicured and they're pink? It looks like, that because of the blood from like, gripping Kubrick's heart.

C: Ooh.

G: Which is like, super fun.

C: He didn't wash it off entirely-

G: Well enough, yeah.

C: Yeah. So real. God. Do I have a best line? Maybe I should just go with yours. [G laughs] I'll go with yours.

G: Okay. So yeah, that's- That's not it. We still have to do our worksheet. No, not worksheet. Spreadsheet.

C: Spreadsheet, yeah. Right. Okay, so we have misogyny and racism. I think that both of these things are relevant this episode. I think misogyny not too high.

G: Yeah. Because the women don't have speaking roles? [laughs]

C: I'd say a 1. [laughs] Yeah. Yeah.

G: One woman speaks in this- two women speak in this episode, and one of them literally just says, "Help me!"

C: Yeah. So is that a one or two?

G: I think maybe it's a one.

C: Alright. Racism, it's- Okay, yeah, so we go from 1 to 5. It's- should we sort of consider the entire Gordon arc altogether in this rating, or-

G: You know what? I don't know. Because- I feel like we we shouldn't. Let's just consider this episode.

C: Okay. Right. I feel like the whole Gordon is probably a five. I feel like this episode alone, a bit lower. Four-ish?

G: Maybe 2, 3?

C: Oh, three. Okay.

G: Add three, yeah.

C: Okay, we can go with 3.

G: 'Cause like, we're also consider- like, even though we're not considering the whole arc, it's still influenced by the whole arc. So like, you know, like, a 3, I think, is reasonable.

C: Okay. And I don't think we have any homophobia- [G laughs]

G: Do we really put the homophobia in? Is that for real?

C: [laughing] Because of "Bedtime Stories," we added a homophobia column.

G: What even happens in the episode?

C: "Dude. Could you be any more gay?"

G: Oh my god, yeah! It was that episode. Goddamn.

Okay, so, IMDb rating. I would say, this is probably rated- I have no idea how this is rated.

C: Yeah. I feel like this is probably middling.

G: Maybe an 8.3?

C: Yeah, yeah, that seems about right. I'm gonna guess maybe an 8.4 from the IMDbers?

G: Okay. I'm clicking! I can't see it. Hold on! I have to rotate my iPad.

C: Your iPaddy [EYE-pa-dee]?

G: It's an 8.4, you're right! My iPady. You're mispronouncing it. It's eye-puh-DEE.

C: Your eye-puh-DEE. I'm sorry! Your iPady.

G: [laughing] For context, I call my iPad "iPady" in front of only myself and Crystal because I'm too embarrassed to call it iPady in front of literally anyone else.

C: It's your friend!

G: [laughing] I call my laptop "lappytoppy." [both laugh]

C: I say lappytoppy sometimes.

G: It literally sounds like sloppy toppy, which is so funny. [C laughs]

C: Uh, okay, yeah, 8.4 definitely too high for this one. Let's see what takes people have.

Sorry. [laughing] Someone called this "the fluffiest episode so far"? [both laughing]

G: You ever decide that you want some fluffiness in your life, and then you watch this episode, and you go, "That's sufficient!"

C: Okay, someone said that "I don't know what is the writers' problem with female characters on the show. They start them out as interesting, and then go mess the characters up over the course of the events." And then they said, "The Bela story is getting ridiculous, with her using the boys in a way that makes them looking like morons."

G: Well, they are.

C: "But I'm willing to get over this." Yeah, they are. Yeah, I mean, I agree with the first part, but I don't see how that connects. I don't know what they dislike about the Bela story.

G: Yeah, I also have no idea.

C: It ends with, “Oh, Dean, how can you just be so great? Okay, I know it's the crazy fangirl in me talking right now.”

G: It literally is. [both laughing]

So yeah, I think that's it for this episode of Busty Asian Beauties. Next week, we will be discussing Season 3, Episode 8: “A Very Supernatural Christmas.” Bit early, but we're doing it. Leave us a rating or a view wherever you get your podcasts.

C: [muddled] Follow us on- [spits] blargh! [G laughs] Follow us on social media! We are on Twitter at twitter.com/BeautiesPodcast and on Tumblr at bustyasianbeautiespod.tumblr.com. Our official tag is #BABPod, B-A-B-POD, and thank you to everyone who has donated to our Ko-Fi at ko-fi.com/bustyasianbeautiespod.

G: You can email us any feedback, comments, or feedback at [email protected]. See you guys next time, buh-bye!

C: Bye!

[guitar music]

#transcript

[nancywheeeler]

oooh director’s commentary! yes please! really i should just send you a ⭐️ because i’d love to hear about any details you’re proud of, but if you're so inclined i’ll admit to being especially curious about all the thoughts behind nightswimming, as it’s one of the fics that made my opinions on the steve/eddie ship do at least a 90 degree pivot if not a full 180

oooh nightswimming, my darling nightswimming!

okay so i mentioned this in my author's note, but nightswimming would not existed without there's a clock in my head (is it wrong? is it right?) by cloverspies 10/10 work of art highly recommend. before i read it, i had been poking around the steve/eddie ao3 tag trying to see what all of the fuss was about other than a new hot white boy just dropped and he could be paired with steve without the baggage of him being 1) his ex-girlfriend's boyfriend + someone who has kicked his ass or 2) a raging racist and abuser who has also kicked his ass.

but then i read cloverspies's fic and had my glass shattering moment. eddie and steve have so much potential for a very fun, banter-filled dynamic (i think certain things that drew steve to robin initially are very much there with eddie; unpopular in hs, not gonna worship at king steve's throne, throws him off his game, etc. and in a lot of ways someone like eddie is the natural progression from his misguided crush on robin. i'm not gonna if eddie was girl in canon but....but...) but then ALSO canon set up so many parallels between the two of them (and we'll just ignore that it's because they lowkey wanted the effect of steve's death without killing steve) that they would probably end up finding much more common ground than they initially thought they would, at least in terms of their experience with guilt re. barb and chrissy and their relationship with dustin / the kids. even totally divorced from a shipping lens, they would've made for a great friendship in S5

but anyway! nightswimming!

i’m racking my brain trying to remember how i came up with the (vague) plot. it might be as dumb as i was looking at this note i have in my notes app full of fic titles i want to use one day, saw nightswimming, and went “huh...eddie and steve talking by some pools.......this could be nothing”

i keep answering these with which part i wrote first, but it usually encapsulates the fic as a whole and what i was shooting for, so:

Eddie raised his eyebrows. “Dude? You’re gonna call me dude while some of your spit is still in my mouth?”

Steve ran his tongue along the inside of his teeth, trying to think of a comeback to that and coming up empty. “You’re unbelievable, you know that?”

“Huh, unbelievable, can I get a definition please?” After a brutal clearing of his throat, Eddie adopted the tone of a stuffy spelling bee moderator. “Something unlikely to be real.”

“Again, you failed English.”

Eddie held up his middle, ring, and pinkie fingers and mouthed, three times.

the last line i’m 99.9% sure was the very first thing in the google doc. before even the title. i could imagine joe quinn acting out that exact mannerism and how annoyed but endeared steve would be by it. eddie is very over the top in a way a guy like steve wouldn’t necessarily let himself be but i think that’s where the attraction starts coming in on steve’s side. when you’re with someone who is so open and doesn’t seem to care about looking stupid, it’s easier to let yourself relax and be more open too, you know?

meanwhile on eddie’s side, steve is really hot! lol but also he cares about everyone so damn much, and he’s equal parts surprising and predictable (a common steve harrington theme in my works apparently), and again, he is really hot on a surface level and a much deeper one. still water, baby.

i think ultimately i just love them both as characters and i love what they could bring out in each other and i just vomited all that in a word document (...and then continued doing so...and cannot stop...)

director’s commentary asks!

#someone tell me to write some ted lasso again or something anything else #my writing #ask

[silenthillmutual]

Hi! For the director's commentary thing, ⭐ for either vita in motu or life in motion? Your work is amazing and I'd love to hear more of your thoughts

thank you so much!!!

i’ll go with vita in motu! i actually started writing this on my phone in a notes app i think? just to get some ideas down about how i thought daniil might feel about his body. i was tired of reading the narrative of trans people who hate their bodies and wanted to do something different, where a character had at least body neutrality. so the daniil in this fic would be okay with surgeries, sure, but he doesn’t actively want them. he binds, but the binding is in part a pressure stim (an ongoing theme i have for most characters i write as trans; pressure stim is nice!!) and in part a safety measure. he’s scared of what will happen to him if he gets clocked. the pest was a really stressful time for him because he had that fear of someone recognizing his agab and had to deal with a lot of anxiety because of it. but overall, he’s fine with how he presents. he’s maybe had issues in the past with his height or weight, but he doesn’t so much have physical dysphoria. i’d honestly like to work towards writing trans characters who don’t bind / pack / tuck / etc at all, because there really isn’t much diversity in how we portray trans characters.

(ig the fic also mirrors the steps i’ve personally taken towards body neutrality, especially as a fat trans person)

i actually hadn’t read anything in the way of pregnancy fic before i wrote this so i’m not really sure how it compares to pregnancy fics in other fandoms (from what i can tell this was the first for patho on ao3), but i have heard the way people talk about them before as being fetishy and creepy and i was nervous to post this fic at first. i considered publishing it anonymously, but that’s...not really my thing. i only have one fic up that’s published anonymously on ao3 and i cannot remember which one it is i’d like to keep it that way. i did get one rude comment about it, but the rest of the people who have read it have been supportive. and since then i’ve seen more trans pregnancy fics in the fandom, which is really cool! i was worried i’d be the only one who saw that as a potentiality for the character.

i think it’s kind of funny how daniil is different with the little kids in classic than he is with the adults and that’s a part of where this came from. his characterization is a mashup of p2 and classic, and that is usually how i write characters - though i do have some differentiation between them in terms of whether i’m writing a character by their route or another’s route or from marble nest. and i kind of thought that having kids might be life-affirming for daniil after losing so much. sort of like a cycle of rebirth kind of thing. i do think eventually he’ll do other things and i even think he’ll get back to a lab and studying thanatology.

oh, and initially the fic started out with artemy being a cis gay guy. i originally wanted to have him be like, “i just assumed i’d never be able to have kids of my own, and i wasn’t going to ask you to do this”, but it’s since morphed into artemy being nonbinary. artemy started out cis because of a little wish fulfillment and because honestly there’s honestly a lot of transphobia directed at gay trans people that i wanted to be sort of like no, fuck you, cis gays can date trans gays. but there’s already honestly so much cis artemy in the tag and my headcanon for him is that he’s nonbinary anyway, so life in motion will have a little bit of artemy discovering they are nonbinary.

#harker.txt #thank u again for the ask anon :] #ominous fic talk

[randombubblegum]

what if you joined my band (and we were both girls) 😳

— a girlparx awtto playlist.

❝ i wanna ruin our friendship! we should be lovers instead❞

here it is!!! the girlparx awtto playlist :) for when you have a girlcrush on your hot drummer with sexy abs and you’re desperately trying to make her understand you’re not just trying to be gal pals.

i’m really proud of the lineup!! mostly gay artists and also artists i wish were gay (hayley williams...pls) and 0% girl in red, clairo, or king princess and also frankly i think it just slaps. go forth and go fucking nuts over girl awsten and otto kissing with me

(track-by-track breakdown here)

#i was planning on waiting to post this until i posted the main girlparx fic but im slow so here u go #OKAY DIRECTORS COMMENTARY IN THE TAGS TIME: #thanks iz for the image manip i made the cover out of #thanks to all my sapphic friends who recced tunes (anne angela shay bailey) because god knows every 'wlw playlist!' is TERRIBLE #seriously if i get suggested one more king princess song i will destroy the algorithm with my bare hands. anyway #i aimed to strike a balance between 'irreverent obnoxious gay crush' and 'horny but in a gay way' and also 'noo im gay sad' #ALSO i think u should listen in order! for the narrative! u dont have to but i really really think u should!!!!!! #also theres like 5 or 6 references to e****g p**** on here see if u can find them all :) #IM JUST RLY EXCITED ABOUT THIS PLAYLIST!!!!! I THINK IT FUCKS #hopefully u will agree... and it is worth the wait :-) hehe #girlparx #awtto #playlist

[matildashoney]

surprise!

MASTERLIST // TAGS // PLAYLIST // ASKS // LYTA // AIEK like and reblog and leave commentary and send messages! do all the things! it makes writing so much more fun! author’s note: this wasn't requested, i just had the idea and wanted to write. okay, send your thoughts to my inbox and i’ll respond later! logging off for now. love you!

Amélie and Harry haven’t seen each other in weeks. Scratch that. Months.

Not because they haven’t tried. No, but because of their schedules between Harry making his very first record in Jamaica and Amélie making her very first movie in Northern Italy, the couple has been separated for two, almost three, months, with only video and phone calls, text messages, and photographs to support their ache for each other.

Distance isn’t for the faint of heart, that’s for certain.

Amélie has been in Italy for nearly three weeks when Harry calls her at their usual time – time difference noted for the two – telling her that he’s got a surprise for her in her apartment. Amélie is suspicious of him, wondering how he’s managed to send her a gift from thousands of miles away, but it’s Harry, and he can seemingly do whatever he so pleases with the help of the right people, so she doesn’t question him, simply accepting that when she gets home after her twelve-hour day, she will have a sweet surprise from her boyfriend waiting on her doorstep.

And what a sweet surprise it is.

On her doorstep, with a little drawn-on bow on top, is a care package in a brown box, her name scribbled in the handwriting she knows so well. Immediately, she grabs the box, her key, and twists open the front door, hurrying into the foyer and rushing to open what’s inside. Amélie calls Harry almost instantly, failing to realize the darkened night sky around him and the way he’s walking seemingly towards a destination amidst the quiet noise.

“Harry, you didn’t have to do this,” she says, shaking her head and lifting the phone to see his face, her eyes welling with tears as she ruffles through the box and sees all the photographs and mementos and favorite items she’s been missing from home. “This was so sweet of you to think of all this stuff while you’re gone. Thank you.”

“I wanted to surprise my angel,” Harry smiles, taking a turn and walking towards the one spot, the one place he’s waited to get to for so many hours. “How was work today?”

“Good, as usual. I think I’m getting the hang of this whole art director thing, H, and I really like it,” she hums, rifling through the box and letting out a giggle when she pulls out the condoms tucked away in the bottom of the container. “Care to tell me why am I going to need these when I don’t see you for another month?”

“Just in case,” he shrugs, taking another turn and beginning to walk where there’s light at the end of the street. “I miss you.”

“I miss you more. Believe me. I’m so tired of seeing all these couples when I can’t be an annoying couple with the person I love,” Amélie says solemnly, stuffing everything she’s taken out back into the box and returning her attention to the man on the screen. Once she does so, her eyebrows furrow together in confusion, the darkness surrounding him not matching the usual scenery that she sees when they call every other day. Considering the scenery that she’s used to seeing every night, it’s as if he’s not in Jamaica anymore. “Harry, why is it dark? It’s only 5 o’clock by you.”

“I finally finished the album, baby. It’s all done. Ten tracks, all complete,” Harry says with a grin, a smile that’s spread across his whole face, ear to ear, cheek to cheek. Amélie notices that he ignored her question, but ignores it, excitedly transforming into a smile that matches his own, the thrill and adrenaline of knowing that the album is finished, which means they’ll be together sooner rather than later. “I’m coming home to you, angel.”

“Oh my god,” is all she can muster, tears welling in her eyes at the thought of getting to see him and hold him and kiss him. Merely the thought alone could make her burst into tears. Distance, although manageable, is not ideal for anyone, especially not so soon in a relationship. God, it’s lonely and hard and some days it makes you feel like your heart will collapse in your chest. “Are you coming here? When’s your flight? I want to see you, Harry.”

Quick knocks at her front door and a quiet beep signaling the end of the call make everything come together oh so perfectly. Amélie rushes the front door, swinging it open with hope bubbling in her chest and so much love filling her heart, that when she sees Harry’s smile and his bright eyes smiling back at her, she nearly collapses into his arms. Amélie wraps her arms around Harry’s shoulders squeezing him as tightly as she can, his face tucked into her neck as she whimpers and cries into his embrace. Harry smiles, kissing her neck softly, happy that he was able to pull off such an elaborate scheme in the midst of such chaos.

“I can’t believe you’re here,” Amélie whispers, shaking her head and pulling away from him, trying to get a good look at his appearance. Harry is tanner than usual, his skin a perfect olive color in the light of her apartment, his eyes shining brightly against his complexion. His hair is still short – from filming and likely keeping it managed while he was away – and it barely slips through her fingers when she runs her hands through it. Her thumb runs over his cheek where his dimple is, and it immediately indents in his skin with a smile as she does so, his mouth puckering to kiss the pad of her thumb. Amélie is in awe of him, in awe that he’s there, that they’re in the same room. “I can’t believe you’re really here. I’ve missed you so much.”

“Better believe it, my golden girl. I’m here for a week. All yours. No interruptions.”

“Golden girl?”

“That’s what you are. My sunshine on a cloudy day.” Amélie smiles and leans on her toes to kiss him for the first time. Her lips are soft and fragile against his, as though he’ll disappear if she hurries too much or tries too hard. Harry can’t take the stillness, though, and grabs her cheeks and kisses her deeply, their mouths breaking for air and a coy smile every so often. “I’ll take a week of that, any day of the month.”

Amélie frowns and she believes that it goes unnoticed, “Only a week?” It feels selfish to want him for longer, considering how much they have going in their lives, but after going without his presence for so long, a week feels like nothing, and she’s sure it’ll go by much faster than she wants it to.

Harry notices. “Have to fly to New York to play the album for the label, but I wanted to show it to you first. Correction, I needed to show you first.” Circling her arms around his waist, Amélie hugs him tighter this time, soaking in the way his arms feel around her body and his lips feel in her hair. “I’ve missed you so much, Ames.”

“I’ve missed you more,” she says into his chest, leaning her chin on his collarbone and looking into his eyes. “I’m happy you’re here, even if I selfishly wish it was for longer.”

“Doll, you didn’t let me finish.” Amélie looks at him inquisitively. “I have to fly to New York to show the label, yes, but as soon as I’m done, I’m coming back here. I don’t need to be in New York without my girl. Not when I could be in Italy with her.”

Amélie grins and grabs his cheeks, kissing him once more and grappling at the back of his shirt, pulling it over his head and tossing it to the side, hurriedly dragging him into the bedroom tucked away in the corner of the apartment and nudging him to sit on the edge. Amélie straddles his waist, smirking to herself when his eyes widen and his head quirks to the side. “I love you. I’m so happy you’re here.”

“I love you more, Amélie Fay. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.” Harry leans up and captures her lips in a kiss, “I say this respectfully and with love, my love, but I’m going to need you to quit talking and take your clothes off.”

#take me back to the light series #harry #harry styles #harry x reader #harry styles fanfiction #all i've ever known series #loving you's the antidote series #1d harry #1d harry styles #harry 1d #harry styles 1d #harry x #harry x you #harry x y/n #harry fic #harry fanfic #1d fan fic #1d fanfiction #1d fan fiction #1d fic

[wizkiddx]

Congratulations on 500 followers!! Could you do nr 2 with Tom please <3

thankyou <33 im very in my feels abt friends to lover atm, so ik this is a completely unoriginal concept but here we are

warning: nothing much- maybe homesickness? (+ the fact tom has poor choice in popcorn )

^^^ sorry I couldn't not put this on here and I will reuse it lots n lots

/////////////////////////

“Right I got two options annnnddddd there is only one correct answer.” Tom hummed up at you, pulling his tired gaze away from the phone screen and up towards the kitchen where you were standing triumphantly - having just raided his cupboards. From behind your back you whipped out a bag of popcorn in each hand.

“Sweet…. or salty?” Sighing with a small chuckle Tom shook his head at your playfulness. He didn’t know how you did it but you always always made his smile.

“I’m not a psychopath…” You huffed in relief, already turning around to throw the salty back in the cupboard where it belonged. “So salty of course.”

You were trapped in a house with an absolute psychopath.

You scowled at him, for having such poor taste, expecting some sort of argument to start. That wasn’t the case though, instead he just stared at you expectantly.

He must really really be unhappy.

You’d sensed it on set that morning - it wasn’t hard to miss. Not when it was your best friend, who for the past two months you’d been spending at least 6 hours a day with whilst shooting. Even when you were supposed to have a day off, when Tom had some solo shots or vice versa, you’d still come to keep the other company. It didn’t make sense but you both just sort of liked it that way.

This wasn’t your first rodeo working together either. Your first joint project had been almost four years ago, when both of you were barely adults, still figuring everything out. Ever since it had been bumping into each other every so often, always with an easy and effortless relationship.

Your current director had noted your chemistry at an awards show (the man never switched off) and decided in that moment he HAD to cast you together for a project. And a year later, here you both were, shooting in Australia for what was set to be a record breaking new release.

And it had been going great - better than great even. But as soon as Tom had shown up to makeup this morning, you’d known something was up. It was fair to assume it was something from home, maybe even just a bit of homesickness, or perhaps something more severe. Either way, the situation was probably exacerbated by the fact he didn’t have his brother or bestfriend or manager or normal syltist with him right now. Tom was pretty renowned within the industry for always having a massive entourage - which was normally made up with his family and friends. This time though he was going it solo.

Today had been long and you’d had to do press at stupid oclock in the morning last night for your current release - which meant your plan had always been to leave promptly and collapse into bed as soon as physically possible.

But Tom needed your company. So you hadn’t. Instead, you���d somewhat subtly invited yourself to his rented house for a movie night - blaming it on your director wanting you both to study the relationship dynamics in ‘out of sight’ (a J Lo and Clooney romance movie).

“You think you know a person and then they loose all your respect… just like that.” You sigh jokingly, gesturing to the bag of ‘foul’ popcorn your costar seemed to like.

“Well we’ve come to a crossroads.”

“It’s been nice knowing you but this…” you scoffed and dramatically rolled your eyes “… I see no way out.”

“Isn’t it better if we have a bag each? Then I might manage to actually get some before you scoff them all.”

You yelped in protest, though really you were just grateful he was still up for a bit of a laugh. He had been much less jokey the whole day, though was seeming to warm up a bit.

Once you had poured the two bags of popcorn into two separate bowels and prepared the film on TV; you plopped yourself onto Tom’s sofa, so your back was against the corner and your feet were over his lap (it wasn’t weird, just normal for the two of you). Instinctively, Tom lightly grabbed your ankles, repositioning you on his thigh slightly before leaning across the pull the blanket over the both of you. Whilst he smoothed out the crinkles in the fluffy navy fabric you took the opportunity to poke your toe into his side - garnering his attention.

“I take it you don’t wanna talk about it?” After he froze, Tom then nodded jerkily. “But if you change your mind, you know I’m here right?” His demeanour changed at your second statement as his body literally sagged into the cushions, with a grateful if small smile.

He respond by mouthing an ‘I know’ and that was enough for you. Shuffling down the side a bit you pressed play, settling in for the evening. Tom still had a hand resting on your ankles, occasionally rubbing his thumb up and down the bony bit.

Honestly you didn’t really see what your director was going on about when he raved about their on screen chemistry and it seemed that neither did Tom. It wasn’t a scathing commentary that gave it away, instead it was his silence. Which you quickly realised was the he had drifted off, his head lolling a little so he was facing you, palms now completely lax on your legs. It was whilst you were just taking in the sight before you, that a buzzing cut through the otherwise soft noise from the TV - which you had turned down for Tom’s sake.

It wasn’t your phone but you instinctively still reached for it from the coffee table and seeing that the name just read “Harry H” you thought it’d be fine to answer.

“Harry?” You whispered into the receiver, slightly cupping your hand round your mouth just to make sure you weren’t too loud for Tom.

“Hello?”

“Harry it’s me”

“Who?” You’d met Harry countless times, though given the fact Tom had been alone all shoot - you shouldn’t of expected the kid to be able to recognise your voice.

“Oh sorry Y/n um Y/n L/n”

“Oh no my fault sorry Y/n. How are you?” The conversation was jilted, you could practically feel the awkward energy radiating all the way from the otherside of the world.

“I’m alright thanks, how about you.”

“Yeh not bad I uhm… I - is my brother there?” Oooh. How to answer that question.

“Um sort of, we er… we were having a movie night and he’s fallen asleep. It’s why I’m whispering like a weirdo.” Harry laughed at that and you continued. “Is everything okay? You need me to wake him?”

“No no, mum just said he was having a rough time so was going to cheer him up with my exquisite sense of humour but if you’ve bored him to death then no need.”

“What can I say I’m just talented. Anyway I should be heading back to mine anyway so um I’ll let you go?”

“Oh yeh no worries, and uhm thanks-um thanks for keeping an eye on him.”

“Someone has to” You chuckled softly back, before bidding a final farewell to Harry.

Having hung up the phone, you leaned over to gently place it back on the coffee table but making a mental note to put it on charge before you left. Your next job was to manoeuvre your legs away from him without disturbing him but before you could even start planning the movement, you noticed his weary eyes blinked over at you. Freezing, your mouth made a little ‘o’ shape as you winced at yourself for disrupting his peace - today really wasn’t the day for that. There was a silence as Tom swallowed thickly, attempting to shake off the heavy lull of rest before he spoke. “Will you stay with me… please.”

Undoubtedly, your body didn’t play it as cool as you wanted it to. Thinking you’d heard him wrong, your chin protruded forward and his eyes widened. “ Sorry not like-not like that just um-just on the sofa… theres-theres spare blankets and I can-“

“-course T, no worries…Oh and um your brother just phoned if you-“

“I know.” He spoke softly and with a nod, but didn’t move at all, apparently no interest in calling his brother back.

With a stammered nod, you stood up, finally removing your legs from his touch in order to nip to the loo. You splashed your face with water, ate some toothpaste ( better than not brushing your teeth at all) before going to collect Tom’s quilt off his bed. By the time you re-entered the living room, Tom hadn’t appeared to have moved at all. The hood of his purple jumped was still up, the blanket still only half covering him, the excess lying cold were you had been sitting. He laughed lightly at you trying to wrangle with the king size duvet and get it in without tripping over yourself or knocking anything over.

“You sure you don’t mind? I’m just being stupid and-“

“Honestly I’m too tired to walk back to mine so this is perfect.”

“You live across the road.”

“Thats like 50 steps too far.” You deadpanned back, as he raised his eyebrows and locked you direct eye contact - which you very stubbornly returned.

The both of you sat like that for a minute, Tom eventually gave up with a sigh as he motioned for you to lie back.

There wasn’t an issue at all with space. A listers rental homes were never lacking in space - the grey sofa was a U shape, with ample space for the both of you to lie down. Each of you took a respective corner, your legs meeting in the middle and gently brushing against each others.

“Thanks for babysitting me today by the way.”

“I wasn-“ You were about to deny it, except one look and Tom saw straight through you.

“Thankyou Y/n/n” Seeing there was no way out of receiving his thanks, you instead opted to just shut him up. Nudging his leg with yours and leaving it touching you murmured you last words of the evening - eyes already closed.

“Fuck off Holland, ‘m tryna sleep.”

~~~~ let me know if you have any feedback or anything (but pls not too mean this isn't proof read so blame that) <33 ~~~~~~

tagging : @thefernandasantana @lovehollandy12 @hallecarey1 @crossyourpeter @hollandfanficlove @msmimimerton @thegirlwiththeimpala

#tom holland fluff #tom holland x reader #tom holland #tom holland blurb #harry holland #tom holland fic #tom holland x you #tom holland x y/n #tom holland angst #peter parker

[uf-oh]

hi! I've seen you getting super into the Re-Animator movies and one of my favourite things is listening to people talk about their favourite things for nine hours straight, so I wanted to ask: should I watch Re-Animator? why?

hello!! firstly, this was the nicest message to receive EVER. I was genuinely floored that you would want to hear me talk about it !! you are such a sweetheart, and i would love to chat more about your currently hyperfixations too <3

in terms of whether you should watch re-animator the short answer is yes, the long answer is the pro's outweigh the cons for me personally but be cautious

i fucking love an unethical scientist. nothing fills my heart more than seeing a man do whatever he has to do to push the boundaries of human understanding no matter the cost, so this movie down to the barest concept is already so perfectly up my alley. herbert west's aesthetic also fits exactly with characters i've hyperfixated on in the past sporting the white button up, skinny black tie, brunette hair and glasses (see newt geizler, edward nygma, arguably gary the gadget guy but i can't get into that right now). and we haven't even touched on the homoerotic subtext

my favourite relationship dynamic is narrative foils, especially a guarded and emotionally-closed off character being warmed by the presence and affection of another. herbert and dan definitely fall into this category. also they grab and touch each other. all the time. its clear they would do almost anything for each other, especially in the first film but also in the second despite their constant bickering.

the cast is also incredible. if you have the patience after you've finished the first two movies, the actors commentary on youtube is seriously one of the funniest things i've ever heard. you can tell these actors are good friends and loved working with each other, and had a great time working on the movie together (this is also apparent in the bts pics which are also phenomenal). its interesting to hear them talk about what they were trying to portray with their characters and anecdotes about the process of filming. definitely one of the draws to these movies for me was jeffery combs, i follow him on twitter now and he's a little unhinged but in the best way, i love his feed so much.

whether or not this movie is objectively good (if thats something you need in a movie) im not sure i could say either way. i liked the plot, but the real draw for me is the characters and their dynamics. also, its really funny???? its kinda goofy, but it feels really natural and almost accidental??? in my heart it is oscar worthy, but whether or not it is a Good Movie i couldnt say. i love it tho

also another thing i should mention, re-animator does have a pretty brutal SA scene. its the definition of using s*xual violence for horror and shock value, and is definitely the most disturbing part of the movie. listening to the commentary, i was relieved to hear the actress in the scene, barbara crampton, talk about how professionally the filming of that scene was handled and how much agency she had discussing with the director. but yeah, its pretty brutal. i skip it now when i rewatch the movie

TLDR; you should watch re-animator. lil meow meow science man has unparalleled hubris, green goop glowing ominously, and a homoerotically charged partnership with his assistant, but its not the pinnacle of feminist cinema.

thank you for letting me rave about this movie, i love herbert and dan so much. also i think its fun that the girl everyone's obsessed with has the same name as me, thats kinda rad. i check the re-animator and herbert west tags on tumblr, instagram and twitter literally every day for new artwork so if any re-animator/danbert artists see this PLEASE tag me in your stuff i love that shit. okay thank you again for this question i love you so much bye

#re animator #herbert west #dan cain #danbert #jeffrey combs #barbara crampton #reanimator #papercutdoctor