#also like the fact flint literally killed gates

[vampirenicotine]

that moment when you’re going about your day and you remember that silver openly declared to flint that he’s his partner in the way thomas & miranda were and flint didn’t deny it but instead said a few episodes later that i would, “be forced to hesitate before hurting you”

#like what #also like the fact flint literally killed gates #who was his platonic partner #just proves that silver was in the camp of his romantic partners #which is why he honestly did nothing about silver betraying him #THIS SHOW #silverflint #black sails

[msevelynsilver]

The way Gates’s and Silver’s betrayals of Flint parallel just blows my mind. They’re both, at the point of their betrayal, Flint’s quartermaster and closest friend. And they come up with nearly identical plans. Gates is going to let the crew believe that they are putting Flint on trial while secretly helping Flint and Miranda escape to Boston to accept a pardon and start a new life. Gates is offering Flint a chance to run from his goals for Nassau in order to live happily with his loved one. A few years (a year? I’m never clear on how much time this show spans), Silver makes Flint almost exactly the same offer. He betrays Flint, with the help of allies (this time Rackham, Bonny, Max and the men loyal to Silver rather than the Walrus crew), and offers him a chance to run from his war in order to live happily with his loved one.

And Flint, who killed Gates for making the LITERAL SAME SUGGESTION, takes it. Why?

There are four key differences in Gates’s and Silver’s suggestions. 1) Flint is theoretically closer to achieving his goal. If you believe him that they will win and that there will be a good life after the war, then he is much closer than he was when they were chasing the Urca de Lima. 2) Gates’s offer involves his hope that Flint takes a pardon, something that Flint told Miranda in 1.07 is unthinkable to him. 3) Gates offers Flint a future with Miranda while Silver offers Flint a future with Thomas. 4) The traitorous quartermaster is Silver instead of Gates.

So let’s unpack that.

1) Flint is closer to his goal than ever and should just kill Silver for suggesting he give up his war. This is not the reason for his change in behaviour.

2) Silver is offering slavery instead of a pardon and frankly I don’t know how to account for that. Does Flint find that preferable? At the very least, Silver knows Flint’s backstory and knows better than to suggest Flint take a pardon or do anything that could be construed as apologising to England. Gates accidentally sealed his fate because he said exactly the wrong thing at the wrong time. He couldn’t have known that Flint was so opposed to the pardon because he viewed it as admitting that his love for Thomas was wrong. He thought Flint merely needed a pardon for being a pirate. I think the lack of pardon in Silver’s plan might have played a minor role in Flint’s reaction, but it is not the main reason.

3) The partner Flint is being offered changes from Miranda to Thomas. In my reading of the show, he loves them equally. Perhaps not in the same way (that’s up to debate and an entirely different post) but equally. This is proven when Miranda betrays Flint by sending the letter asking for a pardon and Flint does nothing to her. Anyone else would have been killed (as is proven by Hal Gates). In Flint’s life, no one except Miranda and Thomas is above being expendable. If he has to kill Gates for betraying him, he will. I’m fully convinced that if Eleanor had presented a big enough personal threat, he would have killed her as well. But Miranda and Thomas are above reproach. They can inconvenience him, disagree with him, betray him, and he will never stop protecting or loving them. So does that change Flint’s reaction to his quartermaster’s betrayal? I think an argument can be made that since Thomas was the cause of Flint’s crusade against England, only a life with him could end it. But I think if Silver had found Miranda alive in the finale, and offered a life with her, Flint would have also at least considered the offer (not in the least because by that point, England has taken Miranda from him as well). So the change from Miranda to Thomas is not the reason for the change in Flint’s behaviour.

4) Which means that it’s Silver. Flint loved Gates and was friends with him for 10 years (I think) and somehow cared for Silver more. Silver did what Gates never managed to do and reached the upper echelons of Flint’s inner circle. He became, like Thomas and Miranda, someone Flint would never hurt regardless of their actions. In that final episode, Silver literally tries to kill him. He sends 6 men after Flint with the order to murder him. And Flint’s only retaliation is to reason with Silver. He does not try to hurt him or kill him. He reacts like he did in season 1 to Miranda’s betrayal, not Gates’s.

And I know not murdering someone shouldn’t be a beautiful sign of love. But for Flint, that’s how it works. Every single person who is opposing his war effort is expendable. Everyone but Miranda, Thomas, and Silver. And the way Silver manages to reach that place in Flint’s heart where he is loved above all others and their story ends in a betrayal in the greatest tragedy* of the whole show.

This is why that last episode kills me. Because Silver takes away Flint’s war, and Flint JUST LETS HIM.

*relationship tragedy. The fact that they all didn’t get to create a new world without slavery, homophobia, racism, and with less sexism is the Great Tragedy. But I’m team Silver on that. I don’t that is a war that Flint could have won.

#captain flint #james flint #long john silver #john silver #black sails #black sails season 1 #black sails season 4 #hal gates

[medusinestories]

Onwards to the episode in which we get to see Flint and Silver each having a very bad day (as well as two literal dicks that nobody had asked to see).

Black Sails VII (s1 ep07)

- We open on Pastor Lambrick's sweaty face as he intensely rehearses the Easter sermon and he’s obviously eaten up by what he did with Miranda. His sermon, unsurprisingly, focuses on sin, keeping sin hidden, and the hell that awaits the sinner. Which leads us nicely onto Flint, who’s distracted (by his own sin? by thoughts of Miranda? both?) during a meeting with Eleanor. Eleanor is pissed that Miranda let Richard Guthrie send a message to the Andromache and then waltz into town to close up his business; Flint tries to take the heat off Miranda, once again protecting her (at this point, he may not know the contents of the letter).

- During this meeting, Flint is startled when Silver first speaks up to say that the mob in the street was bad - clearly Silver is a sort of intruder in this meeting. But Eleanor, after Silver reminds her by unsubtly clearing his throat, tells Flint that he’s not to harm Silver because he was instrumental in setting up the Consortium. Silver looks so pleased with himself in these scenes, and Flint quite defeated when he tells Silver to follow him back to their camp. I love it.

- To parallel Flint/Miranda’s Sulky Sex scene from ep4, we have Anne/Rackham’s frustrating/disconnected sex scene. It shows us a few things about them mainly that Anne wants to keep a lot of control over what happens, hence Rackham being tied up (though of course this might also be his kink), her wearing a shirt that covers up most of her body, and the reverse cowgirl position that means that she’s both in control of what happens and completely avoids eye contact. The position reminds us of the Flint/Miranda scene, where Miranda was also on top, but their scene involved more eye contact (yes glaring counts, he’s still intensely focused on Miranda), gentle touching (on Miranda’s side) and her being naked and open to him. Another parallel is that both Flint and Rackham aren’t in the right frame of mind for sex, Flint being angry and Rackham lost in a sea of worries (and probably also somewhat angry/disappointed at Anne for forcing him into the plot to kill their crewmates). The difference between Flint and Rackham is that while Flint doesn’t seem to have any trouble performing, Rackham is miles away and doesn’t even notice that he’s lost his erection - again. Anne is frustrated by this, and apparently knows him well enough that she offers to put something up his arse, but he’s clearly not in the mood, and she leaves in a huff, abandoning him all tied up as a sort of revenge for his performance problems. Whatever the problem is between them isn’t put into words (because Anne can’t yet, for starters), unlike the one between Flint and Miranda. The intimacy between Rackham and Anne, so often described as close partners, seems much more distant to me than the one shown between Flint and Miranda. I’m not sure whether it’s because of anyone’s sexual orientation, or just the fact that they’re fucking but they’ve never discussed the big important things, such as Anne’s identity/feelings/etc.

- In this episode, Dufresne gains a lot of power: with a freshly (and badly) shaved head and a new tattoo, he’s been promoted to Quartermaster on the Walrus in Billy’s place. And very quickly he has a problem to deal with: Randall revealing that Silver stole the page. Gates had actually already told this to Dufresne, as is revealed at the end of the episode, which might explain why Dufresne is relatively calm during the whole conversation, while DeGroot wants Silver and Flint hanged and Howell is surprisingly ruthless: he brings up the idea that it may be better to kill off Randall in order to get to the treasure, if they can’t make sure he’ll keep quiet about Silver being the thief. Dufresne is actually quite kind towards Silver in the scene where he puts Silver’s memory to the test - a test that could result in his death if he fails it and that Silver constantly grumbles against (I love his grumbling!). Basically, at this point Dufresne remains quite a sympathetic character, which will change a lot as the show goes on, especially after Jannes Eiselen had to leave the show (such a sad story, RIP Jannes).

- In the meantime, the Flint and Gates relationship is crumbling. It's sad to see, especially since they're shown sharing chuckles as they talk about Dufresne's appointment in the beginning of the episode. But then Gates brings up the subject of Miranda and demands explanations about the letter Billy found. We're not shown exactly what Flint answers, but it's clear that he's actually trying his best to give him an explanation without incriminating Miranda too badly. The sad thing is that Flint is actually telling the truth: he actually wasn't involved in any betrayal of his crew and and can only guess at Miranda's motivations. But the fact that he's lied time and again in previous situations, including on the Maria Aleyne where he claimed Lord Alfred drew a weapon on him (and Gates secretly verified that this was a lie), and used men as pawns to advance his and Miranda's plans, is now catching up to him. Flint seems truly hurt when Gates accuses him of using the men for his own purposes, and turns spiteful, telling Gates that he should have been "a better father" to Billy and helped him "understand the world he was living in" (suggesting that such a forthright character as Billy can't really survive in a world of pirates who are all ready to stab each other in the back). After that slap in the face, Gates says he's exhausted from Flint and threatens to take it to the crew. Somehow, this pushes Flint to bare all: he tells Gates about his plan to keep a part of the treasure and use it to build up Nassau, depicting himself as a sort of saviour, doing it for the men's good: they'd rather be rich men in a safe place than dead thieves hanging from a noose. Gates sees this as delusions of grandeur, and tells him that while he'll see the Urca plot through, after that they're done. I actually think he sees Flint’s point, since he doesn’t just throw him to the crew, but won’t admit that out loud. The whole of this scene hurts bad, because you can tell that Flint is desperate and sad to be losing his closest ally and friend, and that Gates is hurting from the loss of Billy and exhausted from the toxic relationship he has with Flint, where he's played enabler to his manipulations for years.

- While Flint and Gates’ alliance is breaking, Silver has to forge one with Randall or die. Randall finds out in the beginning of the episode that he’s been voted out of the crew. This is apparently due to DeGroot’s fears that Randall could be a fire hazard, which the crew took disproportionately to heart. Randall is furious with Silver, who smugly tells him that in these situations, a setback often comes with a new or unexpected opportunity. He’s right, but at this point he doesn’t know that he is the opportunity Randall’s going to latch on. Randall reveals that Silver is a thief, and Silver denies it, saying that Randall is both a halfwit and was in a haze of opium when he heard what he thought he heard; he even tries to convince Randall that he was mistaken (this, my friends, is gaslighting). However, by revealing that Silver was the thief, Randall sets a chain of events into motion which could either end with his death (if Howell has his way, since Randall is an inconvenient witness) or Silver’s (if DeGroot tips the balance, not trusting Silver to remember the coordinates and not wanting to sacrifice Randall for nothing). Silver figures out that these are the outcomes, and tries to talk sense into Randall by making a deal with him: he’ll care for Randall and make sure he can stay on the ship. But it’s only when Silver finally admits that he is the thief and that Randall was right, that Randall accepts the deal. Later, Silver realises that Randall might have orchestrated the whole thing: he’s now got Silver to serve him, doesn’t have to take any risks on the ship, and gets to remain with the crew. Silver wonders if Randall is a genius rather than a halfwit (a word thrown about a lot to describe him). And it seems quite obvious, considering what happened, that Randall still has strong survival skills (an amputee with impaired cognitive skills doesn’t stand a chance of survival outside a crew and he must be aware of it), that he still has a good memory and an ability to pick out useful information and that he’s aware enough of what’s going on to be upset by the crew’s rejection and Silver’s attempt to gaslight him. I think it’s important to recognise that Randall is more than a comic relief or a grotesque character: he’s a disabled man who's lost parts of his cognitive ability and is struggling to survive.

- This episode focuses on Vane facing his past. He seeks out the island where he grew up and its master, Albinus. I’d forgotten or never really registered that Albinus was a pirate and that the men who work for him were mostly his crew - and likely slaves (or children, hence Vane?) that he managed to capture/press into service. He’s retired from pirating and set up a system where his men cut down trees for timber all day, without wages. It’s not clear exactly how he holds so much power over these men, although it seems that everyone is terrified of him. He’s extremely strong physically, seems shrewd, speaks rather well, and his tattoos suggest that maybe he’s involved in some kind of ritual (truly religious or just for show?) which would make him all the more scary to superstitious people. Vane is clearly still frightened: he barely makes eye contact and practically stutters when he first tries to make the deal with Albinus, which is that he’ll take some of Albinus’ men as crew and send Albinus part of their earnings as tribute. It says a lot about Albinus that Vane, after years of having run away, is still so scares that he’s willing to pay him a tribute. But he changes his mind as he stares at a boy bearing the same brand as he does: he tries to persuade the men that Nassau is a pace of pleasures rather than hard labour, and confronts Albinus. The fight is brutal and ends with Vane buried naked, just after Albinus tells him that he’s proud of him. But of course Vane wouldn’t be Vane if he didn’t rise from the dead at the last minute and kill Albinus, goaded on by his inner Eleanor voice.

- In the meantime, Mr Scott returns to Eleanor, apologising for what he did, telling her he betrayed her out of love. However he also reminds her of his slave status: technically, he belongs to her. The argument upsets her, and he quite cleverly uses this moment to ask her to free the slaves who were on the Andromache. And it works: by the end of the episode, she’s made arrangements for the men to work on ships and has bought the women’s freedom and found them jobs in her tavern. But Mr Scott has still decided to leave Eleanor to join Hornigold’s crew, to refrain from meddling with Eleanor’s affairs, since he disagrees with her so strongly re: the Urca. Hornigold approached him earlier in the episode, and the introduction to that scene is quite interesting: Hornigold says to Mr Scott “I’ll need to know your secret” and Mr Scott looks startled and frightened. It seems that he’s startled because he’d been giving food to the slaves, but in light of S3, it could be a much greater secret that’s being referred to. Mr Scott is relieved when he realises that Hornigold is simply talking about tolerating Eleanor, who he clearly can’t stand.

- Flint’s bad day continues, of course, with the big confrontation he has with Miranda. He’s furious about the letter (of which he now knows the contents thanks to Gates), telling her that it could have got him killed, or destroyed the plans they’d made and asking her whether she was trying to embarrass him. This sounds so weirdly petty, and yet it also sounds exactly like the kind of argument that would come up in a bickering couple. Miranda answers that she was trying to help him out of that life, because she wants to move on. This is where Miranda utters the famous “there is no life here, there is no joy here, there is no love here”. I noticed that, covered by Flint yelling at her, and distorted because her voice has gone very shrill, Miranda says another line, which sounds like “you used to love, then”. If that really is what she says, it’s extra-extra-extra heartbreaking to hear (if someone wants to check it for me, it’s around 35:40). It’s obvious that Flint and Miranda’s views on life are very different, and I can’t help but think back to the fact that, as a carpenter’s son from the country, Flint has had to struggle all his life to become who he is. So when he says that you can’t get a life without having a war, and Miranda tells him he’s wrong, she’s speaking entirely from the point of view of her privilege. She’s never needed to fight as hard as he has to be happy, because she got extremely lucky in marrying Thomas. And when she says that Thomas would agree with her, I’m certain she’s right. But life has never been like that for Flint, and there’s no way he’ll ever entirely agree with their point of view. Rewatching this scene is tough, btw, because they both have great points, they’re both hurting so much, and there’s so much to take in between the body language, the facial expressions, the tones of voice and the actual words that it’s a whole whirlwind. And it feels very, very real.

- It’s absolutely hilarious to see Rackham get robbed by the whores taking advantage of his lack of knowledge (and research). He should absolutely have done a better job and has no clue how to run a brothel. He’s lucky Max takes things in hand after having heard from Idelle that the girls were taking advantage.

- Then we have the beautiful Drunk Flint scene. Eleanor notices him feeling very sorry for himself after Gates has pretty much broken up with him and he’s still reeling from fighting with by Miranda. I think Flint feels very misunderstood here. He thought that he was doing something good, to save Nassau and avenge Thomas, and doesn’t understand why they can’t see it, why they only see the terrible methods he uses to reach his goals. So he’s full of doubt, clearly wondering if he’s the villain of the story, and puts the question to Eleanor: is their plan worth it? Eleanor is the only person who still believes in him, which leads us to the only scene that I would ever call straight-baiting. Flint hovers near Eleanor, breathing heavily, and a variety of emotions play over her face during this moment of tension, as she seems to think this is leading to a kiss. It does, he gives her a chaste little forehead kiss and leaves. All the elements are in place to make your average viewer start shipping these two. I actually find it hilarious that the ship barely exists in the fandom (though I wasn’t there in the beginning of the fandom and I guess the viewership changed a lot between S1 and S4).

- The scene with Flint and Gates glaring at each other from their respective ships and Parson’s Farewell playing in the background... epic! We know this is the beginning of a big struggle between them, especially since we find out that Gates has pretty much decided that he’ll hand Flint over to the crew once they get the money. But nnnnggh that scene! The ships leaving on their hunt! Awesome and heartbreaking!

#black sails #flint #gates #flint & gates #miranda #flintmiranda #eleanor #flint & eleanor #mr scott #eleanor & mr scott #silver #randall #dufresne #degroot #howell #vane #rackham #max #pastor lambrick #ableism cw #long post cw #black sails rewatch

[a-man-for-hire-and-his-archives]

Black Sails’ Toby Stephens on Captain Flint and the Final Season

Black Sails will return to Starz on January 29, 2017 for its fourth and final season. When we last left the pirates, Captain Flint (Toby Stephens) was beginning the revolution in Nassau and Long John Silver’s (Luke Arnold) star was rising. We recently got a chance to chat with Toby Stephens about the end of the series, what’s coming for Flint and working on this epic show. Check out his thoughts on season four below!

Here is the official synopsis:

The fourth season opens with hundreds of British soldiers dead in a forest… the Royal Navy sails back to England in retreat… the West Indies are now a war zone, and the shores of New Providence Island have never been bloodier. With the help of Eleanor Guthrie, Woodes Rogers transforms Nassau into a fortress without walls, as Captain Flint amasses a fleet of unprecedented strength, hoping to strike the final blow against civilization and reshape the world forever. Meanwhile, from within the island… an insurgency builds, fueled by the legend of its exiled leader, whose name keeps grown men awake at night… the one they call “Long John Silver.”

But as Flint, Silver and their allies are about to learn, the closer civilization comes to defeat, the more desperately and destructively it will fight back. Oaths will be shattered, fortunes will change hands, and amidst the chaos, only one thing remains certain: it has never been more dangerous to call oneself a pirate.

xxxx

Legion of Leia: I was in South Africa on the set when you were filming that crazy storm sequence in season three. What sort of set pieces are we going to see this time around?

Toby Stephens: It’s huge. There’s loads of stuff that will keep fans extremely happy, I’m sure.

Legion of Leia: Flint had a crazy few seasons. I’m curious about whether or not you think his destiny was set with Miranda’s (Louise Barnes) death.

Toby Stephens: I think yes, it kind of compounded the way he was going. I mean, I think before Miranda died, maybe people could reason him out of certain choices, but I think when Miranda dies, that’s the last nail in the coffin in terms of him going after England in this relentless way. And also, I would say, the other thing that compounds it is finding an ally in Silver. The fact that they become partners in this enterprise, it seems that Flint can only function when he has somebody who he’s allied with or is an alter-ego for him. Someone who can balance him and he can work through. So that is both good for him and bad for him in a way.

Legion of Leia: In the last episode, there is that conversation between Flint and Silver where they’re like, oh, we’re friends. But bad things happen to Flint’s friends. We know a bit about where this is going to go because of “Treasure Island.” What’s ahead for Flint here?

Toby Stephens: Yeah, well, I think it’s really the end game for the whole series, and we know it’s a tragedy because there was no great revolution in the pirate world. There was no emancipation of the pirates and the slaves. It didn’t happen, so why did it not happen and what happens to Flint at the end of that, when his dreams are crushed? What happens to Silver and him? How does that play out? And also, how does the Silver that we know become the eponymous Long John Silver of “Treasure Island?” How does that happen? And I think season four brilliantly leads us to a point where where, it’s a very satisfying ending, but also leaves you to fill in the gaps between there and “Treasure Island.” You kind of know who these people are at the end of this, but it’s a kind of really cool thing to allow people to do that themselves rather than go, look, this is what happens, all the way to the end. It leaves you to do some work yourself.

Legion of Leia: I love that. This show has sent me to Wikipedia more often than you would believe!

Toby Stephens: [laughs] I know!

Legion of Leia: How much research do you do for a role like this, or do you rely mostly on the script?

Toby Stephens: Do you know what? It’s a combination of laziness and there is method to it. I just go with what is in the script. I mean, like you, I’ll go to Wikipedia if I need to know something, if I don’t know what something is. But whether or not it has real historic context, for me is immaterial because I’m working in a fictive world. It’s a fictive world with dashes here or there of historic fact. A pinch here, a pinch there, and I need to work in that world, so it’s better if I stick there.

Legion of Leia: I did love seeing how much was actually built on the set and how many little touches were there, historical and fictive, both.

Toby Stephens: Yeah, what I love is the detail in terms of everybody else, the props, etc. There was a lot of care taken about what would have been there, what wouldn’t have been there, creating that texture of the world, where you can believe it.

Legion of Leia: When we were there, we were hearing stories of bugs in the walls!

Toby Stephens: We were always having problems with–there were these crickets. And they would get in. We would call them “sea crickets!” [laughs] You would be in a take and you would hear [makes cricket noises]. We’re supposed to be in the middle of something scene! [laughs] Or there would be birds up in the rigging going “cheep, cheep!” And you just go, oh my God, there’s another hour in ADR!

Legion of Leia: Did you have to do a ton of ADR?

Toby Stephens: Oh yeah! I have become the master of ADR. I breeze it now! I kind of like it because sometimes you can actually improve things. You know? There was a scene I did in the first season where it was with Gates (Mark Ryan), and it was a storm, and we’re having this conversation and we’re having a drink, and we’re on the set–it was the beginning when they used to gimbal the set. It was so noisy! There was water coming in, dripping everywhere. They wanted it to look authentic. Because it was quite a stressful set to be on [laughs], for some reason my [in a high-pitched voice] my voice was up here! I watched it–I mean, I had to loop it because there was so much noise there, but I thought, I sound like an hysteric! I managed to re-voice the whole thing and kind of couch it where Flint speaks normally. That’s a case in point where you can really improve on things.

Legion of Leia: I can’t imagine trying to speak clearly during some of those storm scenes!

Toby Stephens: I mean, it was mad! This job was amazing because I loved the people and I loved working on it, but there are aspects that I won’t miss. It was totally exhausting. By the end of this last season, I was literally hanging in rags, because it makes such demands on you. You’ve got enormous amounts of dialogue and enormous amounts of acting to do, and then at the same time, you’ve got all of this physical stuff to do, and it’s day in and day out. And you’re in the costumes and you’re in baking heat, and it was long, long days. No other job I would be able to do, in terms of acting–I mean, I’m not working in a coal mine–but there is no other job I could do that would come near this. It sort of made me immune to–it made everything else seem like a breeze. It was so arduous. And some of the stuff we did in season four, some of the stuff that I did towards the end, it was really difficult. Really difficult.

Legion of Leia: Having seen that storm scene and the tanks of water being dumped on you and the ship moving back and forth and the yelling–it was crazy!

Toby Stephens: Yeah, it was also the length of time it went on for. Because we also did two weeks straight, and then we kept on coming back for pickups because it was so particular. And also, it’s part of the reason why I’m so proud of the show, is that they had such exacting standards for what they wanted. They’d cut it together and realize they were missing bits, or that they could get bits better, but it was a drag. You had to get back on this deck and they were spraying you with stuff and they had the engines on. It was brutal. But you look at the end result and you go, that will stand. In ten years time, it will look amazing.

Legion of Leia: What are you going to miss the most, now that the show is over?

Toby Stephens: I think I’ll miss all the people that I worked with. One of the things about the job is, you create these very intense and very fun relationships with people, creative relationships with people, very creative, and then they dissolve and move on. I’ll miss that, and working with such great writers. John [Steinberg], Robert [Levine] and Dan [Shotz], you know, just brilliant writing, fantastic showrunners. They were so good and we had a really intense relationship. I’ll miss that.

Legion of Leia: What do you have coming up next?

Toby Stephens: So I just started doing the reinvention of Lost In Space for Netflix, so I literally just started working for them. I’m really excited for that. It’s a brilliant segue from one genre to another. [laughs] It’s a really fun reinvention of it. It’s really clever, and I’m really excited about it. I think this will be fun in terms of, it’s servicing fans, making a show for now.

Legion of Leia: Also, different costumes. Maybe not so much wool in the heat!

Toby Stephens: I think it will be differently uncomfortable. [laughs]

Legion of Leia: Those costumes were insane and it was so hot while you were filming.

Toby Stephens: Yeah, it was tough, and also in the brutal sun all day long. Standing on ships. It was killer. And the boots. I remember always complaining. I bitched and moaned about my boots all the time. [laughs] These things are killing me! Can you imagine these pirates going, “Jeeze, man! Couldn’t we have flip flops? Could we have a pair of thongs? Why do we have to wear these things?” [laughs]

Legion of Leia: I feel like pirates should have worn fewer clothes!

Toby Stephens: Yeah! [laughs] But apparently they didn’t. They didn’t, actually. The whole thing of pirates wearing all of that is baloney. They actually–they had very light shirts and stuff. Apparently they just didn’t wear much.

Legion of Leia: That was for fancy pirates.

Toby Stephens: And also, it was just for show. Also, what Black Sails kind of gets into is, a lot of it was p.r. It was p.r. by the English, because they wanted to demonize these people, but it was also their own p.r.–like Blackbeard having fuses on his beard and stuff like that. It was all to make people scared.

Legion of Leia: You can see that even with what Billy [Tom Hopper] is doing at the end of season three with Silver.

Toby Stephens: Yeah, and here’s a really fun thing. You get to the end of this season, and you take a screenshot of characters at the end of this season and you compare them to screenshots from the beginning of season one and they’re just like–the journey that they’ve been on, and the toll it’s taken on them is really cool. I mean, Luke just looks terrible at the end of it! And he was so beautiful at the beginning! [laughs] And the same with Tom Hopper who plays Billy Bones. You see he’s headed towards the Billy Bones of “Treasure Island.”

Legion of Leia: I wanted to ask you about Flint and Billy. There is such a tense relationship there with so much history. How is that going to shift this season?

Toby Stephens: Yeah, it really comes to a head. It comes to blows. They’re not going to be able to–it’s really interesting the way Billy goes, I think, in this season. It’s been a long time coming.

Legion of Leia: Do you think Flint has any of the idealism left that he had at the beginning?

Toby Stephens: Well, what’s really interesting at the end of it, one realizes how personal this is for Flint. And that, actually, it’s not really some altruistic scheme that he has to liberate everybody. He’s playing out his own psychodrama in reality. And how demented–how he will not stop. How it will go on and on and on. And somebody has to stop that. You know, it’s a tragedy because we know that there was no–it’s got to end somewhere. It’s not going to be good.

Legion of Leia: I do have to ask you about working with your family! [Toby’s wife Anna-Louise Plowman plays Mrs. Hudson and his brother Chris Larkin joined the cast as a Redcoat this season]

Toby Stephens: Yeah! It was wonderful, actually! It was so wonderful because I hadn’t spent so much time with my brother for a while. And was really great hanging out with him. And it was a bit strange. We had one scene where we were given direction to look at each other across–we had no lines together, but we had to look at each other across this town square. And I suddenly realized, this is really difficult because nobody on Earth knows me as well as my brother does. And to try and pretend with one another is just impossible! There cannot be any artifice! [laughs] So both of us, it was hopeless! I said, you look at my chest and I’ll look at your forehead. [laughs] It’s impossible! You can’t hide!

Are you guys excited for season four? Let us know in the comments! Black Sails will return to Starz on January 29, 2017.

sources: Legion of Leia (unfortunately I can't put link because it wasn't secured)

#toby stephens #interview #luke arnold #black sails

[im-the-punk-who]

Hi, I dont know if you read or know anything about Macchiavelli's "Il principe", but I am studying it in school and I cant help but compare it's fundamentals to how Flint leads. I'm just curious about what you think

Eekekekekekekekekekekkek okay so first off Anon, you are absolutely, 100% right to be getting those vibes. If it’s not actually textual it is at the least meta-textual that Flint ascribes to a very Machiavellian type of leadership. His whole ‘never was there a Caesar who couldn't sing the tune’ speech is...licherally a direct reference to Machiavelli's philosophy that leaders cannot retain their leadership without sacrificing some level of ethical behavior in order to manipulate and deceive their subjects into following them.

And, Flint owns at least two books from thinkers who drew directly on Machiavellian thinking in their texts: De Jure Belli Ac Pacis by Hugo Grotus and The Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes are both visible in Flint’s cabin, and both drew heavily on the type of leadership principles established in books like Il Principe. 

(Also, my eternal quest for the book that sits *under* The Leviathan in that scene remains. Y’all I will literally pay someone for this knowledge. My best guess is Plato’s De Republica.)

In fact, the whole system that Flint’s world was operating under at this time was very machiavellian in influence. 

Henry VIII, who converted to Protestantism and who would eventually lead England in the conversion from Catholicism to Protestantism that would then in turn eventually lead the country into the War of Spanish Succession(the war being fought during the London 1705 flashbacks), was a student of Machiavellian thinking. He took the teachings of Il Principe to heart and used them to transform his country. Over the next hundred and fifty years, England would change from an entirely Catholic country to a Protestant one. Of note, Catholic scholars generally disagreed with Machiavelli’s principles on the grounds that it did not support the Divine Right of Kings.

As well, the Enlightenment thinkers that influenced Thomas Hamilton(and Flint himself) were starting to argue more for personal liberty and choice of the governed, both concepts presented in Machiavelli’s writings. (For those following along, this approach was also being used to justify slavery, as what was ‘good for the state is good for the man’ was used as justification for everything from impressment to colonization and slavery. Men were willing to set aside their morals for what they justified as good for the state. Shrug emoji.)

As James says of England when he and Thomas view the hanging in London:

“You think Whitehall wants piracy to flourish in the Bahamas?”

“No I don’t think they want it but I think they’re aware of the cost associated with trying to fight it. And I think that that sound travels.”

Here we see that Flint knows what Thomas doesn’t or does not want to accept: that England is willing to sacrifice some morality and some amount of lives(both of pirate-prisoners and the ships they take) in order to save themselves the financial burden of rooting out the causes of piracy. The justification for piracy was that it is too costly to fight, and that the nation ultimately benefits from a bit of strife as it drives prices up and allows England to place within the sights of its citizenry an identifiable enemy. (Note that Blackbeard also argues the same of Nassau, that prosperity ‘made it soft’.)

Even as he is changed by Thomas’ line of thinking, this lesson will stick with Flint and we’ll see it over and over again as he deals with the men’s hatred of himself by redirecting them towards other avenues(Vane, Hornigold, England, etc.)

And in actuality, this is what sets Thomas very much apart from his political brethren - he was *not* willing to sacrifice his morals in order to achieve a ‘more effective’ victory. Once he realizes that moral deficit shown by England, he creates the pardon plan to argue directly for a more moral and just way of governance. His whole premise for the pardons was to show England that an approach that considered the needs and wants of the governed was ultimately more effective, both in cost and in gaining the genuine good will of the people. And again, this is another likely reason why Thomas was then targeted by Peter Ashe and his father. Railing against the entire system of government was dangerous. Particularly if one was railing against the government in a way that could be seen as support of an opposing system of religion and political rule(remember how I said before that Catholics were generally against the Machiavellian systems?) Put plainly, Thomas’ rejection of Machiavelli’s leadership tactics would have been yet another argument for his treason against the crown.

Interestingly also, Marcus Aurelius - Thomas Hamilton’s homeboy - is said to be one of Machiavelli’s five “good” emperors, of whom Machiavelli wrote,

“[they] had no need of praetorian cohorts, or of countless legions to guard them, but were defended by their own good lives, the good-will of their subjects, and the attachment of the Senate.”

How we tryna be.

And so we see that Flint has - not so much fallen back into England’s line of thinking but perhaps that he never really fell out of it. And that this is actually a rift in his potential ability to conform to Thomas’ line of thinking, assuming we see that line as more morally correct. We do see Flint, gradually, throughout the course of the show, move more away from this Machiavellian line of thinking, especially once he meets Madi and the Maroons.  And to me at least it’s one of the most important character shifts we see - in contrast to the trajectory of John Silver becoming Long John Silver  - throughout the series. Just as Flint is finally starting to really value the lives of those around him, Silver has learned how effective those tactics can be in achieving his goals. As Hands says - ‘I wonder if he knows how much you learned from him.’

And in fact, Silver almost directly quotes Machiavelli at one point when he talks to Flint about their different leadership styles.

“I once thought that to lead men in this world, to be liked was just as good as being feared, and that may very well be true. But to be both liked and feared all at once, is an entirely different state of being in which, I believe, at this moment, I exist alone.” 

Whereas Machiavelli in his chapters addressing cruelty and mercy writes

"Here a question arises: whether it is better to be loved than feared, or the reverse. The answer is, of course, that it would be best to be both loved and feared. But since the two rarely come together, anyone compelled to choose will find greater security in being feared than in being loved." 

This is clearly the approach Flint has taken - he is the most feared captain on the seas. Certainly in the colonial world and on Nassau, too, his name brings a certain amount of fear with it. Because of this he has been safe from rebellion for quite a long time - however he is also not unaware that his power comes from the people. In the very first episode he talks of his plan with Gates to “position people in all the right places so the crew would never turn.” He has, for an unknown amount of time but I would suspect from the very beginning, been manipulating the crew’s opinion of him to keep them happy. Gates himself, and Silver later, are prime examples. 

Both of them; Gates for the first ten years or so and Silver in seasons 2+3 act as a go between - being the ‘liked’ to Flint’s ‘feared’. They convince the crew - the ‘people’ in this case - that Flint’s plans are in their best interest and not truly the act of a tyrant. It is only when Flint forgets - or neglects to respect - that the will of his crew is how he keeps his power, that he really starts to fail. And, later also, that now he has a rival - Silver. 

Now, I do want to point out that personally I don’t think Flint is a needlessly cruel ‘ruler’ in the sense the crew sometimes thinks he is, nor is he trying to be as a king is to english subjects. He has power, of course, and he does manipulate, lie, and kill if necessary to maintain his power in accordance with Machiavelli’s principles, but he does not do so ruthlessly or to a degree that is unnecessarily violent, nor with only his own advancement in mind. His goals genuinely are in service of the people he leads, even if the tactics he uses sometimes put them in danger for it. Moreso, I would argue that Flint is a prince who created his own princedom. He took an existing power structure(the pirate council in Blackbeard, Hornigold etc) and took most of the power for himself, either through luck, violence, or political maneuvering. And then he kept it through skill and tactical advantage.

Silver, in contrast to Flint’s new princedom, is truly a ‘prince of the people’. He comes to power through convincing the other pirates that he has their interests at heart - even when he doesn’t. But Silver soon learns that being a well-loved leader is difficult. It isn’t until Silver kills Dufresne and Billy uses that fear to build a legend that ‘Long John Silver’ the pirate king comes into being. Silver learns, just as Flint knew, that in a world or corruption, often leaders need to make sacrifices of things they would have once deemed important. 

(I think it’s also important to note for Silver that his main goal is actually one Machiavelli writes of as being ‘a will of the people’. Silver’s main wish is not to rule, not really. His biggest motivator is ‘to be free’. To not have to make choices based on the will or subjugations of others. And so, he attempts to make the leadership forced upon him into something that frees him - unfortunately for him, Madi is right when she says that the ‘Crown is always a burden’ and it would be truly impossible for him to find the kind of freedom he wishes for while wearing it. Which, honestly, is part of why he ultimately fails in that regard as leader of the revolution.)

In the later seasons we see Flint go through this change in philosophy after he meets Madi and the Maroons. He begins to actually value the lives of the people he leads. When put to the choice of going through with the raid on the Underhill estate despite the risk it poses to the slaves on other plantations, Flint resists the idea. As he tells Madi - it would have cost them far more to ignore the ‘will’ of those people he hoped to lead - the slaves - than it would gain them to go through with the plan. And later, even though he can’t be blind to Max’s sway with Eleanor and the others, unlike Billy (and oh how the mighty have fallen, Mr. Bones!) he doesn’t even seem to consider keeping her rather than trading her for the lives of his other men. He no longer wants to trade a potential political victory for the suffering of those he leads. So, too, when he attempts to trade the cache for the fort, he is doing so with the goal being to not have to put those under his power in danger if there is another option. It is, at least to me, an incredibly moving character arc and one that is so very understated. 

And honestly, I think it’s what *needed* to happen before he could move on from his rage-hate bender and begin to find the sort of peace that one might argue those ‘good’ rulers had. Machiavelli’s principles tend to get in the way of your ability to connect with other people: when you see them just as pawns in a game, friends and foes lose their intrinsic value of just being important on an emotional level. It is only through learning to truly value his partners that Flint can learn how to be a better and more just leader.

Also, this passage in chapter 15 absolutely KILLS me in regards to both Flint, and Thomas Hamilton:

“Men have imagined republics and principalities that never really existed at all. Yet the way men live is so far removed from the way they ought to live that anyone who abandons what is for what should be pursues his downfall rather than his preservation; for a man who strives after goodness in all his acts is sure to come to ruin, since there are so many men who are not good.”

Like bitch!! We get it!! Too much sanity!!! Shut up!!!!!

Anyway, all this to say that you’re absolutely right in seeing parallels between Flint’s style of leadership and a Machiavellian prince - he is absolutely written as a prince-like leader. As are Silver, Rogers, even the Maroon Queen(and Scott and Madi as extensions of her) can be compared to certain rulers in Machiavelli’s archetypes. Even Thomas, who models himself after one of those ‘good emperors’ engenders a type of political leader Machiavelli writes about.

(Also lastly, i want to very quickly point out this guy, Cesare Borgia:

Who was a prince of ‘fortune’ who lost his princedom to trusting the wrong person. What a beard, amirite? What a face. He’s even got the rings! I’m sure this means nothing.)

So basically yeah, Flint is absolutely a Machiavelli bitch. 

#anyway talk dirty morally grey philosophy to me!!! #black sails #james mcgraw #captain flint #machiavelli #black sails meta #milos black sails meta #long post #Anonymous

[mycasandstarrs]

SPN 10x05: “Fan Fiction”

As a former theatre kid, this episode brings me so much joy.

“Ghost? Meet Winchester.”

There’s our girl!

“Where is the Samulet?”

“Oh! I took it off. It kept hitting me in the lips, and...”

“That amulet is the symbol of the Winchesters' brotherly love!”

!!!

“There is too much drama in the drama department.” Well...yeah.

“Why couldn't they just do ‘Godspell’ like good little skanks ? Instead it's this... awful, unbelievable horror story. Hmm! Like that stuff really happens! Huh, theater is about life, you know? Truth! Truth! Where is the truth in ‘Supernatural’?”

What the fuck kind of teacher is this??

I had a theater teacher who told us theatre was magic. I think she would’ve liked Marie’s play about Supernatural.

There she goes.

“I mean, it's close, but it's just.... It needs a little more grrrr!”

Our very special title card.

“Sundown” by Gordon Lightfoot

Our beautiful Baby.

Dean awake before Sam? A shocker.

“A teacher in an all girls school went missing in Flint, Michigan. She was heading to her car, disappeared, and nobody's seen her since.”

“Dean, there's nothing here that even remotely suggest there is a case.”

“There is nothing that even remotely suggest there isn't a case. Boom!”  

Logic!

Hell yes!

Thank you, thank you, thank you Robbie Thompson.

“Ugh, theater kids. Great.”  

“What? I was a theater kid.”

“Barely. You did ‘Our Town’, which was cool. But then, you did that crappy musical.”

“The - ‘Oklahoma’? Hugh Jackman got cast off of ‘Oklahoma’.”

“You ran tech, Wolverine.”

Hey, Techies are just as important as the actors.

They missed the huge banner advertising the show??

hahahaha, their faces are hilarious. Granted, if I found out someone made a musical about my life, I’d be speechless too.

“If there is case... It probably has something to do with all of this.” It has everything to do with it.

Marie, writer/director, and Maeve, the stage manager. (Fun fact: I was a stage manager once! Lots of fun, work, and telling people to shut up and pay attention.)

“I'm Special Agent Smith. This is my partner, Special Agent -”

“Smith.”

“Smith. No relation.”

Again with the joke.

There’s plenty of singing in Supernatural, mostly from you, Dean.

“If there was singing, it would be classic rock. Not this Andrew Floyd Webber crap -”

“Andrew Lloyd Webber.”

Love the improv correction.

Don’t shoot down “Carry on Wayward Son”, Sam.

I also had a theater teacher who went through a divorce.

“Maeve, right? You're the stage manager?”

“And I understudy Jody Mills.”

Maeve would make a great Jody!

“I'm gonna throw up.” Shush, Dean.

“I mean, I gotta say, it's kind of charming. The production value, and the...” I love Sam’s sincere interest tho.

Rule #1: You never touch the props.

“Why are they standing so close together?”

“Um...Reasons.”

“You know they're brothers, right?”

“Well, duh! But... Subtext.”

We gotta address that.

“You know, back when I did tech in school, we had two CD decks-”

“I'm sorry, I have to go sign the delivery.”

Aww Sam! I would love to hear his theater stories.

Pfft, Sam.

“There's no space in Supernatural.” We got close to it...

“Chuck stopped writing after ‘Swan Song’. I just- I couldn't leave it the way that it was! I mean, Dean not hunting anymore, living with Lisa?! Sam, somehow back from Hell, but not with Dean?! So, I wrote my own ending.” I don’t blame her.

“Dean becomes a woman.” Would still wanna see that happen in an episode.

“So, Sam came back from Hell. But without a soul. Then, Cas brought in a bunch of Leviathans from Purgatory. They lost Bobby. And then, Cas and Dean got stuck in Purgatory, Sam hit a dog. They met a prophet named Kevin, they lost him too. Then Sam endured a series of trials, in an attempt to close the gates of Hell. Which nearly cost him his life. Then Dean? Dean became a demon. Knight of Hell, actually.”

S6-9 summary, courtesy of Dean.

Here comes the second hand embarrassment.

“That is some of the worst fan fiction that I've ever heard ! I mean, seriously, I don't know where your friend found this garbage!” Oof, I still don’t like that.

“Siobhan and Kristen are a couple in real life. Although, we do explore the nature of Destiel in act two.”

“Sorry, what?”

“Oh, it's just subtext ! But, then again, you know, you can't spell subtext without.... s-e-x.”

!!!!!

Hi, Jensen.

“I don’t understand.”

“Me either.”

“I mean, shouldn't it be... Deastiel?”

LMAO SAM.

“You know... How about Sastiel? Samstiel?”

“Ok, alright. You know what? You're gonna do that thing, where you just shut the hell up. Forever.”

Teasing brother, Sam.

“This whole musical thing, everything, it's... It's all a coincidence? There is no case?” When is it ever just a coincidence?

“Get in the car!”  

!!!!!!!

BUT HE NEVER DENIED IT THOO, that’s all i’m saying.

“You know, we should've done ‘The Outsiders’, like I told you.”

Maggie’s the second person to get kidnapped.

“I called the cops, and a bunch of adults just told me I have an overactive imagination.” :(

“It is all real. And so are we. I'm Sam Winchester. That's Dean.” NO NO NO.

“You guys are way too old to be Sam or Dean.”

“Oh, yeah!”

“More of a Bobby/Rufus combo? Maybe.”

How old do they think Sam and Dean should be???

“We are what the books called hunters.” They believe that.

First guess: a tulpa.

“How do you kill an idea?”  

“Well, in ‘Hell House’, Sam and Dean burnt the house down, to take out the one tulpa they hunted.”

Correct!

“Gird your loins. It's horrifying.” Umm...okay.

I love how reluctant Marie was to burn her prop.

“What?”

“It’s not a tulpa.”

“Say it one more time, but just a little bit more Arnold--”  

LMAO, Dean.

Calliope.

“According to the lore, Calliope manifests creatures from the story she's tuned into.”

The show must go on.

An understandable panic attack over the possibility of getting eaten.

“Is Marie gonna get eaten?” Shush.

I love when Dean calls people “champ”. It’s so sweet and endearing.

“If Sam and Dean were real, they wouldn't back down from a fight. Especially my sweet, brave, selfless Sam. There's nothing he can't do.” !!!

“I used this for my one-woman ‘Orphan Black’ show, last year.” Marie is the theater kid I would’ve lowkey wanted to be.

“Writer. Director. Actor. I'm gonna Barbra Streisand this bitch.” FUCK YES! KICK IT IN THE ASS!

Dean fixing Stage!Cas’ tie!!

Funny Sam asked for Chuck...

“Oh! I-I, I love him. I do! But honestly, the whole author introducing himself into the narrative thing, it's just not my favorite. I kind of hate the meta stories.” I politely disagree.

“Alright, listen up, girls. Now, you're all here, because you love ‘Supernatural’.”

“Actually, I was hoping we'd do ‘Wicked’.” 

“I want you to get out there, and I want you to stand as close as she wants you to, and I want you to put as much sub and add text, as you possibly can. There is no other road. No other way. No day, but today.”

“Did he just quote ‘Rent’?”

“Not enough to get us into trouble.”

“Ghooooost-facerssss!”  This episode just adds wonderful years to my lifespan.

You know what I would pay to watch this play in full???

“The Road So Far”

There it is.

The misunderstood thumbs up, lmao.

Sam goes bye bye.

Maggie and the teacher.

They were in the school’s basement.

Hello, Calliope.

“I’ll Just Wait Here Then”

Nothing makes me more emotional than seeing the audience fall in love Stage!Cas, much like we did with our real Cas.

“If I have to sit through that second act, one more time... There's robots, and tentacles, and space. I can't even.” lol

“A Single Man Tear”

That exorcism special effect is so wonderful! I can see how they do it now, but from the audience’s POV, it’s absolutely magical.

What the hell did the audience think Dean was doing??

“We're through the looking glass, here, people. Strike the wendigo set, let's prep the priests costumes. And Sarah? Get understudies into hair and makeup.” Maeve’s a A+ stage manager.

“Supernatural has everything. Life. Death. Resurrection. Redemption. But above all, family. All sorts of music you can really tap your toe to. It isn't some meandering piece of genre dreck. It's... epic!” Agreed.

Stage!Dean is a pro if she could keep singing with everything going on in the background.

lmao at the one guy putting on his poncho.

Original Stage!Sam knocks out Calliope.

Understudy!Sam kills the Scarecrow.

Sam kills Calliope. A trifecta of Sam Awesomeness.

RIP Calliope. Killed by Sam.

The audience must be wondering how they managed to do that for years.

“Take a bow, Sammy.” Take a bow too, Dean.

“Thanks for saving my friends.”

“Sure.”

“You know? If you'd cut your hair a little, you'd make a pretty good Dean.”

Aww.

“Dean? You never should've thrown this away.” YYYEEESSS

“It never really worked. And, I don't need a symbol to remind me how I feel about my brother, so...”

“Just take it. Jerk.”

“Bitch.”

I love Dean’s panic when he realizes he just called a teenage girl a “bitch” without meaning to, lmaoo.

Take it away Stage!Winchesters!

Let me tell you, I literally bursted into tears when they started singing “Carry On Wayward Son”. It’s beautifully done.

Starting with Stage!Mary, who is more or less Square 1 of the entire story.

i remember a lot of people being upset about Cas not being part of the family lineup at the end, and I get it. But if Marie was only going off of the first 5 seasons, it makes sense that she didn’t see Cas as family yet because Sam and Dean didn’t see Cas as family yet. They’re just one year shy of that.

BUT the same girl who plays Cas is on stage as Adam, a technical Winchester. You could say Cas took over Adam’s role as the third Winchester “brother” because canonically speaking, that’s the highest title Sam and Dean have given Cas.

“Who's that?”

“Oh, that's Adam. John Winchester's other kid. He's still trapped in the cage, in Hell. With Lucifer.”

lmaooo. Awkward.

“Don’t you cry no more.” I sing, while crying.

I wish he had kept the Samulet Part 2 on there.

A picture perfect ending.

...One last surprise.

“Oh my gosh! But wait... That means that- Calliope came for me or for-?” Did Marie know who he was?

I thought it was Cas...

I legit lost my goddamn mind when I saw him.

A perfect episode of Supernatural, in my most humble opinion.

#supernatural #spn summer rewatch #spn liveblog #spn 10x05 #fan fiction #our 200th episode :')

[woozapooza]

I'm just curious (you can answer privately if you prefer) is the criticism of Silver about how he stopped Flint's war and disposed of him? Or is it more about Madi?

answering this publicly because I’m feeling a lil controversial today (but not so controversial that I’m gonna put this in the tags, and certainly not so controversial that I want to get into a fight)

(oh boy this got Long, perhaps even Longer than the man himself)

The specific posts I saw that prompted me to make that post were about his relationship with/betrayal of Madi, but the thing that annoyed me wasn’t so much what people were saying about that topic as it was about the amount that people focus on these two betrayals, particularly from Flint and Madi’s points of view, as opposed to a) Silver’s point of view and its possible merits and b) the big picture. That was a rather clumsy sentence, so let me clarify.

First of all, I’m not saying that people should not criticize him for his actions in the finale, nor am I denying that he betrayed the two people he was supposedly closest to, nor am I disagreeing with the people who think what he did was wrong (although I don’t fully agree, either). I’m not saying that anyone’s wrong to dislike him. That’s not the problem. The problem is the way people characterize him as weak and selfish in contrast to the brave and noble Madi and Flint without sparing an ounce of compassion for the point of view of a character who has gone through trauma so bad he can’t even talk about it. See, it’s true that Silver lacks Madi and Flint’s devotion to The Cause, and I see why some people see that as a character flaw, but there are two reasons I have trouble viewing it as such.

1. Just because as far as we know (as far as we know!) Silver has never experienced systematic oppression like Flint and Madi does NOT mean that he hasn’t experienced feeling like the world hates him—in fact, we know the opposite is true (“a place of unending horrors”). If he can’t see The Cause as clearly as they can see it, for me the logical conclusion isn’t that he doesn’t have the moral capacity to imagine a better world; it’s that the world has done everything in its power to show him that it will never get better and that the best he can hope for is to grab what little comfort he can and just try to get by. This isn’t to deny that Madi and Flint have suffered, but as another post I read on here said, what happened to Silver is probably a lot more random, a lot less systematic, which is why it’s harder for him to imagine winning a fight to change the world. Madi in particular has grown up in a community where, from what we see of the Maroon island, people work together, protect each other, and thrive. It’s likely that Silver never lived in a community like that. The crew of the Walrus was probably the closest he ever came. This isn’t to say that Madi has some kind of privilege Silver doesn’t have, or to erase the fact that she was literally enslaved! I’m just saying that she and Silver have different experiences that create different views of the world, and it’s unfair to minimize Silver’s experiences, even if we don’t know exactly what they were.

2. There’s this tendency to create this dichotomy between Madi and Flint, who believe in ideals and can see the big picture, and Silver, who has no ideals or principles and only sees what affects him personally. While he is DEFINITELY not as idealistic/ideal-driven as they are, I don’t think it’s accurate to say that he lacks any sort of like…principle guiding his actions. The scene I think of when I think about why I still like Silver after the finale is the part where he says: “This is what it would be. Time after time. Endlessly. The measuring of lives, and loves, and spirits, so that they may be wagered in the grand game. How much ransom can be afforded for the cause? How many casualties can be tolerated for the cause? How much loss? That isn’t a war. That is a fucking nightmare.” (Side note, this speech kinda reminds me about Jack’s speech about all the things that are in the box other than literal money, except it’s also the exact opposite because Jack was saying “we can’t stop now or all these terrible things will have been in vain” whereas Silver is saying “we have to stop because otherwise the terrible things will keep piling up.”) That, to me, doesn’t sound like a man who just wants the thing that makes him happy (Madi) and doesn’t care what’s good for anyone but himself. That sounds like a man who is in fact looking at the big picture, and guess what he sees? More unending horrors! He’s not saying “I have to stop this war for freedom because my girlfriend might die and that would make me sad,” he’s saying “I have to stop this war because war is a horrible thing and we can’t keep disregarding real human suffering just because it’s done in the name of a better world that we’ll probably never live to see anyway because the world and humanity inherently suck.”

What’s sort of weird to me is that people criticize Silver for being self-centered, for refusing to see the big picture that he could be part of, but then they don’t acknowledge the big picture that Silver’s actions are situated in. Yes, he betrayed people he loved, but he didn’t do it just because it was convenient for him; he did it because—in my reading, at least—he thought it was right. Some people make it out to be about Madi and Flint and therefore judge his actions entirely based on their effects on them, when he actually did do it with a bigger picture in mind. (I would argue it’s comparable—not equivalent, just comparable—to many other characters’ terrible actions, such as Flint killing Gates with a bigger picture in mind.) In fact, he knew Madi was likely to resent him, so it’s not like he did it so that he could have a wife! He knew he might be losing Madi forever by saving her life. It was both a selfish act and a selfless one.

ANYWAY all that being said, he did betray Madi and Flint AND he betrayed the cause. What I think bothers people the most is that he took away their agency, and I agree that neither they nor the viewers are under any obligation to ever agree with him. I’m just frustrated by the simplistic, completely unsympathetic takes on both who Silver is and why he did what he did.

Here is a really good post in defense of Silver that I really agree with, and here is another one by the same person.

Anyway yeah them’s my thoughts about that. Again, I’m not saying other people are wrong, so no one kill me, please.

I know you were probably not expecting an essay when you sent this ask but once I got started I just couldn’t stop.

#x #analysis #Anna watches Black Sails #Anna watches tv #RIGHTEOUS DEFENSE OF BELOVED CHARACTER MODE #John Silver was the real treasure all along #Black Sails #John Silver #lyledebeast #ask #I have many thoughts

[trappedinthe18thcentury]

Recap: Black Sails S01e02

Everything comes to its end one day. Even the golden days of piracy. And our protagonists know it well. The main topic of this episode is talking about Afterwards.  

Although Eleanor has a body of a weak and feeble woman, she has the heart and stomach...eh, never mind... I just wanted to say, she is living a quite masculine life. She is a boss, manages her business, and after the working hours, she visits the local brothel and pays for a girl. Like an average male costumer. Well, actually, she isn’t an average customer, she pays so much, that she has "exclusive rights", as we learn it a bit later, when Max gives only a handjob to a man because of the agreement with Eleanor.          

Anyway, the women are lamenting about the main topic of the episode: what if the appear of the Scarborough is the first sign of civilization is coming. (And we know very well from the first episode, it sounds so much more terrifying than “winter is coming”.)   

A pirate’s life can be hard, even after his death. The sailors of Flint’s ship just pissing on Mr. Singleton. ( I mean literally. On his corpse.) Billy can’t believe, what he did and shows the empty paper to Mr. Gates. It looks like not everyone is convinced by Flint of his leadership. There are at least three men who might be planning a mutiny. One of them is the old weird man, Randall who has to work with Silver together in the kitchen, and he just tells Pirate Ken, he doesn’t like thieves. Meanwhile, Mr. Gates realizes the previous cook couldn't commit suicide by just stabbing a blade in his own back. (Haha, it sounds like an old Hungarian joke about a victim of the Soviet KGB, who shot himself in the back while fleeing. ) Silver knows, he has to try to run away. 

Which is not so easy, when you’re on a ship. And she has an accurate accountant, who doesn’t allow you to take a boat. It’s not your turn, boy, you have to wait. Silver won’t wait. 

And....spla-a-a-a-a-a-a-sh-sh-sh-sh-sh.    

Pirate Ken is a funny guy, isn’t he? And obviously, a smart one, because he asks for different directions from different people on the beach. Mr. Gates is just scratching his nice round head, what to do now. Fun fact, the accountant tipped right: Silver wanted to go eagerly to the brothel. But for a totally different reason, everybody might have thought.           

Another everyday scene from the life of a young businesswoman: a misogynist (and also a quite racist) new captain arrives in the harbor and he doesn’t want to make business with Eleanor. She has tits! Horrible! Also, Captain Vane, our Wannabe-Badass-Guy arrives, and I should be maybe more respectful with him because he seemingly has a reputation. After introducing himself to the other captain, the mab changes his mind and agrees on the business with Eleanor. Actually, Vane looks quite normal in the daylight, even humble, while sitting in front of Eleanor and begging for a job. As Jack, the guy with the weird beard ( actually Vane’s quartermaster ) pointed out before, they have not enough information attacking a merchant ship with a really valuable cargo since Eleanor and Vane broke up. Eleanor says it’s not personal, it’s business. ( You can try Eleanor, but they never ever will believe it. Trust me, I know, what about I’m talking, a.k.a. the life of a young businesswoman chapter 124365956925493917)        

By the way, Jack accepted Max’s offer and wants to pay with pearls. It’s the crew members' property. And no here come the...

 Tits? 

What the hell is happening?

Two men are observing two paintings. One of them is an original masterwork, and the other, well.. it's not. But one of the two men can’t spot the difference. He sees tits, fruits, and plants on both of the paintings, and it seems to be enough for him. Probably he wants to sell them as a part of a prey.

 And he is just saying and saying again: fruits - fruits, tits-tits... 

I l-l-love absurd humor. Really.     

So, I have something common with Mr. Gates, who is observing and enjoying the scene. Billy is with him, still concerned about what happened on the ship, but Gates tells him, he did the best he could: he protected the crew. They aren’t here just for fun, the other one, not the Tits-Tits-Man, is a certain Mr. Fraiser, an appraiser. Mr. Gates knows, he must be the key to where to find Silver. And voilá, Mr. Fraiser goes to the brothel to meet Max and Jack. He verifies the value of the pearls. But news travell fast, even when based on false information: Vane wants to stop the business. He "knows", that Flint killed Singleton for the schedule. Jack seems to be a smart guy and puts the pieces of the story (including Flint lying to his own crew) together. But Silver is approximately three seconds smarter than him and he is able to escape from the brothel.  

Meanwhile, Flint tells Eleanor the story of the Urca de Lima and talks about his utopia: with the help of the money, the pirates can settle down and starting a normal life inside of this island. Dear Flint, it sounds like the pirates himself would bring that terrifying civilization into their own life. Anyway, Eleanor has more information than any other, she even realizes, what Max was talking about in the morning, and knows, the girl is ina big trouble. But she refuses to go and starting a new life with here anywhere else. Of course, she would never leave her Miss Bossy life behind her.

From Max’s point of view, it looks like she was betrayed by Eleanor and later she decides to go anyway. She is able to escape from her room, only Anne Bonney, the woman with the big hat follows her. 

In the dark, Vane and Jack want to get the schedule, but Silver only sends messengers with meaningless messages. Of course, the pirates kill them. A bit later Jack lost the pearl by falling into the water.

Also, Billy and Flint arrive at the place and start chasing Silver. At the end, Pirate Ken has no other choice, than memorizing the content of the paper and burning it. Now Flint has a very good reason not to kill him. 

Smart. 

[Sing me a song of a ]... hey, hey, that’s an anachronism, the song about Bonnie Prince Charles couldn’t exist before he was born! I don't really know what Eleanor and Mr. Scott talking about because I’m focusing on the song. Sorry. 

At the end of the episode, a new character is introduced, a lady playing fine music on a harpsichord. A totally exhausted Flint arrives in her home. She says calmly: take off your boots.  

[drivingsideways]

Could you eleborate on your tags in this post? I really like your metas! If it's not too much trouble! /post/163702439009/do-you-think-flint-enjoys-violence

Hi anon! Well, I’m going to try and keep this short, but it’s about Flint. SO. :D 

I think @sidewaystime did a wonderful job of talking about how Flint’s relationship to violence is a complicated thing. What I was responding to was a post series Discourse that seems to be divided at the moment along whether Silver was ‘right’ to do what he did to stop the war or not. A lot of the argument for the “yes” side of that argument seems to rely on painting Flint as someone whose anger was entirely (a) born of reasons personal and (b) completely out of control. 

So let’s address (b) first. There are examples where Flint’s rage *is * out of control: Charlestown comes to mind, the Maria Aleyne, post Charlestown murders. In fact, post Charlestown and until the Maroon Island [i.e. until he resolves something within himself with the help of Dream-Miranda] is the closest I see him as being completely batshit insane with rage/sorrow/despair. But as I see it: at no point during this time is he unaware of the consequences of what he is feeling/ doing either to himself or other people. I bring this up because I think there’s a tendency to read Flint as unaware of his own True Motives. Some of this comes from the Miranda/Flint fight in 2.05  What she says (yells!), is that he hasn’t been “clear” about his goals TO OTHER PEOPLE. A corollary to that is that he hasn’t been open about what led him to this goal. And this is absolutely true. Flint discusses his grand plans with exactly two people before that- Gates and Eleanor, both of whom remain unaware of the tragedy that drove Flint to Nassau. Miranda is saying that without communication he is closing every door to achieving his goal except the one that leads to more violence. And this is where she says -paraphrased- [you are fighting for the sake of fighting, because that’s the only state you can function in]. And I think people have taken that and run with it as though it was an Eternal, Unchanging Truth about James. Although the very next thing that happens in the plot is that he listens to her and chooses a less violent path. 

And that’s the kind of thing I feel gets missed out: all the times he doesn’t choose a violent option even though it exists. Btw, that is a thing he has done from the first episode. Yes, he kills Singleton brutally, but hey, remember the literal first dialogue that we hear from him in the entire series is him putting a stop to his crew murdering someone? He listens to Eleanor, agrees to a dialogue with Vane in S2. He listens to Miranda about Ashe. Eleanor, again, in S4, in the middle of the freaking war, he allows himself to be taken hostage if it means there may be a chance to win the war without excessive bloodshed, even when that decision is hotly contested by his own people. 

This is not a man who is incapable of not choosing violence, it is a man who deploys violence strategically. This is a man capable of swallowing his pride and anger, if he sees a way to achieve his goal without violence. Is the Peaceful Way his first instinct? NO. But is he incapable of taking that path? NO. 

Here’s Flint in 3.10 telling his back story to Silver: 

Flint: Madness is such a hard thing to define, which makes it such an easy label to affix to one’s enemies. Once it had been applied to Thomas, once our relationship had been exposed, defiled, scandalized… everything ended. There were times that I was persuaded to sue for peace since then, but that was the day that on some level I knew… that England was broken… and that sooner or later a good man must resist it. [emphasis mine]

Ok, let’s back up a bit. Earlier in S3, Flint has a chance to end a war before it even starts, an offer he absolutely refuses.  Why does he? 

3.07, On the beach with Governor Rogers: 

Woodes Rogers: Lord Thomas Hamilton. I didn’t know him, but I understand you did. Miss Guthrie tells me you were part of the first effort with Lord Hamilton and Peter Ashe to introduce the pardon to Nassau. As with most things, the men first into the breach bear the heaviest casualties. But in the hindsight of victory, they were the ones whose sacrifice made it possible. Without Lord Hamilton’s efforts, your efforts, it’s likely I wouldn’t have been successful in my efforts to finally secure the pardon. All I have done here is finish what you began. I am now what you were then. And without you, there would be no me.

Flint: Clever.

Woodes Rogers:  Thank you.

Flint: So that’s what this is. We’re all reasonable men, we all want the same thing. You offer me a pardon, I accept it, this all ends? 

Woodes Rogers: Maybe. The pardons are on the table. No one is being hanged. No one’s even being tried. They’ve all been forgiven, just as you wanted. Just as Thomas Hamilton wanted. So what is it that you’re fighting for that I’m not already offering?

Flint: Thomas Hamilton fought to introduce the pardons to make a point. To seek to change England. And he was killed for it. His wife and I went to Charles Town to argue for the pardons, to make peace with England, and she was killed for it.England has shown herself to me. Gnarled and gray… and spiteful of anyone who would find happiness under her rule. [emphasis mine]

So here we go: Flint listens to Woodes Rogers’ proposal- which sounds exactly like what they were working toward just a few months ago?? But this time he refuses it. Because he sees right through it, and he recognizes that there is no possibility of reconciliation that does not include absolute surrender to England’s [”civilization’s”] Rules. The Rules that include continued slavery. That include men like him being condemned and ostracized. Woodes Rogers’ proposal sounds exactly like Thomas Hamilton’s- except that the intent was completely different- Thomas wanted to change the status quo and Rogers intends to preserve it. 

And you know what? He’s fucking right. Because literally the next fucking thing that happens when Flint refuses, is that Woodes Rogers ceases being “reasonable” and  ALSO tries the oldest trick in the book: gaslighting. 

Woodes Rogers: “ Then let us be very clear about something. I am reasonable in seeking peace. But if you insist upon making me your villain, I’ll play the part. So let us assume that, as of this moment, the unqualified pardon is no more. From this moment on, any man participating in the act of high seas piracy will be presumed to be one of your men, an enemy of the state. I will hunt him, I will catch him, and I will hang him. And while I am aware of your feelings on the subject, I am no backwater magistrate cowering in fear of you. You know where to find me. [emphasis mine]

Right: because somehow demanding freedom from slavery is “making [you] a villain”. 

What I mean to say in the above is that: Flint’s refusal to arrive at a compromise with England is not because he’s “out of control”, it’s because he is clear sighted about how systems of power work. He’s cut through all the bs that is “civilization” as per a colonial power and has found it to be rotten to the core. And that is what he pitches to the Maroon Queen: the absolute truth, not just about England (which she knows already) but also about the consequences. There is no certainty about anything- but trying is better than not. 

And now coming back to (a) which is that Flint’s anger is entirely personal. To which my answer is: of course it is. There are people who can devote themselves to larger causes and fight oppressions that they do not themselves experience personally, and I think those kind of people have amazing empathy, and may we all be more like them.

 But the sad truth is a large number of us do not wake up to systemic injustice until we experience it personally. And then what? Are we supposed to sit on our hands and say, ok, this anger of mine is really selfish because it has its beginnings in something awful that happened to me, and now that i recognize it doesn’t just happen to me, it happens to a whole lot of people both like and unlike me, but I’m not going to do anything about it-because maybe I’m playing out my own issues? 

But (i hear you say), this isn’t just about filing a petition on change.org, it’s literally starting a war. 

Ok, first off: I’ve said it before- the war is already on. Slavery is an act of war. Imprisonment of  “sexual deviants” is an act of war by the State on the individual (and larger queer community). Flint and Madi were attempting to change the terms of it. And secondly, let’s give rest to the idea that it was Flint alone who wanted a war. 

Mr.Scott to Madi: 

Mr.Scott: “ I wish you and I had not been so separate all those years.I wish I could have found a way to be a better father to you. But over time, I was determined to leave you something behind, to give you the one thing that no one could ever take away and that would make you strong enough to understand their world, interact with their world, wage war on their world. But if their identity lies in their stories, I wanted you to know them so that when we are ready to call them enemies, you would be ready for it.”  [emphasis mine]

This is an absolute recognition of what I was saying before: the war was ongoing. Mr.Scott and the Maroon Queen have spent a lifetime to prepare Madi to respond to the war on their people. In Flint, the Maroons had finally found an ally that could actually help them get somewhere. 

And as for Flint, the discovery of the Maroon Island led to another realization: and that was he no longer has to wage war alone. That there is solidarity to be had.  And that came at the end of the period where he was at his most self-destructively lonely. And having found himself on relatively stable ground again, he’s able to both articulate the effect and the use of rage/hatred. 

Here’s a conversation with Silver, in 3.09 about the punishment meted to Dobbs (over attacking one of the Maroon Crew)

Flint: That’s not why you did it.

Silver: Really? Would you like to tell me why I did it, then? 

Flint: Well, I wasn’t there, but, um, I’d hazard the guess that you learned of what had happened, told him how fucking stupid he was, and in that moment, he gave you a look that amounted to something less than contrite. And in that moment, you felt it. 

Silver: Felt what? 

Flint: Darkness. Hate. Showing indifference to the authority that you sacrificed so much to acquire, disdain for refusing to acknowledge that his actions, had you not intervened, would have led to an outcome that he would have held you responsible for reversing. Pride. Questioning what kind of man you are if you don’t seek retribution for the offense.

Silver:  So what are you saying? You saying I went too far with him?

Flint:  Maybe you went too far. Maybe you didn’t go far enough. Maybe you did it just right. The point is that while you were doing it, you heard a voice telling you that disciplining him would prevent him from repeating the offense, a voice that sounded like reason, and there was reason to it, as the most compelling lies are comprised almost entirely of the truth. But that’s what it does. Cloaks itself in whatever it must to move you to action. And the more you deny its presence, the more powerful it gets, and the more likely it is to consume you entirely without you ever even knowing it was there. Now, if you and I are to lead these men together, you must learn to know its presence well so that you may use it… Rather than it use you.  [emphasis mine]

Silver: You have some experience with this, I imagine, living in fear of such a thing within you? 

Flint: Yeah, I do.

Silver:  I can’t tell if this was a warning or a welcome.

To repeat: this is not a man who is wandering around in blind, selfish rage that’s indiscriminately targeted and can only be quenched by blood. This is a man who’s been through hell and come out on the other side, and then says “I cannot believe we’re as poorly made as that”. Which makes me want to burst into tears, even as I type this. 

 OK WOW. I NEED TO STOP. I’m not sure if this is what you wanted to hear, anon. :) 

#replies #Anonymous #james flint #this got completely out of control #sorry anon

[stilljumpingback]

(via Black Sails Episode 209 - XVII)

Black Sails Episode 209 - XVII RECAP

WELL-FORMED THOUGHTS

“When I first met Mr. Gates and he asked me my name, I feared the man I was about to create.  I feared that someone born of such dark things would consume me were I not careful, and I was determined only to wear him for a while and then dispose of him when his purpose was complete.  Am I ready to let him go?  Truth is every day I’ve worn that name I’ve hated him a little more.  I’ve been ready to return him to the sea for a long time.”

The cognitive dissonance that is being James McGraw/James Flint.  This revelation, that he hated being Captain Flint, is a gut-punch, even though we saw the first hints of it in his conversation with Silver about whether he was viewed as a villain.  But this depth of self-hatred?  WOW, it is horrible.

It must be agonizing to feed the darkest parts of yourself (we know James McGraw had a violence in him that was “darker and wilder” than other men’s), to intentionally develop that darkness when every other part of you wants to stop.  It must be confusing to fear being consumed by that darkness while also loving what that darkness makes you capable of doing, to hate yourself for loving it.

James McGraw:  the most tragic figure in all existence, about to become even more tragic.

FRAGMENTED THOUGHTS

Poor Eleanor.  It must be awful to grieve a confusing loss AND put up with people who are Performing Grief in order to impress you or size up your strength.  Even more awful when the woman you used to love pretends to understand, but she’s just sizing you up too.

How unbelievably sexy is it that Flint became captain of a pirate crew in less than four months?  How perfect it is that he became captain by “being someone worth listening to”?

How unbelievably weird is it to see Flint as the calming influence?? His hand on Miranda’s back.  

“We were angry.  We allowed that anger to drive us to a dark deed.  But I ask you not to judge me by that one deed.  Judge me by the ends that I have come here in service of.”

James’s acceptance of his sins but request to be viewed as more than them reminds me of Eleanor’s statement in 208: “I have done what I’ve done and I will live with it.  But do not for a moment believe that that defines me.”  They really are so similar.

Billy saying “You’re all good people” to his crew is HILARIOUS (but no LOL section for this episode because NO ONE DESERVES TO LAUGH after Miranda’s murder.

The hope that shines in Flint’s eyes when Peter first entertains their plan – OH it’s painful now.

RIP Randall.    This is the second time the Ranger crew has boarded a ship by water just this season.  Someone really should be keeping better tabs on them.

BILLY VS. VANE, wow!!

Silver is so good at producing solutions out of impossible situations.  When Vincent asks if Silver is saving the two of them or the whole crew, Silver doesn’t answer.  He doesn’t know either.

Eleanor’s emphatic assertion that she’s not a pirate felt jarring to me at first. But Vane confirmed her worst fears that pirates, no matter how much they say they love you, will murder your father if you take something valuable from them.  BRB CRYING FOREVER.  Of course she wants to eradicate piracy with a vengeance.

Anne comes back just in the nick of time, because Jack and Featherstone would literally be dead without her.  Her reunion with Jack is lovely.  She apologizes, and he looks so scared to approach her too quickly, unsure of who she is and where he stands with her.

It’s very satisfying that as Max, Jack, and Featherstone hesitate, Anne is the one to set their pursuit of the Urca gold in motion.  She’s found herself, and therefore her confidence.

The conversation between Vane and Billy is lovely.  Shockingly sad to hear him call Billy “Mr. Gates’s boy,” and shockingly perfect to hear that Vane recognizes Billy’s “proper pirate”ness and has long wanted him on his own crew.

Silver is helping Flint’s crew survive, Billy is convincing Vane to help Flint.  We might as well rename the show Black Sails: the Story of a Bunch of People Who Hate Flint But Find Themselves Helping Him Regardless

It’s ironic that the story Peter wants Flint to tell Whitehall, the true story, is one that made us as viewers see him as Bigger and More, but it’s a story that will make Asshole London think of him as small.

Am I reading too much into the fact that an angry woman gets killed for speaking her mind in a world that values submissive, supportive women?  Feels a little on the nose to me.  I see what you’re doing, showrunners!

I don’t like Peter, but I do think his plan is genuine.  I think he regrets his past actions and has convinced himself that it was his only choice (“a hard choice”).  I think he does still want the redemption of Nassau and will work with James and Miranda to accomplish it, even if his plan keeps himself above questioning while submitting James to humiliation.  The Turning Point when he becomes a villain is when Miranda is murdered and his solution to this is to publicly try and hang Flint.

“You wish to return to civilization, THAT is what civilization is.”

Major props to Vane for seeing the bigger picture so quickly.  He trusted Billy’s experience, and when it was substantiated, he realized that his only option is to do a 180 and rescue Flint.  This Vane is so much more interesting than selfish “show me my future in this room” Vane.

“Nassau is strongest when she is feared.  And if what promises to happen here tomorrow actually happens, a trophy made of one of her most notorious captains, she may never be feared again.  So I suggest we do something about this.  I suggest we get him the hell out of there.”

#Black Sails #blacksails #209 #s02e09 #XVII #episode review #episode recap #Captain Flint #James McGraw #Miranda Barlow #Miranda Hamilton #Peter Ashe #Eleanor Guthrie #Charles Vane #Billy Bones #John Silver #Anny Bonny #Jack Rackham #Max #Featherstone #RIP #one of the absolute best episodes

[mst3kproject]

Short: A Case of Spring Fever

MST3K featured a number of movies, such as The Starfighters and last week's Squirm, that were simply not memorable.  They also did a number of movies and shorts that were deeply memorable, but for all the wrongest possible reasons.  Mr. B Natural was one of those, and A Case of Spring Fever is another.  Both were intended to be whimsical and each, in its own way, ended up being fucking terrifying instead.

The point of A Case of Spring Fever is to explain how springs work and how essential they are to daily life – particularly to automobiles.  Our hero, I guess, is Gilbert, a man whose wife wants him to fix the couch before he goes golfing.  When he complains that he never wants to see another spring again, a cartoon imp called Coily the Spring Sprite appears and grants his wish.  Gilbert quickly realizes that things like his watch and car won't work without springs, and begs Coily to restore them.  He then becomes a sort of spring evangelist, and spends the entirety of his golfing trip prostelytizing to his increasingly annoyed friends about how useful springs are until they never want to see another spring again!

The film is meant to be light-hearted and educational, and possibly to sell us cars, but it lends itself immediately to dark and horrible interpretations.  Mike and the Bots spend the short and the subsequent skit about Mikey the Mike Sprite wondering how the rules of this universe work.  Does every man-made object have a little pixie waiting to snatch it away from us?  Have such creatures existed from the dawn of time, anticipating that they will someday be discovered, or did Coily (I'm so sorry) spring into being with the invention of the first spring?  Was it only Gilbert who was suddenly spring-less, or did everybody else, too, find their watches stopped and their mattresses bounce-less with no explanation?  If it was everybody, was that everybody on Earth, or did it extend to aliens who could theoretically visit us and bring their springs with them?  Would it be possible to make another spring after Coily took them away, or would any new spring vanish as soon as it was finished?  What happened to the Law of Conservation of Mass as all spring-shaped matter just vanished from the universe?

People would think of questions like these no matter whether the short itself were successful in entertaining and educating us, but the fact that we dwell on them illustrates that it is in fact a failure.  Did anybody spend The Lord of the Rings wondering whether Saruman used to be gray and had to be killed by a Balrog before coming back as Saruman the White? Well, actually, yeah, I'm sure somebody did (it may have been me), but those people's friends probably (definitely) told them to shut up and watch the damn movie.  The film itself was more interesting and entertaining than such questions.  In A Case of Spring Fever, the questions distract us because the short can't hold our attention.

(I do know how the Maiar work, by the way. Please don't feel like you have to explain it to me.)

But that doesn't tell us why A Case of Spring Fever is so memorably distressing.  I've seen weirder stuff on TV than Coily the Spring Sprite and it didn't stick in my mind like this short does – and some of that was supposed to be messed-up.  What is going on here?

The most obvious thing is Coily himself. You don't forget Coily.  He appears as a little cartoon helix with curly lines for arms and legs and a head that looks like it belongs to a bad-tempered Christmas elf.  When he speaks, it's in a squeaky, grating old man voice.  Every time Gilbert realizes some springless device won't work, Coily appears and shrieks “no spriiiings!” in a mocking tone before vanishing again, until our hapless protagonist is forced to take back his wish or go insane.

Coily is neither well-animated nor appealing in appearance.  His gestures are repetitive and he never really looks like he's part of the environment – perhaps he's not supposed to, since he does represent an outside, supernatural force, but it's more likely that the animation was just cheap and primitive.  At least some effort was made to make sure the actor playing Gilbert looks in the right direction.  I think Coily was meant to be cute, but his long nose, pointed ears, buck teeth, and spiteful expression are almost demonic, and his attitude definitely so.  There's something downright nightmarish about the way he pops up to mock as Gilbert grows ever more frustrated.  He is literally torturing his victim into compliance.

As Crow observes when he asks how this all fits into 'God's plan for us', Coily is also a very pagan little bugger.  In ancient Greece and Rome, people believed that both natural and man-made objects had their own guardian gods or spirits.  Iuturna, for example, was the Roman goddess of fountains, and Ianus the god of doors and gates (Wikipedia lists Fons as the god of springs, but they mean the water type).  One of the ways early Christianity tried to discourage worship of these gods was by portraying them as demons.  Coily, a spirit with a restricted area of responsibility, who must be appeased with devotion or else will lash out and punish people, is just such an entity.

Scholars in the Middle Ages wrote books about the complex hierarchy among the legions of hell.  I wonder where Coily fits into those.

Even more disturbing is how the encounter with Coily changes Gilbert.  We don't get to know Gilbert very well, but the brief glimpse we have of him is of somebody impatient and a bit lazy, eager for an excuse to avoid his chores and go play golf.  When he takes back his wish for no more springs, the film cuts abruptly from Gilbert in the car to Gilbert under the sofa again, which could be interpreted to mean that the last few minutes were only a dream... but then we find Gilbert utterly transformed.  Rather than relaxing and enjoying the golf game, he spends the entire afternoon telling his friends about springs, giving even more examples of their ubiquity and usefulness than we already got from Coily.  He doesn't act like somebody who just woke from a nightmare.  Instead, the nightmare seems to intensify as Gilbert loses his own personality and identity, leaving only an obsession with springs! It seems that Coily has brainwashed Gilbert, or perhaps even possesses his body.  That would explain why he suddenly knows so much about how springs work and the many other areas of life they are important to.  He has become a puppet under Coily's control, spreading the cult of springs for some dark purpose.

I'm kidding.  I think.

Another source of unintentional horror is how A Case of Spring Fever reminds us that our society takes a lot of important things for granted. The lives of first-world urbanites revolve around a number of services that could theoretically be pulled out from under us at any moment. Running water is a good example – when I was younger, the water main on the street where I lived broke, and my family had to get our water from a tank truck at the end of the street for a few days while they fixed it.  During that time basic things like cooking, washing, and even using the toilet were of course far more inconvenient and time-consuming than we were used to and you can bet it made us appreciate how much we take water for granted... until about an hour and a half after it came back on.  Electricity is probably an even better illustration: we don't realize just how much our lives depend on it until the power goes out and we're left not knowing what to do with ourselves until it comes back on.

It's not possible for every single spring on the planet to suddenly evaporate, but things like electricity and water can.  A large solar flare could theoretically kill the power grid over huge areas and the damage might take weeks or months to repair (as those who survived Hurricane Sandy can attest).  There are places even in North America where infrastructure problems have left people without clean water for years – Flint, Michigan is only the most famous example.  Not to mention those of us who are dependent on medications or some other survival aid that makes contemplating the zombie apocalypse way less fun.  The world humans have built for ourselves is fragile, and we don't like being reminded of that.

A Case of Spring Fever is something the Brains had kicking around for quite a long time before they found an opportunity to use it – they referenced it in both Viking Women and the Sea Serpent and Bride of the Monster.  These skits couldn't have made much sense to the viewers who hadn't yet seen the short, but the host sketches often didn't make much sense anyway – it must have been a relevation when A Case of Spring Fever finally aired.  I suspect they put it in front of Squirm because they knew they were being cancelled and this was their last chance to get it on the show.  I'm glad they did.

I can think of a few other shorts that manage to be fucked-up and fascinating enough that I'll probably end up reviewing them.  Days of Our Years (appearing before The Amazing Transparent Man) comes to mind, as does Design for Dreaming (from Twelve to the Moon).  I may even try to track down the entire runs of things like Radar Men from the Moon and Undersea Kingdom, though I'll probably be sorry I did.  Wish me luck.

#mst3k #reviews #a case of spring fever #40s

[yenneferw]

For the character thing: Oswald (Gotham), Max, Anne, Jack, Thomas, John, James, and Billy (Black Sails), and the Doctor :D (il your blog)

tAww thank you! :-D And thank you for all the characters! Sorry for answering this so late lol

Also I didn’t even realize I wasn’t doing it in order I just saw James’s name and I fuckin went for it lol oops

Aaaalso sorry it’s so long I have a lot of feelings

Oswald Cobblepot:

Why I like them: Oswald’s such a cute little fuck and he’s very devious and the underdog so I latched onto him early on and he’s one of the only things left about Gotham that doesn’t make me sad after all the queerbaiting 

Why I don’t: I really didn’t care for when they always had his teeth dirty that was,,,,,,,,,,, too much. Also some of his hairstyles have been a bit more questionable than others. Also the fact that he was made canonically gay just to queerbait like yay a gay guy but,,,,,,, meh 

Favorite episode (scene if movie): It’s been a bit since I watched it but the episode where he was pining over Ed and trying to tell him he loved him was a good one for him he looked cute and I liked his plight 

Favorite season/movie: I really liked his rise to power in season 1 and if I remember correctly he finally ended up somewhere in the end after all the shit with the gangs so that was really cool 

Favorite line: I can’t think of one right now but I’ll make up for it with my favorite Look ™ which is how he’s always able to look like he’s kind of on the verge of tears

Favorite outfit: Idk anytime he’s wearing a suit is good

OTP: Os and Ed obvs 

Brotp: Mmmmmm idk him and Ivy seem cool as friends even tho I haven’t watched in a while

Head Canon: don’t ask me headcanons,,,,,, i’m so bad at headcanons a lot of the time

Unpopular opinion: I don’t know the fandom well enough lol i’m bad at his

A wish: Nygmobblepot,,,,,, alas,,,,, which isn’t to say it’s bad to hold out hope but i’m so cynical and bitter :-/

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: Death, heterosexuality

5 words to best describe them: clever, manipulative, ambitious, cowardly (but shh it’s okay he’s not always cowardly), vengeful 

My nickname for them: Os I love when ppl call him Os lol

James Flint:

Why I like them: do you want me to write a book,,,,, I love him so goddamn much it hurts…….. He’s just so smart and he deserves so many hugs, he’s a gay icon, he tries so hard to do right even tho he’s a fuckin murderous pirate, he’s a murderous pirate that likes his books and his tea and gardening with his best friend, his eyes are the prettiest things on god’s green earth….. love him 

Why I don’t: not applicable I refuse to insult my boy lmao

Favorite episode (scene if movie): Probably the one where Miranda died or the one right after bc Toby Stephens is such a good actor and also he fuckin burned the town down for hurting his best friend and??? goals. Or the last couple of episodes bc that shit iwth John………… and then the reuniting with Thomas………… wow

Favorite season/movie: I really liked his rise back to the top from season 2 bc it makes me sad to see him failing and he starts going on a mad and grieving downward spiral after season 2

Favorite line: “This ends when I grant them my forgiveness, not the other way around” I’m sure there are more bc his speeches are all beautiful (like the “there be dragons one”……. kill me) 

Favorite outfit: Everything he wears is perfect 

OTP: flinthamilton is literally the only thing that waters my crops anymore, although silverflint gives them a nice solid rain every once in a while and is hella valid too

Brotp: James and Miranda is so beautiful that I regularly cry about them but I also liked when James and Madi were teaming up

Head Canon: He and Thomas break out of the plantation and become feared pirates again, also he was dating John and Gates lmao

Unpopular opinion: He’s gay and not bi like not for bi erasure or anything but like he just gives me such a gay feel you know what I mean. And also I don’t think what he had with Miranda was really anything 

A wish: for him and Thomas to be happy 

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: for him and thomas to be sad lmao

5 words to best describe them: Intelligent, vengeful, loving, sad, amazing,,,,

My nickname for them: idk I don’t have nicknames I guess I always call him James and not Flint and it seems like a lot of people just call him Flint lol (also “lvoe of my life” does that count)

Max:

Why I like them: oh my god. oh dear i love her. When will your fave. She’s so brave and smart and loving??? like I called James loving but Max is on another level. She’s so protective of the people and the things she cares abotu and loves, and she’s so fucking smart. And she’s so brave to pursue everything she wants to pursue, like she’s a wlw of color in the 1700s and yet she still rules Nassau without giving any fucks about conventions and shit

Why I don’t: oh man is there a reason. I don’t like that she went to Woodes Rogers’s side for a while and betrayed Anne and Jack but I understand why she did so I’m not angry with her for it

Favorite episode (scene if movie): whenever she walks on screen,,,, but idk I can’t think of anything specifically but I liked it when she took over Nassau from Eleanor 

Favorite season/movie: I liked her arc in season 4 even if I really didn’t like all the decisions she made, and I really liked how she ended up in the end so probably season 4

Favorite line: she’s so smart and wise so like everything she says but also I really like her speech to Anne “I am so sorry for working so hard to protect the wrong things, for failing to see that there is nothing important that does not include you” 

Favorite outfit: that yellow dress oh my god! does anyone else remember that yellow dress! it was so pretty she looked so pretty! She has really good style in general but I love that yellow dress 

OTP: Maxanne

Brotp: Her friendship with Idelle is nice and also I like her friendship with Jack

Head Canon: again I’m so bad at headcanons

Unpopular opinion: I don’t think I do

A wish: For her to rule Nassau and continue dating the love of her life Anne Bonny and support her piracy and have her position in Nassau fully supported by everyone alive 

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: death? sadness? she deserves literally the best all the time

5 words to best describe them: compassionate, perceptive, brave, honest, wonderfulbeautifulgorgeous i love her

My nickname for them:I don’t have one for her

Anne Bonny:

Why I like them: She’s amazing honestly I love her sailor’s mouth and I love her bravery and her principles and how logical she is. And I love how kickass she is and how she’ll do anything for the people she loves and I love when she stops being guarded around people and her face Softens, I’m gay for how she looks out from under the brim of her hat 

Why I don’t: I honestly can’t think of a reason……. ok I guess I don’t like that she got violent with Max in the beginning when she was having her gay crisis and like killed Idelle’s friend…….. but honestly reblog if you get murderously violent while having a gay crisis

Favorite episode (scene if movie): I can’t think of something specifically but like when she was with Max and they were just soft and dating that is my reason for waking up in the morning, AND when she saved the ship with the glass and all god wow i died

Favorite season/movie: Mmmm season 2 was prime maxanne season wasn’t it…….. good shit

Favorite line: I can’t think of any rn but wow every time she opens her mouth it’s a gift

Favorite outfit: idk generally her pirate outfit? and her hat is amazing

OTP: Maxanneeeee

Brotp: her friendship with Jack is something I would die for they make me so happy

Head Canon: I don’t know that I have any idk maybe that she and Max are still dating after the show ends?

Unpopular opinion: I don’t know that I have one about Anne

A wish: That she’s happy with Max and potentially Mark/Mary too if she wants to be

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: Being unhappy,,, not being with Max or Jack,,

5 words to best describe them: strong, logical, angry, devoted, the world “fuck” 

My nickname for them: I don’t have one for her

Jack Rackham:

Why I like them: he’s so funny and I really like his goals and his arc like he starts out as this guy who just wants his name remembered and that’s still him in the end and I like that that goal doesn’t change, but he finally gets to be the single pirate captain in Nassau which is really cool for him, and he’s also super smart I love him

Why I don’t: I didn’t like his first reactions to Anne and Max, he was kind of a dick about it, but I’m glad that he eventually accepted them and got closer to Max and all

Favorite episode (scene if movie): I liked his scenes with Blackbeard and I also like his earlier scenes where he’s more comic relief-y and I really like when he gets to be a Pirate Captain Dude, that’s not an episode but I just like these particular moments with him. I really liked when that one girl at the Guthries’ was like “Do you know Captain Jack Rackham????” and he was like…………………….. i’ve made it guys

Favorite season/movie: Mmmmm honestly Jack is really consistently awesome throughout like so is everyone else but he’s really well-characterized and grows a lot throughout and I can’t really pick which season of him I like the best

Favorite line: there are so many “if you’re all going to act like children, then I will be your daddy” it’s not my favorite but it plagues me every waking moment of my life and I can’t ever escape it, to rogers: “you and I were neck and neck in this race til the end. But, jesus, did I make up a lot of ground to catch you,” and I really like his speech to Teach about Vane but I can’t find it for the life of me

Favorite outfit: man all of them, Jack Rackham is the most extra well-dressed man in Nassau

OTP: Jack and happiness…….. 

Brotp: if anyone answers this with anything other than Jack and Anne then I’m not sure they watched the same show like to each their own but I can’t imagine a life where their friendship isn’t my fuel

Head Canon: he had a major crush on Charles Vane. I don’t always love Charles Vane so I think he could’ve done better but he definitely had a crush on him

Unpopular opinion: again I don’t think I have one I”m not good at this

A wish: for him to be the most feared pirate around just like he wants to be i’m so proud of him

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: for him to be hanged or something especially if it was in front of anne or for him to have to watch anne die

5 words to best describe them: cunning, ambitious, sarcastic, idealist, stubborn

My nickname for them: i don’t have one but like….. another love of my life….. actually everyone that anon asked me about is one of the lvoes of my life anon must know me well

Thomas Hamilton:

Why I like them: oh my heck he’s beautiful. He has such a good heart and such a good vision of the world. He wants things to be so good and the world doesn’t deserve him at all. He’s so caring and loving and gentle and understanding and he just wants to see a world where people aren’t afraid of him and his sexuality and people aren’t afraid of pirates because he understands that a lot of them are just people who society has really hurt like James turned out to be, he’s such a good leader and if England didn’t suck he could’ve done so much

Why I don’t: the wig that’s all that wig killed me like I don’t even like regular wigs but that big ass brown wig haunts me

Favorite episode (scene if movie): the flashback scenes even tho it’s very short they kill me. His smile as he looks at James. I too would go to war with society over that smile 

Favorite season/movie: lol i mean he’s really only in season 2 unfortunately for us all. That little bit in season 4 is revolutionary but season 2

Favorite line: I feel like I’m not gay enough if I don’t say “Know no shame” bc god can you get a better gay line than that I’m in love

Favorite outfit: anything but the fucking brown wig I’m sickened by that wig

OTP: flinthamilton is unbury your gays, straightbait, and overall beautiful so like………. gay icons

Brotp: his and Miranda’s relationship was not as characterized as James and Miranda obviously so I’m not as undyingly in love with them but they were super good and I’m sure they were just as good as James and Miranda but for obvious reasons that wasn���t onscreen as much

Head Canon: he becomes a pirate dude with James after escaping the plantation no one can convicne me otherwise

Unpopular opinion: I don’t think so 

A wish: for him to just live in peace and for him in another universe to actually get everything he wants out of life

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: what if he had actually died. my heart hurts. why did i type those disgusting words

5 words to best describe them: visionary, optimistic, sympathetic, intelligent, twink extraordinaire. that’s six words you say? how can you counter twink extraordinaire 

My nickname for them: my boy james’s SOULMATE

John Silver:

Why I like them: He’s so…………. like I like his self preservation and I fucking LOVE his characterization and his journey from selfish coward to selfless leader, he might be the best characterized character in this show like the show is really really good at characterization but John Silver obviously had a long way to go to become Long John Silver and He Did That. He’s also so sweet and soft sometimes and I love his curly hair

Why I don’t: I just………. my heart is always with James so when he sort of went the opposite ways I couldn’t help but be on James’s side….. like I still love him and understand his view……. but i’m sad

Favorite episode (scene if movie): I really like the episode where he starts talking shit at dinner to the entire crew and outing that guy for fucking a goat and I also really like the episode where he loses his leg and I really liek the last couple of episodes. I just like a lot of him ok he’s great

Favorite season/movie: I like the beginning of his Long John Silver story when he redeems himself to the crew in season 2 but I also like his coming into Long John Silver in season 4

Favorite line: oh my god he says a lot of good things but I don’t know who I would be if I didn’t say “I will stand here with you, for an hour, a day, a year while you find a way to accept this outcome so we might leave here together” and then the parallel speech to Madi…….. I’m alive and living and this is going to kill me

Favorite outfit: anything but his beginning blue jacket that jacket is the worst lol

OTP: silverflint or him and Madi

Brotp: before Billy…… was cancelled, him and Billy were good buds and I liked it

Head Canon: that he dated that one guy who drowned with the goat Muldoon or something 

Unpopular opinion: do people like his blue jacket? I hate it

A wish: that he can at least be happy with Madi at the end and their relationship is eventually fixed which I think the thing on the cliff alludes to

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: death…… sadness…….

5 words to best describe them: manipulative, secretive, loving, enduring, perceptive as fuck

My nickname for them: none but what if everybody called him Johnny

Billy Bones:

Why I like them: ok have you seen him. he’s so handsome CHRIST. But also he’s always like the voice of reason which is really nice up until season 4. I think I latched onto him bc I already really liked Tom Hopper because of Merlin but he’s also pretty strong in the face of torture and everything he stands for being turned against on his ship, even if it’s not always what I stand for

Why I don’t: season 4? I don’t know her. Also he doesn’t like James and I. would die for James

Favorite episode (scene if movie): I liked it when he was quartermaster for a bit he was a p good quartermaster in season 1 and I also liked the episodes where he “made” Long John Silver and Captain Flint

Favorite season/movie: Idk probably season 1 bc that is when things are still gentle…… innocent…….. good…..

Favorite line: the fuck tent line is iconic. “perhaps we can all agree to forgo, you know, just this once, a fuck tent” when will your fave

Favorite outfit: shirtless 

OTP: idk he definitely dated Ben Gunn js

Brotp: him and Gates

Head Canon: he is asexual as fuck have you ever met him? asexual biromantic. sorry i make the rules and I stick by them 

Unpopular opinion: this isn’t an unpopular opinion i’m sure but billy after s3 can choke. before s3 he’s fine. after…… don’t talk to me about that 

A wish:for him to come to his fucking senses and stop being a horrible idiot

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: for him to stay a fuck lik ehe was at the end fo s4

5 words to best describe them: headstrong, loyal, sentimental, ideological, determined

My nickname for them: i dont’ have one but can you imagine if ppl called him bilbo 

The Doctor:

Why I like them: I mean this really depends on which Doctor you know? this one’s probably going to be long bc I’m gonna do a bit about all the new whos. So 9 I like because he’s very brave and determined in the face of everything he just lost and because he has such a good heart when he easily could have been so cold. And when he is faced with how he has hardened some, he always works on getting better and being a better person. also idfk but like christopher eccleston is all of our uncles who brings us the cool like $20 iTunes cards. 10 I like because he’s so loving that it kind of ruins him. Like that kind of is the way of the Doctor but he just keeps on loving and loving and loving until he’s traveling alone desperately looking for some fun and some companionship so he doesn’t have to feel the hurt of Rose and Donna and doesn’t have to feel how badly he misses Martha. He’s like. He’s like the guy that goes and gives you a giant bag full of shit that would suck if you just got it alone but in bulk like deodorant and tissues and socks and shit. 11 I like because he’s very fierce and fiercely protective but also silly and fun like I like how he can be bouncy and stuff and then the next moment he’s been quiet and scary or loud and scary or gentle and wise. 11 forgot to get everyone anything but he’s the main source of laughter so everybody pretends they’re not disappointed bc his gifts are usually cool. 12 I like because. Eyebrows. But also because he’s a lot different than other Doctors like hte Doctor tends to do morally ambiguous things sometimes but it feels like 12 is so much more morally ambiguous than others. He’s angry about everything that’s been done to him and he feels grief from things he hasn’t thought about in a while and it’s an interesting and different twist on him. 12 intentionally got everyone nothing and ate all the vegetables and left. why am i relating them to christmas? i’m materialistic 

Why I don’t: I don’t feel like going that in depth again but I’ll just say I don’t like how Moffat’s Doctors become what the story is about. The story I feel like is supposed to be about not only the Doctor, but the story and the companions, but Moffat’s Doctors are so much the centerpoint of the story that it loses some of the really really cool things from RTD’s era and some of the spirit of the Doctor. moffat is why my farm animals have all run away 

Favorite episode (scene if movie): this is really hard lmao. I’m gonna pick an episode a Doctor. 9- The Empty Child and The Doctor Dances. I like “Everybody lives!” that’s the best. 10- Midnight. That acting tho and really seeing 10 scared and helpless is something different and really cool. Also The End of Time bc it’s literally the best episode of anything in existence. 11- Idk I can’t really decide. Maybe “The Big Bang.” I love 11 but for the life of me I can’t ermember a fave ep. 12- I’ve onyl seen s8 and part of s9 but I like that one episode where the Doctor thinks he’s dying with Missy I can’t remember what it’s called

Favorite season/movie: 9 lol he only has one. 10- 2 or 3 I really can’t decide. 11- 5. 12- I’ve only seen 8 fully lol

Favorite line: that requires…… so much thought and so much work. They say a lot of cool things. The Doctor is all about speeches and one-liners lol

Favorite outfit: 11 has the best outfit ngl but 10′s is a close second

OTP: Rose and 10 obvs who doesn’t love them, I mean River and the Doctor have always been good, idk my otps for Doctor Who usually involve companions and their partners

Brotp: all the companions every single one of them I’m alive. have you ever met amy pond. have you ever met martha jones or donna noble. have you ever MET jack harkness 

Head Canon: I have……….. a lot I feel like i couldn’t type all of them up first of all the doctor is gay so jot that down

Unpopular opinion: mmmmmm I’m sure i have some but I can’tt think of them 

A wish: FOR THE DOCTOR TO BE ANYTHING BUT A STRAIGHT WHITE MAN

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen: for 13 to be a straight white man or for Chibnall to be as bad as Moffat :-/

5 words to best describe them: genius, kind, hopeful, loving, vengeful

My nickname for them: I don’t know that I have any but I might that I’m not remembering

#anon #ask meme #ask

[slowlyandrogynousmiracle]

Long Ass Rant About Black Sails/LJS/Flint/Madi and Why Treasure Island is the God in which The BS Producers are Honoring....

Look, seriously, I can be an ass when people make me but I’m going to say my last piece ( probably not lol) on current events happening in Black Sails. This show was never about ships though as with all shows one starts shipping. The Silver/Flint fandom has had dominance for two years and midway through in pops Madi...John Silver’s actual love interest from the books and people are either ok and rolling with this or ignorant, bitter, and using the most transparents excuses available to devalue her meaning not only to the story but the Flint. She’s the one “ getting in the way” making Silver “ do things he wouldn’t” when that is so far removed from the truth I realize that a great deal of these people have championed and rallied behind this ship so long that they literally have had two years of warping the story in their head without much direct competition from the idea. I get that. I actually do. I recently had my heart shattered by Bamon but like Silver/Flint I clearly saw what the show kept saying but I chose to ignore it because I had hope they would put these two together but they didn’t. 

I’m not in anybody’s tag screaming bloody murder. Actually this is the first time I have even brought up my disappointment because in the end I am an adult and despite me being salty af about it I also know that the show didn’t really deceive me when I step back and actually look at it. They kept hammering nauseatingly that Delena was endgame and that Bonnie and Damon were best friends. I wanted something else. The writers however were ALWAYS (grrr) telling a different story and I am mature enough to accept this despite all the million reasons I can list that make my ship more valid. It doesn’t matter. TVD doesn’t owe me anything. Black Sails does not owe the Silver/Flint fandom anything.

This show was constructed around the mysteries in Treasure Island. It does bother me that a great deal of people don’t even comprehend the character LJS. You don’t have to read the book to know that he is the most infamous pirate for a great deal of reasons. One being his ruthlessness but that is attributed to his cunning and charm. Tes, LJS is the most charming person one can meet. He’s also smart. When we are introduced the the pirate world, the  “ Golden Age” has diminished because no one is rallied behind a common cause or desire. Pirates are slothy creatures that are major alcoholics and spendthrift theifs with no rules or honor code. LJS has made something of himself or I should say, John Silver has and it is mentioned for all of five seconds bu Hands that LJS cares about two things in the world; his fortune and his wife. He is a pirate but he leads no pirate resistance.

I am not sure what TS meant when he said LJS turns into a miserable person. I have no why he interprets the character as such but as the guy playing Flint and what he stood for I could see him having a biased opinion of the character. LA has never stated his character as miserable and again  the source material is that. *SPOILER ALERT* but LJS gets his part of the treasure, Flint’s portion to be exact. Maybe TS meant LJS becomes more cold and heartless and cynical. I don’t see that as a bad thing considering he’s been a pawn between two men for a great deal of time. The point is, the mysteries this show is addressing as the prequel is Flint’s story, the reason Flint feared LJS, the story of Silver’s African wife , the story of the treasure, and the story of how did Billy Bones piss off LJS to the point of stroke.

That’s the story they are telling and yes while there are historical changes the the events that happen to these characters are going to have to coincide with the source material. In the words of James S.A. Corey who is currently doing the show Expanse of whom they wrote but also adapted the TV series format and made changes stated, “ you want to make changes that tell the story better but you don’t want to mess with it too much, Especially a successful story less you take away from the story the fans are fond of. If it’s not broken leave it alone” Point being that while Shotz and company have changed death scenes and added characters to this world it will all tie back to T.I. ultimate canon. Flint will die. He will die alone. You can imagine a Thomas Hamilton reunion all you want (hell they may do fanservice and make it seem Flint goes away to find him) but he doesn’t die happy. 

Flint’s character is the most fascinating of the show there can be no doubt of that but lets not rewrite history just because you like a character or you just happen to empathize with them in all things. You have to accept that whole you make overlook his flaws I personally and others cannot and don’t think Flint deserves a happy ending. He has put people through SHIT. Billy’s mad descent came because of Flint attempting to kill him that led to his TORTURE. He didn’t come back whole from that. I still blame Billy for Billy’s actions but his hatrad is well deserved. He killed Gates when it became clear Flint would bring them into harm. His BEST FRIEND. He killed him when it came between his goal and him. You can romanticize all thee wants about how this is all for Thomas and what happened but Gates was also Billy’s mentor. What makes Flint’s pain more important than anyone else’s? He terrorized his crew and pushed even when he was all fucked in the head. He was a tyrant! He is a murderer. He’s also selfish and completely manipulative. I joke about the Koolaid but like LJS in the books, Flint has a certain charm that is sincere but also very motivated towards his own ends. 

Does he care about Silver...sure...in the same way he cared for Gates. And we all saw what happened to Gates. I think Flint feels he owes Silver because he DID help him come out of the fog after Miranda but again, can we not actually remember the show;s motivations. Silver jumped in because the crew was screwed and everyone was desperate and Billy begged Silver to be the “Gates” for the crews sake. Silver I correctly recall balked, didn’t want to do it, was afraid of Flint and overall though the was nuts. Facts people. Facts. There was no pining looks of longing. Flint saw Silver as a shit who he needed and Silver saw Flint as the Captain who was straight up cray and concocted a plan with Villy to shove him out. 

Then Maroon Island happened and Silver met Madi. Only when Silver speaks with Madi regarding his concerns and she offers herself as a tether does Silver make an actual attempt at friendship with Flint without so much trepidition. Facts. They are literally lining it up for school children to follow. I mean they legit made a scene just to show Silver WATCHING MADI as if he just found God. We call these turning points. 

Since then this show has shown that Silver has been able to find a real connection with Flint ( in friendship. I can’t be bothered to hide the fact that that’s all it’s ever been.) due his very real connection with Madi. Both Billy and Flint both wrote off his relationship with Madi. Flint by never really believing Silver told her about the treasure and Billy by throwing her name in his face as if it was a non factor. Now I think Flint IS trying to be better but that’s his tragedy. He is too consumed by the darkness. He can longer shake it off even if he wanted to. Which is why Silver cannot confide in him about his grief because in some ways he doesn’t feel Flint comprehends that what he lost of so much bigger than what he suspects due mostly to his soon to be revealed backstory. But Flint also knows Silver is more than he allows him to be. And the minute he is off his leash it will NOT be to Flint’s benefit so that shades his concern.

I just am tired of people acting like this is brand new. That Silver is the “bad guy” now when Silver has made one of the most unselfish remarkable turnarounds in the show. Here was a man living on his luck and smarts who cared about nothing and no one who got involved with a pirate crew just for the stake in a claim of a massive treasure that Flint was hiding btw. Since then he has found some place with the pirate brethren, has conquered his fear and can stand next to a man like Flint while holding his own, and has opened himself up to the only love he’s probably had and been returned in his life. He is NOW WILLING to give up the one thing that got him involved in this in the first place for the chance to have a life with this woman. That doesn’t sound like the bad guy because his desire no longer matches up with Flint. He didn’t BETRAY Flint (look up the definition please before you start posting it la di da). If anything he’s taking a play straight from the master’s playbook. And Silver is right! Flint was all willing to give that gold up for a completely completely dismantled Nassau but not for the part of the slave alliance that leads the slave alliance. Julius sure as hell ain’t playing ball. Madi is important to the cause in her own right. She’s also been going to BAT for Flint so the hate coming her way is equally ridiculous. 

The influx of recruits has completely reorganized what Flint wants now. He knows he can win which means he isn’t willing to let the treasure go because now he can use that to fund something bigger. He has already moved on from Nassau now that it is within his reach. He’s done the one thing Julius was afraid of. The minute his troops move off to Boston the British swoop right back in and put them back in chains. Or are the slaves journey completely meaningless? If so, then you know what you are.

Lastly, and oh my favorite of course is Madi will side with Flint and leave John in the dust because this isn’t what she wants. 

Like, I’m not even trying to be funny but as much as Madi has been supporting Flint it’s VERY recent and if you think she’s going to shun Silver ( and her mother since I’m pretty sure she helped dig up that treasure. She probably agreed to let Flint have his plan and if he doesn’t work, all bets off and save her daughter) for fighting for her life. And that’s not say she wont have any words but if you think she’s going to betray Silver when she could have literally betrayed him and Flint and got what SHE wanted for HER people then it doesn’t take a genius to figure out she’s probably going to see her way to why Silver made the choices he do. I mean this is the same woman who has belaboring that Flint cant be trusted, Like Silver said, Flint didn’t force the choice between Billy and Flint because Flint was smart enough not to give Silver any reason to doubt him. Now he has, and the word is “Boston”

Stop ignoring James McGraw’s cray. God you gotta love him because he don’t STOP but this man has intentions we...just...he need to retire but he clearly ain’t tired of the fight. That’s bullshit. He even stated out of his own MOUTH that it will get interesting when the moment comes when they aren’t of like mind. This man stay ready for the backstab because he know how to wield that knife better than any. What’s worst is people are rooting for him. Like Flint is the worst thing for what Flint wants. You doesn’t take small steps, he takes this unheard of leaps with sheer force of will and while in part that’s admirable it’s mostly reckless and suicidal for anyone following him. Ya’ll know this. Stop playing. Stop bullshitting. You can love him without defending him always. 

And to say Silver’s change is sudden and how can he go from trusting him to not....lets go back in time....to a day ago if that when Flint said “ trust me.” Grab my hand and lets count it up. WR went and got the Spanish due to him accepting Eleanor’s dumbass deal because he completely underestimated Woodes bloodlust, Eleanor died, Madi “died” Silver was forced to hand over his friend to the slaves because of Billy’s dumbass but to repair the alliance for Flint’s war, and he had to fight for his damn life completely outnumbered while he mostly sat and walked around the countryside miraculously unscathed. Now, just take your feelings out of the equation for a minute and honestly say, would you once again trust him? Last time was an epic fail! So now, Silver has every right to side eye the fuck out of Flint for even asking because everytime Flint says so, everything goes to shit. He’s be an idiot to continue to follow him down a path only he can see. 

Back to Madi, the Underhill estate was the first encounter she had with the real world and it affected her severely so it pushed her to Flint who is the older wiser man of the world. He starts shoring up his new alliance. Silver is dead and he kept it moving. So Madi keeps referring to this one event that changed her mind about Flint. I don’t think Silver wants to kill Flint. If he couldn’t kill Billy, he’s not immediately thinking kill Flint. Outwit him and making the final call, yes. But not kill him.( Hands sure as hell does but he wants to kill everybody and Flint is in his spot) but he def isn’t following him anymore. As with all people, eventually you have your own ideas of what your life will be. Madi wants to lead her people but she is curious as John says and she is not meant to be hidden away. That was the biggest nod to the fact that Madi will indeed get her canon fate with Silver. So no worries there for me. She is going to come out of this more aware of what she wants. They paralled their story for a reason. Two crowns rising at the same time and neither not really made for the world in which they are the rulers of. Madi has conflicting desires and because of who she is she will maintain both.

Its soon to be Silver versus Flint and I already know the malarky about the be spewed so I wanted to get this long ass rant out so I don’t have to come back to the feeling. Flint has been dodging his comeuppance for a good long while now. Silver has done NOTHING wrong even when it has been clear his “friends” have been using them for their cause that he isn’t even invested in but out of love for them he tried to play the mediator. Now both men have made it clear the ONE THING he cherishes above all else is not as important as their own ends which is fine but I don’t know how anyone can blame him for choosing after thinking he lost her, this woman he loved more than anything. He could not even breathe thinking she died for nothing. The only reason he still stood next to Flint is because SHE could not have been wrong and died following this man.He was NOT OK without her. The Silver/Flint bond was destroyed the minute she was “gone” His tether means more to him than anything because it’s something he’s never had and spewing hate his way for this is just butthurt because you didn’t get your beloved ship. Fuck the ship. It’s about the characters and if you actually cared about anyone besides Flint you’d want him to have what you so badly want Flint to have. The hypocrisy is beyond ridiculous. Love Flint all you want but stop victimizing him.And stop trying to twist everything to produce your happy ending. Hell I may not get everything I want as well. But I am following the story as it is presented and what I know of the book and overall what TV shows do.

They don’t write based on peoples shifting ideas of whats happening in the show, They wrote this with an idea of connecting it to the book with the hope of in a few years actually doing a T.I. I see no reason to have a fake Madi death, only to reveal she’s alive just for her to say screw you Silver I got my own peeps and move on. Wishful thinking for some but for the still sane you get the gist.

“In the many sequels to Treasure Island Silver tends to be a more gentle rogue who always seems to do good in the end. We know in the end of Treasure Island, he manages to slip away with part of the treasure.”

“Long John Silver is unlike all the other pirates in this novel in two ways: he owns property and he has a wife. (Three if you count the fact that he's smart, and most of the others are total idiots.) Long John Silver is the legitimate owner of a pub in the coastal town of Bristol, and he's married to an African woman. (Stevenson calls this woman a derogatory term for a black woman; we won't reproduce it here because we find it offensive.) Neither of these facts takes up a huge amount of space in the novel, but they indicate something special about Long John Silver: he blurs boundaries.

Where the other pirates of the novel drink their fortunes away and go back to begging or crime all too quickly, Long John Silver is planning for the future. He's settling down and trying to become an actual gentleman, not just a gentleman of fortune. Even Israel Hands comments:

He's no common man, Barbecue, [...] He had good schooling in his young days, and can speak like a book when so minded. (10.14)”

“ For readers of Robert Louis Stevenson's day, Long John Silver's mixed-race marriage would have been a part of that mystery. He is married to an African woman at a time when mixed-race marriages were not common or even considered acceptable. So he lives both inside and outside the law. He owns property (inside the law), but is still a pirate (definitely outside the law). And he is married (inside the law), but to a woman of a different race (socially unacceptable in the 19th century). He breaks rules and challenges the simplistic binaries of good guy/bad guy in multiple ways, which makes him all the more alluring.”

This is LJS that many of us knew before this show started. The man who was both the light and dark. Who was Flint without falling prey to Flint’s demons. He has his tether. Madi remains. 

http://www.shmoop.com/treasure-island-book/long-john-silver.html

http://pirates.hegewisch.net/whosilver.html

#silver x madi #long john silver #Black Sails

[constructedstories]

“eughhh why is silver being so ooc?!?!?!”

“what happened to the silver whose world revolves around flint?!?!?”

       okay first off. no. n o. now, don’t get me wrong, I love flint as much as anyone. he’s a fascinatingly complex character, a villain whose motivations have been so convincingly written and compellingly played out by toby -- he’s done some fucked up shit, but we all kinda root for him regardless because we understand him and empathise with him. I also, believe it or not after reading this, understand the appeal of the silver/flint ship and I can see why people ship it, even if I’m never gonna stand here and say that it’s my ultimate otp. I love silver, I have done since his very first scene of s1 and watching his and flint’s relationship develop has been fascinating, but I think a key mistake people make when characterising this ship is to look at it too much from flint’s perspective and not enough from silver’s ( this also lends into my salt about the fact that half of the fandom only seem to appreciate silver for his dynamic with flint but I digress )

       silver and flint’s relationship is not healthy, particularly for silver. we have a guy who entered into piracy out of necessity and opportunism, who wanted a share of the urca de lima treasure and was prepared to throw anyone under the bus in order to get it, but eventually won the loyalty of his men and found a place to belong. honestly, up until s3, I don’t interpret silver as really holding any fondness for flint at all. the man is a fucking liability; silver had already witnessed him killing gates, didn’t know for sure whether billy had been pushed into the water or had fallen, repeatedly disregarded his crew’s lives to pursue his own agenda -- but silver recognised that flint was his route to the urca treasure, so he hitched his star to flint’s out of necessity -- just as silver says during their exchange in 3x10. he then found a place to belong in the crew, literally sacrificed a limb for them and was granted power and authority over them because of it. all of this is COMPLETELY independent of flint. flint wasn’t even on the fucking ship when silver made that sacrifice -- although he did plant the idea in silver’s head with that whole ‘where else would you wake up in the morning and matter?’ spiel.

      enter s3: billy and silver are working together to prop flint up as captain because they believe it’s in their best interests. they’re both united in their lack of actually caring for flint, although silver IS beginning to empathise with him because he’s been granted some access into what’s going on in the man’s head. after 3x03 they ditch their rivalry for a partnership, and from then on silver grows to respect and value flint as a friend. however, his friendship/whatever you want to call it with flint is downright toxic for silver -- it enables his darkness, puts undue pressure on him to manage flint and temper him for the BEST INTERESTS OF THE CREW, and it’s only with madi acting as a tether that actually allows silver to survive under such pressure -- hence why he falls for her. now yes, I do think silver and madi’s development was rushed, but this is someone who loves silver for him and who he has a genuine connection with. madi is to silver what thomas was to flint, an idealist whose ambitions are admirable and inspirational to silver and has actually given him a vested interest in this war ( because he literally has no other reason to be in this war than to exploit the power given to him by billy ).

      he then believes that she DIED. just after being told by billy that flint would consume her and ultimately cause her end ( and silver knows of the pattern of people being killed due to flint -- thomas, miranda, gates ). upon finding out that she’s alive, can you really blame him for wanting to do everything in his power to save her? also, it’s been established in 4x05 that silver no longer understands the path that flint ( and madi, to an extent ) is on -- a part of him genuinely wants out at this point, and considering that long john silver of treasure island is fucking married and owns a tavern in bristol, it’s clear that he and madi WILL make it out and, when all is said and done, be together. we know from history that they don’t make it to fucking boston in this war of theirs, and all of this IS coming to an end. absolutely none of this is out of character for silver. in s1 and 2 he is a character who will betray anyone and everyone to get what he wants, and just because he now has madi and the crew and a place that matters to him, doesn’t mean that he won’t do this again in order to keep them. he’s also not thinking rationally at this point -- he’s just been grieving the woman who is being pitched to us as the love of his life.

      no, I don’t believe that silver wants to betray flint. do I think that this is how the ultimate betrayal will go down circa treasure island? probably not, I’m sure there’s more to this. but this is GOING to happen, one way or the other, and blaming madi for splitting up flint and silver is just an excuse to hate on a female character for interfering with a non-canon m/m ship and I’m honestly not even fucking surprised since this always happens in fandoms like this. silver and flint are not going to sail off into the sunset, happy and together and in love. black sails is a story about tragedy, and on top of that they have to honour treasure island. is flint dead in TI? yes, but of course the writers could take a different spin on that. but he’s not with silver and they are no longer on good terms. silver names his fucking parrot captain flint in order to mock him. that much is extremely unlikely to change in how they end this show.

#ooc #unpopular opinion for ts #spoilers #long post for ts #;where else would you wake up in the morning and matter ( about silver. ) #dROPS THE MIC

[mcnieves]

Black Sails Season 4 Episode 8

"XXXVI" (SPOILER ALERT)  Skeleton freakin' Island!We're here! What an awesome and foreboding way to round out this great show. Acting as sort of a nexus between history, Robert Louis Stevenson's novel, and Mr. Gates from Season 1, this cursed place is quite fitting as a quasi-supernatural stomping ground for the collision that's about to occur between Silver, Flint, Rogers, and Rackham. I'm not saying we're about to get assaulted by spooky undead warriors, Curse of the Black Pearl-style, but the sheer ominousness of the landscape lends itself to a story that's about to go all sorts of sideways.  Both Silver and Max chose love over ambition this week, in Chapter "XXXVI," though while Silver's choice of a wife over a war was deemed, by Flint, to be the result of mental and emotional fragility, Max's decision to not (literally) marry into Grandmother Guthrie's plan because she wanted to be with Anne felt like a huge moment of clarity for the character.  Sure, a part of me lamented the loss of Max's possible fruitful future as the "woman behind the man" in Nassau, since it's something Max could pull off with her eyes closed, but her choice to take the harder road here, the one led by her heart and not by her survival instincts, felt right. It was an extremely touching moment, the one between Max and Anne, during a final run of episodes where hardly anyone is guaranteed happiness.

All of this makes me worried for Jack, naturally, who's out to do the impossible by killing Flint. Though part of me now likes his chances (for survival, not for killing Flint) a bit more as his story this week, albeit brief, had certain comedic underpinnings. Also, just the idea that he's taken on a task that's way over his head seems to suggest that he might come out of all this still breathing. Either way, I hardly think we've seen the last of Jack and Anne together on this show. We still need to see how he'll react to Max's choice since, you know, he's only doing what he's doing right now to secure a future for him and Anne.Taking into consideration that fact that both Flint and Silver could be trying to pull off an "Ocean's 12" here, and faking their rift to try and get the ultimate drop on Rogers, we still have to assume that this was it for them. This was the breaking point. Flint's plan was never allowed to even get off the ground and Silver brought out the treasure to save Madi. The bond is broken and only Hands truly saw it coming.It's pretty telling that, before Flint even got his mini-mutiny started, he was falling back on his old manipulation tricks while talking about how he believed that Silver and Madi were the future of the entire pirate kingdom. That was textbook Flint right there, trying to talk Silver out of his rut and spiraling hopelessness about the war. Empty words that provided momentary comfort.The look on Bones' face, right at the end when Silver began talking about Flint's betrayal, was amazing. It was a solid mix of "I told you so!" and "If only you'd killed Flint when I told you to!" Keep in mind too that Rogers is also set up to fall pretty hard in these final episodes. He's losing loyalists left and right and we've already seen how he crumbles when his showy moments of strength get undercut. Right now Mrs. Hudson and Mrs. Mapleton are plotting something somewhat undetermined - though it doesn't seem good for Woodes. And does it involves Jack?

#blacksails #starz #xxxvi #perioddrama #tobystephens #captainjamesflint #blacksailsfinalseason #lukearnold #longjohnsilver #piratestiltheend #treasureisland #blacksailsstarz #skeletonisland

[laurabwrites]

Scenarios and Systems I will probably not write

I've been immersed in the tabletop RPG world long enough that random things get my brain to churn out an idea for a scenario or a system at a distressingly regular rate. Distressing not because I dislike feeling creative and having ideas. But because, despite writing down the better ones to come back to later, I am fairly sure I will not find (make) the time to turn them into usable things. Because the editing and general fiction writing I do is a) more satisfying and b) expands to fill the available time, if allowed. I could fix this by just setting aside some time every week to just. freaking. write. these things. But then I'd have more projects in various states of incompleteness and each one would make less visible progress on a day-to-day basis. Which I would find more frustrating than having lists of scenario and system ideas I know I probably won't get to. It's entirely in my power to change the dynamics and make the time. I've just calculated for myself that the trade-off, right now , isn't worth it. Maybe that will change in the future, maybe it won't. But if it does, I've got my list of ideas I can use.

Scenarios ideas:

Giftschrank: I've written about this one (and the next one) for this blog before, but I haven't written the scenario yet, so it belongs on the list. The original posts went up March 14th 2016 and March 24th 2016 but the summary version is that Giftschrank literally means 'poison cabinet' and, in German, refers to the cabinet the controlled substances go in a pharmacy or, in a library, refers to a biohazard zone for information. Which just screams for a scenario in the Eclipse Phase universe about information escaping/being stolen from a research facility located on an exoplanet only accessible through a Pandora Gate with the players unsure which side they are or should be on. If I ever actually start writing scenarios, this will probably be first, just because it was the first one I wrote down and I really like the name.

Courrières Mining Disaster: I've also written about this idea, back on the 31st March 2016, but. In 1906, a very large mine in France exploded and then caught fire. It was an awful disaster that killed more than a thousand people, but the part that caught my attention was the group of miners trapped underground, in the dark, for more than a month  before rescuing themselves. To which I said, 'damn that would make a terrifying Call of Cthulhu scenario, the system already had a sanity mechanic.' Writing this one up would involve really learning the 1920s era Call of Cthulhu system, researching mining equipment, technology, and practices of the era, finding a map of the actual site (shouldn't be too difficult...), and building the characters, because no way in hell an I going to let the players build some insanely broken character taking a gun and no rope into the mine for some reason.

Base Raiders: I also have an idea for a base to loot. Well, more like a scene within the base. Let me give y'all the backstory first, because the idea came from understanding the Base Raiders setting. Base Raiders is a Fate system by Ross Payton where the players are in a world where superheroes existed before suddenly disappearing on a day. Left behind were are those superheroes' and supervillains' hidden bases, which you, as PCs, go raiding. Also, lots of the PCs are turning into superheroes themselves.

The idea for the base I'd write is that it's a superhero family and friends' ER and hospital.  Family and friends a superhero thought might be a target for hostage situations would be given emergency teleporters paired with medical monitoring devices. When the teleporter detects tampering or the monitoring service detects a problem, the user is teleported to the triage room of the base or, if the problem is severe enough or the facility is marked as currently slammed, directly into cryogenic freezing. This all came from expanding a scene in my head of a dead body on the floor of medical bay, face down in front of a gurney, having obviously bled out, based on the very old, dried pool of blood the corpse was lying in.

As for writing it up, I'd need to read the system (yes again) in order to make sure something like this doesn't already exist in canon, figure out power-levels of gear that could be looted (all of which would be medically based/themed), and see what kind of security other bases use. Then I'd need to figure out what sort of security would be compatible with a hospital. 

Systems: 

The first two system ideas come from encountering the flashbacks in the Leverage RPG (through the Drunk & the Ugly's APs) and Red Markets' non-linear time mechanic with scams in negotiations. Also how much I enjoy cop procedurals and heist films. ... And now that I'm thinking about it to write this post, Shadow Run and the inordinate amount of time I have spent planning how to hack, rob, extract, and otherwise do mischief to fictional corporations in a cyberpunk dystopia.

Any rate. 

The first is a system around criminal heists with Ocean's 11 style flashbacks while the second has cops investigating crimes with flashbacks to what the criminals did as the cops figure it out. Alternatively, combine the two where the players are both a cop and a criminal. The scenarios would start with a crime having been committed so you have the end result and the cops need to work backwards. When they figure out something, everyone switches over to their criminal character and there's a scene of what happened. I don't actually know where I'm going with this one, or really why/how is different than Leverage so there's a secondary reason this one probably won't see the light of day.

The next five are all systems I'd like to write using the Profit system found in Red Markers:

Running a community hospital

Stone Age tribe level survival

1800s escaped slaves survival

1800s colonization of the American West

Modern day survival scenarios  

So... a lot of survival games in there... It fits with the Profit system's focus on trade offs, opportunity costs, and resource scarcity. Which is how health care fits in with the rest of them for me: resource scarcity. What can I say, there's two ER doctors and a health policy economist in my family, I hear and talk about this sort of stuff more than the average lay person. For the community hospital, I think the players should be the administrative heads of various departments in the hospital. Each compete for resources and prestige in order to stay relevant (and an actual department) while having to use the resources to drive value to the hospital (along with all the other departments) so the hospital can keep their doors open.

I'm picturing the Stone Age tribal survival system as a semi-cooperative, narrative game. My idea is that players control a section of the tribe, like the hunters, the gatherers, the shamans, the elders, etc. instead of individual characters. So folks need to cooperate for the tribe and the characters they're responsible for survive but there's room for intra-tribe politics and changing what kind of society you're building. Sessions/scenarios would be things like going on a hunt, gathering resources, dealing with nature, or trying to build up a tribal improvement (like finding a good source of flint so the nappers can make better spears or something). I think I'd handle trying to change societal norms through an altered negotiations mechanic.

For the escaped slaves system, I was thinking of the American South but if I made this work I could expand it to other countries in the Western hemisphere during the same time period. For instance, I happen to know for a fact there are tribes of folks in Suriname (a small country north of Brazil) in the interior composed entirely of folks who ran from the plantations on the coast and reformed societies like the African ones they were stolen from. But the core idea came from a session recorded for Technical Difficulties (which hasn't been released yet) — it was a Call of Cthulhu game where the characters were escaped slaves who headed into the Great Dismal Swamp to escape pursuit. I'd be interested in stripping out the magic and making it just about survival and what risks the players are willing to take. Do you work towards making a life in the remote area you're hiding in? Escape to the North? The West? Canada? Flat out, can you avoid the slave catchers and are you willing to kill to stay free?

Thinking about that lead to the idea for a system in the American West about colonization. I'd want to write it so you could play the Americans pushing west (and stealing land from the Native Americans in the area) or as members of local Native American tribes. As an American, you're away from civilization, in remote areas, how do you survive? You're invading land someone else calls home under the belief of Manifest Destiny, that you deserve it more, that they're 'savages'. How far are you as a player willing to go as a character who believes those things, explicitly or implicitly? As a Native American, do you resist? Adapt to the changing social and political climate?

Both the last two systems would require a lot of research for me to feel comfortable contemplating writing. For the American West one, I would want to do as much research as possible before even attempting to approach members of the tribes in question to ask for advice. And I'm not a historian in training nor do I have the inclination during my free time. I mean, I'd do it because I have a specific goal and I'm good about working towards goals. But yeah, I am not unaware of how much work these two systems would require from me. At least I might be able to use the same information on tools and technology across the systems.

The last system, the modern day survival system, seems the easiest of the proposed systems. I'm already familiar with the time period :) Just have to research survival skills and craft a narrative around why the players are in such straits. I'm not saying that's not work, I'm just saying the other systems require researching skills and setting/time period. Thinking about the narrative, it feels like a system build around one-shots — here are your characters, here's the situation, survive. I mean, unless you're a Special Forces operator going through training, I'm not too sure why you'd end up in a series of life threatening survival situations. ... If you do, maybe it's time to look at your life choices. Anyway, I'm thinking of things like 'You're all average people from X country who just survived a plane crash in Y location. Survive until rescue or get yourselves back to civilization.' scenarios.

So there you have it, three scenarios for three different systems and six or seven full systems I probably will never write. Unless someone wants to collaborate on them and kicks my ass. I'm real good at working on things when I'm responsible to another person. ;)

#not writing #systems #game design #scenario building #tabletop rpgs