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inkblackorchid · 2 months

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What the hell happened with Crow: an autopsy (Part 3)

Trying my absolute damnedest to finish this one and part four sooner now that I've finally covered the Pearson backstory. *Ehem* Hello again! I hope you're ready for more yelling about a certain spiky-haired Blackbird aficionado, because I sure am.

To get some things out of the way first, though, here come the usual disclaimers:

This is part three of a series of posts about hpw Crow's character was handled during 5Ds' whole run. You can find part one here and part two here. Reading them technically isn't required, but things sure will make a whole lot more sense if you do. (Bring snacks, they're long.)

This post isn't meant as a Crow hate post, nor is it meant to convince people who didn't vibe with his character to change their mind. This is my very long winded-attempt to analyse the writing decisions surrounding his character as best I can, without too much bias. That said, full disclosure, I do personally like Crow, so there's a good chance that will shine through whether I want it to or not. But also, I'm trying to have fun here, so please cut me some slack.

In case you haven't read my previous Crow posts (no shade there) and/or still believe the many, many production rumours that have been haunting the 5Ds fandom since the show's original run, please let me burst your bubble(s) with some insanely comprehensive research by someone over on Reddit (thanks again to @mbg159, who's also here on tumblr): No, Crow was not meant to be a dark signer, or the final boss of season 1, and his spike in screentime has nothing to do with his cards. And also, No, Aki didn't get less presence in the narrative because her VA got pregnant. What if you don't have the time to read either of those long posts? In that case, please take away this simple, very easy rebuttal of why the above theories are bullshit: Their would-be "key points" don't line up with the 5Ds production timeline. At all. Not even vaguely. So please, ditch them, let them die, seeing them still talked about makes me feel like I'm gonna break out in hives. And for the love of god, don't use this post or in fact anything else I post to pit Aki and Crow against each other. Both characters have their strengths and their reasons to love them. I am not the least bit interested in starting any character discourse. So please, spare my sanity. Ok? Thank you.

And now, we can get to the good part at last. In my previous post in this series, I stopped my analysis at episode 95, a.k.a. part two of the Pearson backstory. In this post, I will thus be picking up right after, at the very start of the WRGP—with the Team Unicorn match. The goal for this post is to analyse Crow's part in this particular arc, then provide some food for thought/ideas on how things that rubbed some people the wrong way could have been improved.

More below the readmore, and I give you not just my usual warning, but an extra warning, too: The universe will not let me write short things, so tread with caution, stay hydrated, and expect a veritable dissertation below, because this post feels long even to me, who has long since lost her sense of length when it comes to text. (But I'm well aware this is the result of me refusing to split the WRGP part into two separate posts, so I take full responsibility for that.)

Since we left off right after I chewed through all the issues with Crow's rather belated backstory and especially Black-Winged Dragon last time, we jump right into the thick of things now, with episodes 96 and 97, which serve as the preamble to Team 5Ds' first WRGP duel against Team Unicorn. Crow only gets two major things to do during this short stretch of episodes, the first being that he's Team Unicorn's gateway into roping Yusei into a duel during practice, which helps them set up a ruse that baits the 5Ds gang into sending Jack as their first wheeler because they think Jack's deck is best suited to countering Andre's—which, as it later turns out, it is not.

(Arguably the screenshot where Crow gives off the strongest Youngest Sibling Vibes during the entire show. Look at him, all chastised.)

Crow's second role is an odd one that I argue only he out of the main three guys could fulfill at this point: He's the one to get injured right before the Team Unicorn match, rendering him unable to compete, which leads to Aki offering to take his place for that particular match.

(Pictured: Bird Boy regretting all his life choices up until that point simultaneously.)

Here's the first moment I have to talk about in greater detail. See, the thing is, I don't know what the fandom consensus on Crow getting injured here is, but I argue that this moment was a (rare) strategic decision made by the writers at this point. Crow's injury accomplished several things: 1. It sets up the mystery of why his back wheel locked up out of nowhere, which is later paid off through Team Catastrophe's shenanigans. 2. It organically allows Aki to take his spot without introducing any argument about which of them is "worthier" of having that third spot. 3. Through this, it also allows him to actually bounce off Aki for once (a point I will come back to below, during the Team Catastrophe section). And 4. It allows the show to (TECHNICALLY) pay off the setup they did in letting Aki get her turbo duelling license and train with the boys. (Generally, Crow's and Aki's character writing intersects a bit during the pre-Diablo incident WRGP section, something I'll touch on below.)

Moreover, I think this is also the only match where they could have done something like this, and the reason for it is very simple: Team Unicorn are one-off opponents whose presence in the narrative is only relevant as far as it concerns the WRGP, and they are also one of the first teams the 5Ds gang faces. If we think about the opponents Team 5Ds has after this, it becomes very obvious why Crow could only be injured during this duel: If they had tried pulling this stunt later, it would have forced the writers to pull Aki centre stage during a much more plot-relevant duel than this one (which they were apparently allergic to, but let's not go there), not to speak of the fact that it would have forced them to sideline someone they were definitely trying to sell as the third portion of their protagonist trifecta, which would have probably been awkward. (If not for the fact that they literally did this to Crow later in the show, but I'll get there. Yes, I know there's a lot already that I'll still be "getting to".)

The thing is, whether or not it feels like an awkward writing choice to make so early in the big tournament of this arc (you be the judge of that), Crow's injury finally allows him to have a few interesting character moments for once. For one, there is his immediate disappointment about being forced to stay on the sidelines. Aside from the fact that this is a human and relatable reaction to his injury, it stings even more for the character than it does for us as the audience, because Crow got a moment where the Satellite orphans he previously took care of cheer him on for the tournament literally within the same two Team Unicorn preamble episodes.

(Say what you will, this is just stupid cute.)

So when Aki eventually offers to take his place during the match, he's understandably apprehensive—and again, this is human. It may seem mean in the moment, but from a character writing standpoint, it's a natural response. Plus, it's certainly more interesting to watch the group have a bit of conflict among themselves, rather than everyone immediately jumping straight to acceptance. It introduces tension, and, for however brief a moment, raises the question of whether Crow might refuse to let Aki take his spot. This is also the point where Aki and Crow's character writing officially intertwines, at least for the stretch of episodes between the Team Unicorn duel and the Team Catastrophe duel. And you know what? Say what you will, but I think it does a world of good for both of them. The 5Ds cast, as lovely as it is, doesn't get a lot of room to bounce off one another where it concerns personal matters anymore, once the WRGP starts. Arguably, they get little time to bounce off one another outside of plot-related discussions at all once this portion of the show comes around. The characters are treated as "fully developed", and thus, the writing largely doesn't take the time to show us how the group naturally interacts with one another anymore, especially not with how many side characters (chiefly Bruno and Sherry), antagonists, and duels the show now has to juggle. So Aki and Crow getting even a smidgen of personal conflict here is honestly a breath of fresh air. The interaction kicked off by Crow's injury isn't completely plot-irrelevant, like most character interactions during the pre-WRGP were, but it's not something that feels like it's only there to explain the machinations of the antagonists to the audience, either.

Let me go through this in a little more detail to illustrate my point.

So, episode 97. Crow storms off after Aki offers to take his spot, while Aki heads out to prepare her runner, intent on helping her team. The personal motivations here are already very nice and reflective of these characters as we've gotten to know them up until this point: Crow's angry and disappointed (mostly at himself, which is noteworthy!) because he can't compete. And specifically, he's angry because not being able to compete in the first match means he can't show the kids his duelling like he wanted to. Then there's Aki, whose offer to take Crow's place is every bit as much of a strategic suggestion as it is a bid for acceptance from her. Acceptance, which is the thing she's been all about ever since she was introduced, basically. So she pleads with her friends to accept her, see her as an equal, and allow her to duel for the team, which they do. And Crow initially throws a fit, but then...

(Listen. You have no idea how much Crow and Aki getting to actually be friends means to me.)

He comes around to the idea and not only gives Aki his express permission to take his spot, he even coaches her a bit right before the match. Moreover, as his text states above, he literally entrusts her with the kids' hopes, as well as his own. This quickly brings both of them full circle: Crow, who already has a theme of legacy attached to him, passes the torch to Aki for this match, and in so doing, offers her the acceptance she asked her teammates for. (Frankly, stuff like this makes me wonder why on earth people were so eager to pit these two against each other, when their shared moments are actually some of the best-written during the often rocky WRGP arc.) So, though this injury pulls Crow out of the duel, it, funnily enough, ties him better into the story and to the other characters.

From there, we then dive into the Team Unicorn match proper. And well, being injured as he is, Crow doesn't exactly get a whole lot to do there. However, since we're in the portion where his and Aki's writing overlaps a bit, I do need to go on a quick tangent about what Aki's portion of this duel means for Crow.

(Sigh. Okay, buckle up for a quick and rough detour.)

First, something I need to get out of the way and off my chest: I have made no secret out of the fact that I hate Aki's portion of this duel, save for the moment where she summons Stardust. Hell, this duel segment is pretty much universally hated by anone who has even a smidgen of sympathy for Aki. It's regarded by many as the very moment the writers axed Aki's character, and for good reason: After all the buildup surrounding her getting her turbo duelling license, the supposed "payoff" of it all is that she gets to duel against Andre for a depressing four turns before being defeated immediately, which leads into Yusei's frustrating portion of this duel, which, to my knowledge, isn't regarded any more kindly by fans than Aki's segment. It's a massive let-down, simply put. But the thing is, it's not just a let-down for Aki. After all, the brief character conflict she had with Crow about taking his spot here can and should be regarded as part of the setup for this moment, and as such, it can also be considered to be wasted the second Aki leaves the track after barely making an impact whatsoever.

However, I do need to mention that I have a theory on why this segment was handled the way it was, mostly because I feel like Crow's later interaction with Aki, shortly after she's out of the duel, underlines it (mind that this is just my personal theory, though, after having watched the show perhaps more times than can be considered sane): I think there is a cultural aspect to this duel. See, the word ganbaru, which anime subtitles often like to translate with "do your best" or something along the lines, has a greater significance than the translation implies. Though it's not inaccurate per se, there's more than just the idea of doing your best behind ganbaru, because it's something like an umbrella term not just for doing your best and succeeding, it's also the idea that you have to keep trying, even if you don't succeed. It's related to tenacity, to persistence, even in the face of terrible odds. And make no mistake, I don't mean the Japanese equivalent of "if at first you don't succeed, try again" here. I genuinely do mean "you have to keep trying, even if you fail". There is no guarantee of success here. And for that reason, the idea behind ganbaru is also that it's not simply the success that has value, but the effort made in the attempt to attain it, regardless of the result. (Side note: I tried to scrounge up a resource I could link to that nicely explains this concept, but unfortunately, all the promising articles were paywalled and the ones I learned it from require institutional access to lecture materials.) And this is where I will posit the tentative theory that this is exactly what the 5Ds writers were going for with Aki's segment of the duel—it was very much meant to be the payoff for her turbo duelling license setup and her plea to take Crow's place, but it wasn't so much her success that was meant to be valued, as the effort she (and by extension, Crow) made for and during this duel. And this is where Crow's little pep-talk with Aki after she's out of the duel comes in, because it feels like it supports exactly this interpretation:

(This is essentially the whole sequence. Note how Crow, despite so fervently entrusting Aki with his and his kids' hopes prior, doesn't admonish her for making a bad showing in the slightest.)

I don't think it gets any clearer than it is here. During this sequence, Aki is painfully aware of how poor her performance was against Andre, especially after she was so insistent on duelling at first, and despite having been entrusted with Stardust by Yusei, to boot. Yet, Crow doesn't have a single word of criticism to offer her. Instead, he even tells her she did well and that nobody's perfect. It very much reads as valuing Aki's effort over the result she achieved to me, and thus seems perfectly in line with the idea behind ganbaru.

However, if we assume I'm correct about the intentions behind this writing choice, we come back to why Aki's segment of the duel is so hotly debated and why it may have arguably been a disservice not just to her, but to Crow, too, character-wise. Because the majority of non-Japanese watchers of the show culturally don't have a 1:1 applicable concept like ganbaru, this writing choice was more likely to fall flat for them, because to someone who wasn't raised to understand the idea behind it, Aki's portion of the duel doesn't register as a payoff; it registers as a massive disappointment, because it feels like the writers, who had so much setup already done for her, let her fail on purpose, just to later let Yusei attain his arguably dumbest victory of the entire show. Thus, they also essentially waste the conflict she had with Crow about whether she would be allowed to take his spot in the first place, because with how little she achieved during the duel, she may as well not have gotten on the track. (Figuratively speaking. Please Do Not take this to mean I would prefer a version where Aki hadn't duelled at all. That would be worse. It would be infinitely worse.)

(Also, side note: If this post reaches anyone who's actually Japanese and still remembers this duel, I would genuinely love your input on whether my interpretation is feasible or just wishful thinking. Did you interpret Aki's part of the duel the way I did here? Or did it fall flat for you, too? If what I'm saying here feels like an absolute reach, please tell me. I'm honestly just trying my best to make things make sense here and remembered this concept from some classes I took in Japanese studies at uni.)

With all that in mind, it doesn't come as a surprise that some people were just as frustrated with the way Crow was barred from duelling here as they were with Aki's segment or Yusei's later victory. But it is what it is—the Unicorn duel concludes the way we all know it to, and with that, the show begins setting up the following duel with Team Catastrophe.

The only other, non duel-related, noteworthy thing that happens between the Unicorn and the Catastrophe match is a brief appearance at the Poppo Time by Sherry, who admonishes the signers for celebrating their victory early and warns them about Iliaster. Why do I bring this up? Because it's one of less than five times that Crow is in the same room with Sherry. Remember, Sherry. The girl he later, during the finale, talks out of working for the big bad evil guy because he suddenly seems to have such a deep understanding of her motivations and character that he can accurately deduce what argument will make her understand that working with Z-ONE won't give her what she's looking for. So, does Crow get a meaningful interaction with her during this scene, then? Nope. Not even in the slightest. Crow says exactly one sentence that is aimed at Sherry during her appearance, and that sentence is this:

(What a meaningful conversation!)

And yes, I will come back to Crow and Sherry's dynamic in particular. But we'll save that for the Ark Cradle arc post. For now, just keep it in mind as we move along to the other WRGP duels.

So. Team Catasrophe.

During the duel against this team, which was previously only hinted at ominously, the writing for Crow and Aki overlaps again, and this starts with the writers essentially doing a complete switcheroo of what came before: Instead of Crow getting injured and being unable to compete, it's Aki who crashes, ends up in the hospital, and is thus forced to give up her spot during the duel. (This also goes hand in hand with her suddenly losing her powers, which we are given absolutely zero explanation for, but let's not talk about that clusterfuck here. If you're interested in my opinions about that particular trainwreck, I have a rant for you.) Additionally, it's during this stretch of episodes (103-105, which is a whopping four episodes less than Team Unicorn got) that we find out that not only Aki's crash, but Crow's previous one, too, were both sabotage, caused by the rather unscrupulous Team Catastrophe by way of a special card that can cause real damage even when there is no psychic duellist present. (A card we also find out was given to them by Placido/Primo, but this is irrelevant for both Aki and Crow.) Crow's reaction to this piece of information, particularly once Aki gets injured due to the same thing, is where things get interesting for him again, because he gets pissed, to say the least.

(A moment I imagine firebirdshippers must have been positively delighted about.)

Here, I have to reiterate an earlier point: Think what you will of Team Catastrophe, of Aki's crash, and of the sequence where her powers suddenly don't work, but this moment here, where Crow gets angry on her behalf and swears to duel Team Catastrophe into submission—not because he wants his kids to cheer for him, or because he wants to prove himself, but as revenge for his friend—is one of sadly only a handful of moments the writers use to show the strengthened relationships between the individual members of Team 5Ds after the dark signers arc. It's one of the precious few scenes that actually shows, rather than tells us or lets us search for scraps in the subtext, that the signers, and the members of Team 5Ds as a whole, care for each other outside of revolving around Yusei like planets around the sun. Even if it's laughably small, it's at least a hint that there are individual friendships between the other signers, too, that they all stick around one another for reasons beyond gravitating towards Yusei for one reason or another. And for that alone, I'm grateful that they put this here, even if Team Catastrophe was otherwise so ridiculous and made such a bad showing at their actual match that they could barely be taken seriously as antagonists at all.

Speaking of which. The actual meat of the matter. The Team Catastrophe match. What does Crow do here? Well, he duels! Even though he wasn't supposed to, for injury-related reasons. What both his participation as well as the actual duel accomplish, though, are that they not only showcase previously established character traits of Crow's again, but they also make a (possibly unintended) callback to a previous, major duel Crow took part in: His dark signer duel against Bommer/Greiger. Where and how? Let's see.

Firstly, Crow's participation. The reactions of the other characters to this make it very evident that Team 5Ds did not plan for this, with Yusei and Jack even going as far as to say they "had no choice" but to let Crow duel, because he insisted. This is perfectly in line with the stubbornness we already know from him at this point—a stubbornness that was also a major reason for why he took Bommer on and later continued his duel with said man, despite Yusei showing up and telling him he shouldn't be duelling a dark signer.

Secondly, there's the manoeuvring thing, and here's where I can call attention to a fun tidbit: The WRGP isn't what introduces the concept of manual mode during turbo duels to the audience. It's Crow. During his duel with Bommer. Being crafty and a bit shrewd as he is, Crow, during said duel in the DS arc, purposefully switches to manual mode when he duels Bommer, because he figures that attacks that can deal real damage can probably be evaded if you actually have control over your runner and aren't stuck in autopilot.

(Don't believe me? Here it is. And frankly, it is somewhat hilarious, yet also very fitting that Crow is the only one who thinks to do this during a duel with a dark signer.)

The reason this particular bit is relevant during the Team Catastrophe duel is because Crow essentially repeats this trick here. Of course, it's a bit less impactful now, given that manual mode is standard for WRGP duels, but still: Due to Hook, the Hidden Knight, Crow is forced to pay attention to the track and manually evade the monster's attempts to make his back wheel lock up during the duel, mirroring how he thought to manually evade Bommer's attacks during the DS arc.

Thirdly, there's the revenge angle, and this one is a particularly juicy callback. Remember, Crow's major reason for taking on Team Catastrophe, despite being injured, is that he wants to get revenge for Aki. This directly parallels how his major reason for duelling Bommer during the DS arc was that he wanted revenge for his kids, whom he believed to be dead at that point in time. (It also, interestingly, establishes a bit of a connection to his deck, which boasts a fair amount of revenge effects, but I'll not get into that here, seeing as I've talked about Crow's cards a bit before.)

Keep in mind, despite all the things listed above that this duel accomplishes, it's also by far the shortest WRGP duel. It lasts a whole six turns, total, which is ludicrous compared to the likes of 27-turn Team Unicorn, 26-turn Team Taiyou, or 25-turn Team Ragnarok. And I don't think it's controversial to say that the Catastrophe guys are probably the most forgettable WRGP Team, too. Yet, somehow, despite all its shortcomings in terms of memorable antagonists and plot relevance, this is one of the best duels of the WRGP where Crow's character writing is concerned. Now, I'll be perfectly candid: Coming into this post, I did not expect the Team Catastrophe duel, of all things, to end up being as good at actually showcasing Crow's character and his ties to other characters (who aren't Yusei) as it was, but here we are. And we had better hold on to the good the Team Unicorn - Catastrophe segment did for Crow, because the next thing that's coming up is a harsh break from the WRGP, starting with the sudden appearance of Placido's home-engineered army of killer duel robots. And what does Crow get to do during this part?

Uh. Well.

(Pictured: Bird Boy being demoted to benchwarmer while the city's being ransacked by murder duel robots.)

Nothing. A whole lot of nothing, is what.

During the duel robot invasion, we only ever flash back to Crow to ascertain that he is, in fact, useless during this part of the show, something he shares in common with Ruka, Rua, and Aki here, because all of them get pretty much nothing to do while Yusei finally gets the hang of accel synchro. Granted, Aki gets to save a little girl at the hospital, but in comparison to Yusei's lengthy, plot-heavy duel with Placido, this feels like a consolation prize. And for once, Jack is only marginally better off, too, because sure, he gets to beat up a couple of robots, but that's it, really.

Where Crow is concerned, his plot relevance doesn't actually resume once the Placido duel finishes, though. (And neither does Rua's, Ruka's, or Aki's, while we're at it.) Because wouldn't you know it, the next big thing directly after the duel robot invasion are the Red Nova episodes, where three out of five signers (Crow, Aki, and Ruka, unsurprisingly) are removed from the screen almost in their entirety again while Jack gets his much-needed dragon upgrade so he can keep up with Yusei, in order to uphold his status as a classic, almost-evenly-matched yugioh rival.

Speaking of upgrades and dragons, let's make a quick detour while our protag and rival duo take their express vacation to the Nazca plains. It is, of course, no secret that no signer outside of Yusei and Jack ever got a dragon upgrade within the anime. (No, I'm not forgetting about Life Stream Dragon. But that one, unlike Shooting Star Dragon and Red Nova Dragon, was a.) teased all the way back in the DS arc and b.) didn't have a unique summoning method or some other gimmick that made it an "elevated" synchro. So I'm discounting Life Stream as a "proper" dragon upgrade on purpose.) Is this the point where I start arguing that Crow should have gotten one, then? Well, not quite. Not with the writing the show canonically gave us, at least—after all, with how late Black-Winged Dragon was introduced, it would have been bonkers to upgrade him here already, if even at all. However, I do argue that the way the show hands only Yusei and Jack upgrades seems a bit... off. Now, I know why only those two get upgrades, or at least I think I do. After all, they're the central protag/rival duo, and within the framework of the character archetypes the larger yugioh canon has created for itself, this would have always made them the first, if not the only candidates for dragon upgrades. What feels a bit off to me, though, is that specifically the 5Ds cast feels like it... chafes a bit against those character archetypes, for lack of a better word. The problem is this: The signers, as far as the first two arcs are concerned, are sold to us as equals who all have very powerful ace monsters. Yes, Jack and Yusei are still undoubtedly the best duellists among them, but not on account of having uber-powerful extra special monsters that were acquired through supernatural means that are categorically inaccessible to the other signers. However, with the appearance of Shooting Star and Red Nova, this changes. While Yusei and Jack were previously and would have always been the two guys who had a Special dynamic with a capital "S" on account of their character archetypes, their acquisition of the dragon upgrades—and even more so, the lack of upgrades their fellow signers receive—now decidedly puts them in a different power bracket and skews the balance between previous, supposedly "equal" characters. (Which, unfortunately, is yet another thing that makes everyone else easier to sideline.)

Why do I bring all this up in a post dedicated to Crow? Because this new power imbalance arguably impacts him more than the other signers—because he's Team 5Ds' second wheeler and doesn't miss another WRGP match from here on out. Thus, that power imbalance is felt in the upcoming duels, where Yusei and Jack bust out Shooting Star and Red Nova like it's nothing, while Crow is left manoeuvring with the somewhat underpowered Black-Winged Dragon and whatever else he can come up with. This is also why I claimed that the show did sideline Crow in some aspects further above. Because while some parts of his writing go to great pains to establish him as part of a protagonist trifecta that is now supposed to take centre stage before the other characters, he also permanently lives in Jack and Yusei's shadow, ultimately barred not just from reaching equal status as a signer (due to his late and rocky introduction and dragon acquisition), but also barred from becoming the equal of his foster brothers as a duellist. Frankly, I'm surprised the show didn't make this a plot point, because the first thing my mind jumps to when I think about this is whether Crow felt left behind after his brothers acquired such immensely powerful, special cards. But more on my personal writing ideas later. For now, let's just put a pin in the power-imbalance thing.

So, when is Crow back on screen in any meaningful role, then? (Note that I mean this as literally as possible. As per my discussion about "screentime" and my gripes about it in part two, I gloss over the parts where Crow is on screen, but could be traded for any other signer or even a lamppost without affecting the scene at all.)

Well, the next thing Crow gets to do isn't exactly glorious, but it sure is funny.

(I want you all to remember that he has to wear this costume and play this part in Team 5Ds' absurd plan to capture Yaeger/Lazar because he lost at rock-paper-scissors. This will never not be funny to me.)

Ignoring the hilarious outfit and Crow playing the bait at a fabricated cup ramen promo event meant to lure Yaeger in, bird boy does actually get something that's not just for funsies to do during the two episodes where Team 5Ds is trying to get more information about Iliaster: He gets to have a duel revanche against Yaeger, who, if we remember the DS arc, ditched him the last time they squared off. Much like the Team Catastrophe duel, this one, too, calls back to previous duels Crow has had: For one, it's the obvious conclusion to his unfinished, first duel with Yaeger. And for two, Crow repeats a "trick" (for lack of a better term) here that is also unique to him: losing on purpose, which we remember from his duel with Lyndon.

(Identical-looking clown family jumpscare be upon ye.)

And again, much like getting injured for the Team Unicorn duel, I argue that this story beat here is something that could also only have been accomplished with Crow. Because he's the only one who has previously duelled Yaeger, firstly, because not wanting to make a child cry by beating their dad in a duel makes sense for him as a character due to him being a family-oriented person who loves children, secondly, and because losing on purpose in this scenario is a tactic that would seem out of character from anyone else, thirdly. (We recall, the only times Jack and Yusei, respectively, ever consider/offer to lose on purpose is when the lives of people close to them are on the line, in the shape of Carly/Rally. As for the others, aside from not being present, Aki, Rua, and Ruka are so heavily sidelined at this point that they would have never been an option for this. And if his writing is anything to go by, Bruno is mostly purposefully forbidden from accomplishing Plot Things, especially through duels, while he's Bruno.) But hey, due to the way this episode is set up, losing on purpose works out for Crow, because it convinces Yaeger to stop hiding and actually share his knowledge about Iliaster. This, by the way, is the second scene where Crow gets to be in a room with Sherry for a longer stretch of time. And look, him joking that Sherry might kill Yaeger if he doesn't spill the beans about Iliaster soon is fun and all, but in light of the Ark Cradle duel later, I have to point out that he, again, doesn't get to have so much as a shred of a meaningful conversation with Sherry here. Again. But moving on. The scene with Yaeger at the Poppo Time then leads us first to the small sequence in the arcade where the gang has to win a simulated duel to get Yaeger's encoded intel, then to episode 116—the Moment Express episode, where, due to this being a Yusei, Sherry, and Bruno-focussed episode, Crow gets nothing to do again. (And also doesn't get to interact with Sherry again.)

Congrats! We've survived the WRGP break. This leaves us with three more WRGP duels before shit hits the fan and the Ark Cradle arc commences. And full disclosure, I'll be doing a bit of a quick-fire round of those three duels. Why? Because despite them all having their merits in their own rights (they're the better liked duels of the WRGP for a reason), there honestly isn't that much focus on Crow during them. He duels, yes, and I've seen people point this out over and over again as the supposed smoking gun that shows how Crow had so much more relevance and screentime than Aki and yadda, yadda. We've been there. And it's not that I can't see where this argument is coming from—I'll be the first to tell you that it's a travesty that Aki never got to duel in the WRGP again outside of the Unicorn match. But I want to use the final three matches to dig into how the way these matches—and especially the opponents to go with them—were set up made it nearly impossible for Aki to replace Crow again during any point of the WRGP finals.

First, episode 118. This is the only preamble episode we get for the first two WRGP finals teams, and here, our group is split in two: Yusei, Bruno, and Rua introduce us to Team Taiyou, while Jack, Aki, and Crow introduce us to Team Ragnarok. There isn't much to say here, because the only thing this episode does for Crow is a shallow repeat of what the Team Catastrophe duel did: By putting him in a group with Aki and Jack, and letting them decide among themselves, independently, to check out the exhibition match, it implies that he voluntarily spends time with signers who aren't Yusei. Thumbs up. Gold star. You made an effort (I guess). Then, the real fun starts.

Round one. Team Taiyou.

(Pictured: The sweetest country bumpkins to ever grace this earth. Yes, I'm biased.)

So here's the deal with Team Taiyou, from a narrative standpoint, as best as I can grasp it: They are a callback to Team 5Ds' roots. Specifically, to the boys' Satellite roots. The Taiyou boys come from humble origins, have only one, mostly home-engineered duel runner, and play using old cards that are widely considered shitty, as 5Ds canon tells us. They are essentially the non-signer, countryside version of what Jack, Crow, and Yusei once were, which is why this is the first duel where the duellist constellation on Team 5Ds' end couldn't possibly have been altered. Team Taiyou is there to remind us where our boys started, so it has to be our boys duelling them. This also goes for Crow, even though this duel otherwise doesn't accomplish much for him, character-wise. Instead, it's more of a narrative wink at the audience, as well as providing a breather between otherwise extremely tense, plot-focussed duels. But yeah, Crow's part in this match isn't much to write home about; he doesn't get any verbal interactions that are very meaningful to his character, can't get so much as a scratch in on Zushin, even with Black-Winged Dragon, and is defeated so Yusei can take out the legendary giant.

Round two. Team Ragnarok.

(Behold the pizzazz of at least two contenders for Haircuts With The Most Spikes in the show.)

Though this duel is framed as being even more so aimed towards bolstering Jack's character writing than Crow's, given the inclusion of Dragan's personal history with Jack, Team Ragnarok gets significantly more interesting for Crow again than Team Taiyou did. This is, of course, mainly because of Brave/Broder. Where Team Taiyou were a callback to the 5Ds boys' roots, Team Ragnarok are their narrative foils. Dragan is the duellist who lost his pride to contrast Jack, who's brimming with pride at all times, and Harald/Halldor is essentially the rich, "destiny isn't bullshit, actually" version of Yusei. Meanwhile, unlike the first two, who highlight our 5Ds boys' characteristics by contrasting them, Brave acts as Crow's mirror. Through Team Ragnarok's flashbacks, we see that he gets almost exactly the same, lovable-rogue-type backstory that Crow did during the DS arc, just in a different setting. The only, major difference between them is that while Crow is more down-to-earth, Brave likes to be pretty flashy.

(Keep in mind that he's doing this on a runner. Is there such a thing as courses on how to do acrobatics on your runner? Like there are courses for vaulting on horseback irl? I'm overthinking this again.)

Unsurprisingly, the duel thus ends up addressing the similarities between Crow and Brave, mostly through two things: One, the duel essentially becomes a contest of who can out-trickster who, culminating in the famous, ridiculous-in-the-good-way sequence where Crow activates a trap from his graveyard, to the shock of pretty much everyone present. And two, despite being on opposite sides, the two bond over their concern for the children they took care of and their concern for children in general, which is expressed most clearly in the scene where Crow's kids, in an attempt to hold the poster they made for him higher, very nearly fall over the barricade in the WRGP stands. Despite the hefty length of the full duel, these are pretty much the only things actually related to Crow's character that come up, though. They're good, don't get me wrong, but in a duel that is otherwise this dense with plot, Aesir shenanigans, and Iliaster foreshadowing, it's no surprise that the duel doesn't add that much to Crow's character, outside of giving him someone he can bounce off very well and relate to. Again, though, we are faced with the same situation as with Team Taiyou: Due to the way the members of Team Ragnarok are written, meant to contrast/parallel one male duellist each from Team 5Ds, nobody other than Crow could have taken the third spot here, either. It would have felt awkward from a narrative standpoint (as much as I would have loved to see Aki duel more).

Now, finally. Round three. Team New World.

(Welp. Here come the robots.)

I had to check to make sure I wasn't misremembering this, but due to the way this duel was set up so José/Jakob could bust out Meklord Emperor Granel with a ridiculous amount of attack points, Crow gets a resounding four turns total in this duel. (Gee, I wonder which other character got this treatment during a WRGP duel.) During those four turns, there are only two things he accomplishes: One, leaving behind two combo pieces Yusei later uses, and two, showcasing the shrewd tactics that earned him the label of "trickster" during the Ragnarok duel by bringing out a non-synchro monster that can take advantage of a synchro monster's attack points and effects—Aurora the Northern Lights. And arguably, this is a very smart play, moreover, it's the only time anyone in the show has the bright idea to not use synchro monsters against the known and feared synchro-killer Meklords. Unfortunately, as smart as it is, the narrative doesn't reward Crow for this play—José all but shrugs what could have been a turning point in the duel off, then proceeds to steamroll Crow the next turn, leaving Yusei to score the win, as usual. To get back to the "Crow got so much more screentime than Aki during the WRGP" thing for a second, of all the duels in the WRGP finals, this is arguably the one where Aki could still most easily have taken Crow's spot again, because here, it doesn't matter whether it's him or someone else, as this duel isn't tied to his character in any way. Unfortunately, due to the Granel-steamroller-strategy, this is also the duel where letting Aki take his spot again would have been the biggest shot in the foot, because unless they had changed Team New World's strategy, Aki would have gotten brutally guillotined here, same as Crow—something I can't imagine anyone, not even people who hate Crow, being happy about.

With that, though, we've finally made it through the WRGP. So, what's the bottom line here? Frankly, speaking from my own interpretation, Crow occupies an... odd spot during this tournament, to say the least. Though he does get to duel the majority of the time, few of the duels actually cater to his character in any way. Moreover, he only gets to be the star of the show in a WRGP duel once, during the by far most forgettable match against Team Catastrophe. And mind that I use the term "star of the show" very loosely here, because the problem the WRGP arc as a whole has, in my opinion, is that the rather lame Team Catastrophe duel is the only one in the whole tournament that isn't won by Yusei, which categorically means that any of the other character's big moments are usually undermined by the fact that they ultimately still need him to save the day. Thus, moments like Aki summoning Stardust Dragon and Crow using an anti-synchro-killer strategy that for once actually forgoes synchros are somewhat cheapened by the fact that they're not actually the turning-point moments they're initially painted as, because ultimately, Yusei always has to be the one to save the day. What's worse is that this almost feels like a bit of a non-issue that could have easily been fixed—given that the show tells us that teams can shuffle around their line-up for a match any time. But unfortunately, the writing never interacts with this as a possible strategic element, nor does it ever seem to consider letting Yusei lose, or forcing him to give up his spot for a match. I feel the need to say that I don't put the blame at Yusei's feet here, though: This strongly feels like an oversight by the writers, and perhaps a disproportionate need to have a nigh-infallible protagonist (on the duelling side of things) that their audience would never run the risk of calling "lame". For Crow, though, this chiefly means one thing: In any duel other than the Catastrophe one, it was always clear that even if he partook, he would never finish the match. And yes, this is technically an issue Jack has, too. But this is where the character writing outside of the duels comes into play, too.

Unlike Jack, who actually gets to do something during the Diablo invasion (albeit very little), who gets his very own dragon upgrade and who gets a very personal, pre-duel plot with Dragan, the show's writing doesn't bother giving Crow a lot of plot- or character-relevant things to do, once the WRGP starts. This is also why I was so surprised at how much the Unicorn and Catastrophe duels embrace his interactions with Aki—compared to the later duels in the finals, this portion still makes Crow feel genuinely relevant and interwoven with the other characters. Meanwhile, out of the three final duels, only the Ragnarok one actually tries to establish a connection to his characterisation, through Brave. The Taiyou duel only sets itself up in such a way that Aki partaking instead of him would have been awkward. Meanwhile, the New World duel just has him being treated like a floormat in a sad parallel to Aki during the Unicorn duel, seeing as they both get a nice moment where it looks like they might turn the duel around (Aki summoning Stardust Dragon and Black Rose Dragon onto the field at the same time; Crow summoning Aurora the Northern Lights, which couldn't be absorbed by the Meklords), only to have their hopes dashed as they're mercilessly cleared off the track. Outside of the duels, many scenes sadly give the impression that they may as well not have included Crow, though—he often gets so little to contribute to a moment or even to say at all that substituting him with a cardboard box seems like it would not have impacted the scene in any way. And that's without addressing his non-existent connection to Sherry, which feels extra glaring, given his later interactions with her on the Ark Cradle.

All in all, the WRGP feels like a very mixed bag, where Crow's character writing is concerned. His belated backstory, which I talked about in part two, is front-loaded and asks as many questions as it answers. Then the tournament commences, gives him some actually decent character interplay with Aki for once (at the cost of letting her succeed in the tournament, it seems), only for him to be basically irrelevant during the WRGP pause again. And once the whole thing resumes, it becomes this hot-and-cold thing where some duel aspects seem tailored to him, while others treat him as completely expendable. The end result is an arc where I'm left wondering why exactly the writers felt the need to make it seem like Crow made up one portion of a protagonist trifecta, if they never actually bothered treating him as equal to the other two. (The answer, I believe, lies somewhere between the fumbled setup they did for him during the Fortune Cup and DS arc, and the way yugioh in general treats its character archetypes. But that's just speculation on my part.) The one, saving grace the WRGP (outside of the Pearson backstory) has for Crow is that it at least doesn't introduce any new character- and/or timeline inconsistencies. In fact, his character stays remarkably true to form once the tournament begins.

Okay, onto the final bit, then. As I've done in both previous posts, let me delve into completely subjective territory and offer some ideas on how this arc could have been handled to make it seem a little less all over the place with Crow. And since his writing here canonically intersects with Aki's several times, let me try to do it while offering the best of both worlds to both characters, if I can.

As far as Crow's backstory is concerned, I've already offered my solutions to that in part two. Now, to stay consistent with my own suggestions, I'll try to branch off what I wrote in the last post. This means that, as per my previous two analyses, we're dealing with two scenarios again: One, Crow stays a signer and we try to touch canon as little as possible. Two, Crow isn't a signer and we adjust canon in whatever way we need to to make him feel interesting and necessary despite/because of that.

First, though, let's get two adjustments I personally would have made in both versions out of the way:

The way the WRGP is structured puts every character that isn't Yusei at a massive disadvantage, where character moments in duels are concerned. Thus, I propose an overhaul. Among the changes I think could have benefitted the characters (yes, all of them) are: One - Aki actually getting to accomplish something during the Unicorn duel (she can and should still have her moments with Crow, but maybe let her portion of the duel end in her thanking him for coaching her, creating a more upbeat scene that strengthens their friendship, which could double as good setup for their later double-duel against Sherry). Two - letting the Team Catastrophe duel actually play out properly (as in, they become more meaningful as opponents by having a better strategy, for example, and Crow could stick it out longer against them, in order to make this more so his win than Jack's. Also, why not let Aki actually see him get back at Team Catastrophe for her?). Three - giving Crow an actual character moment during the Taiyou duel (what if one of the country boys had played a card or two of the ones he learned to read from? It could have helped drive the parallel between the two teams home.) Four - letting Crow's anti-Meklord strategy get at least a little payoff, if only for two turns (show us at least proof of concept, damn it!). Yes, the Ragnarok duel is the only one I wouldn't rewrite (unless special circumstances are introduced, see below). Additionally, let Team 5Ds alter their line-up more than once, damn it. Let them actually strategise about the duels, let them take into consideration who should go first when and whose deck might be better suited to which scenario. Also, remove Yusei from at least one duel. Doesn't matter how, just let him not partake once. Perfect setup to let Aki duel again, and would also allow for spicy character interactions. (Arguably the best duels where this could have been done would have been any of the final duels, though it would have also required rewriting the antagonists somewhat in any case.)

For the love of god, give Sherry and Crow some setup. Let them actually interact, let them introduce their philosophies to one another, just do something, anything to make Crow understanding and talking sense into her during the finale seem earned. A few chance meetings, or maybe even a tiny side-plot could have done so much here. And if you can't let them interact outright, at least let Aki and Crow talk about Sherry! Double whammy! The two characters who end up duelling against her are made to seem even more like a team, and Crow actually gets to find out what Sherry's deal is on-screen. Just. Set. it. up. I beg you.

There we go. Now, onto the two branches.

Option A: Crow stays a signer and obtained Black-Winged Dragon.

Seeing as Crow's signer status, funnily enough, isn't all that relevant during the tournament itself (save for two notable exceptions), there aren't that many fixes to be made here. Crow can still get injured, miss out on the Unicorn duel and be the star of the Catastrophe duel. But giving him something to do during the duel robot invasion that isn't standing around and hoping Yusei will fix everything would also be nice. It's fine if he can't drive out there and duel, but why not let him do something else? He's a crafty guy, why not let him find, say, a way to fry the Diablos' runners, taking a few of them out even from a semi-stationary position without duelling them? He could at least get as much of a consolation prize scene as Aki got with her saving that child. Then there's Team Taiyou, which, save for what I proposed above, is a duel that doesn't feel like it needs changes. Crow does his thing here. That's it. The same goes for Team Ragnarok, especially given that they're specifically written to oppose an all-signers Team 5Ds. Finally, there's Team New World, which, if I'm being completely candid, I would personally overhaul to change the cyborgs' strategy entirely in order to actually let all three members of Team 5Ds shine. But this is the version where I touch canon as little as possible, so... Aside from what I wrote above, no changes needed. Just make Crow seem a little more relevant, make his strategy have at least a little payoff, even if Granel's back out and menacing literally two turns later.

Option B: Crow, as per my previous posts, isn't a signer and doesn't have Black-Winged Dragon.

This is the version that would categorically require heavier changes, though they honestly don't arrive until the break in the tournament. Unicorn and Catastrophe stay the same, I would still propose that Crow gets to be a little more useful during the Diablo invasion. But! In this version, seeing as he never acquired BWD, the break in the WRGP would be an excellent spot to let Crow acquire an upgrade for his beefy Blackwing ace monster of choice. Give him a little side-plot, too, something to do, something where he proves himself. Maybe let him run into Iliaster here, or maybe call back to Pearson again and introduce the new Blackwing upgrade as a treasure Pearson stashed away before he died (maybe this could have even been the card Bolger was actually after; the world is our oyster here). Then he's beefed up, too, and actually feels a little more on the same level as Jack and Yusei. The tournament recommences and again, the Taiyou duel could stay mostly the same, I think. Ragnarok and New World are where it gets really interesting, though. The way I see it, Ragnarok could go two ways with Crow not being a signer: Either he partakes as he did in canon and his non-signer status is called out as a peculiarity by our Swedish boys who happen to be obsessed with fate (which would make his performance against Brave seem all the more impressive), or, due to this being a duel all about destiny and celestial pissing contests, Crow's spot is given to Aki again for this duel due to her signer status (this would, obviously, require rewriting Brave, perhaps even switching him out for a Ragnarok lady instead). As for Team New World, this duel would honestly be a lot more juicy with a non-signer Crow, because much like he was for the dark signers, a non-signer Crow would essentially be an unknown in their plan for the cyborgs. He would be the guy who's Not Supposed To Be Here. Granted, he would still be beaten, but he could still get an excellent moment where his out-of-left-field anti-Meklord strategy genuinely seems to turn the tables for a bit, angering José and providing even stronger setup for Yusei to win later.

Aaaaand that's that. Somehow, I get the feeling the WRGP had the least things that needed fixing because it also had the least actual character writing. But that might just be me. It's late and I have been writing for A While. But hey, I got out part three faster than part two! I consider that an achievement.

Now, while I get my talking points in order for part four, I hope you'll have fun chewing on this one. See you in the grand finale to my Bird Boy dissertation.

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joelsgreys · 1 year

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We love a writing prompt challenge - I'd love to see what you do with post!outbreak Joel and ❛ what if i hurt you? ❜

smut prompt challenge

Thank you so much for sending this one in to me my darling! <3 I decided to be a little adventurous with this one, I hope you like it. Also, it turned out to be a longer than I meant to, it was supposed to just be a blurb/short drabble and it turned into a 3k oneshot. Whoopsie. I am not at the point where I can write smut with no plot, I have to have at least a teensy bit of plot lmao.

pairing: Joel Miller x Female Reader

warnings/tags: 18+ only, minors dni. explicit. post outbreak, set in Jackson. established relationship. jealous/possessive/slightly intoxicated Joel. reader is just a lil bit toxic too. rough sex, p in v sex, unprotected sex, bit of spanking, praise and pet names. very lightly implied age gap (reader is referred to as kid by an older side character but she’s in her mid to late 20s, Joel is canon age, mid 50’s; purely self indulgent with the age thing tbh) okay, I think I got it all.

word count: 3k

“Alright kid, I’m heading out for the night,” Seth announced, flipping off all of the lights inside of The Tipsy Bison. He made sure to leave one last dim yellow light on for you so that you could finish cleaning up around the bar. He tossed you a set of keys to the building from where he stood near the front door. As he shrugged into his blue denim jacket, he asked you one last time, “Are you sure you’re going to be okay locking up the place all on your own at this hour?”

You couldn’t help but laugh a little. You walked over towards him, twirling the set of keys between your fingers. “Oh please. What could possibly happen to me in a secured, gated community where everybody knows everybody, Seth?” You questioned him, shaking your head slightly. “And besides, it’s not like we’ve got a register full of cash just waiting to be robbed. It’s the end of the world, so I think I’ll be just fine closing up shop.”

“Well, you got me there,” he sniffed. “I suppose I don’t have anything to worry about.” He paused, lowering his voice as he added, “And much less when you have your very own guard dog sitting over there and keeping his watchful eye on you.”

You glanced over your shoulder at Joel. He was sitting at the opposite end of the long bar nursing what had to be his third or fourth glass of barrel aged bourbon; even after all the shit you two had been through together over the last several months while making the dangerous and violent trek across the country, Joel had never, not once, behaved like this with you. He had never been this ridiculously overprotective of you, not until you’d begun working as one of the evening bartenders at The Tipsy Bison. He wasn’t all too fond of your new role in Jackson, and he’d made it abundantly clear by dropping in late at night to make sure the rowdier male patrons who would frequent the bar after evening patrol were behaving, keeping their hands to themselves—and off of his girl.

You turned back to Seth, flashing him a sheepish, apologetic smile. “Look, I know he can be kind of rough around the edges sometimes. But he’s not all that bad, you know?”

“Kind of rough around the edges? One look from Miller can send anyone running for their lives in the other fucking direction,” he remarked with an amused snort as he pushed the door open. “Be sure to turn off that last light before you leave, kid. Oh, and don’t forget that I’m going need you here tomorrow at three for the opening shift, alright?”

“Got it. See you tomorrow,” You said, giving him a little wave as he left. You pulled the door closed and locked it behind him, giving it a gentle tug to make sure it was secure. Shoving the set of keys into the back pocket of your light blue denim cut off shorts, you made your way back across the quiet, empty bar and over towards Joel. You let out a soft sigh, lightly draping an arm around his shoulders. “Joel, please. It’s almost one o’ clock in the morning. I still have quite a bit to do around here before I can leave,” You stated. You reached up, affectionately running your fingers through his graying, dark brown curls. “You have patrol duty in a few hours. Go home and get some sleep. I’ll be fine on my own.”

He scoffed. “Ain’t no way in fuckin’ hell I’d let you walk home alone at this hour.”

You sighed again, withdrawing your hand from his hair as you stepped back.

Joel turned on the bar stool he’d been perched on for most of the night, his dark brown eyes taking the sight of you in; they glazed over your fitted, tight black tee shirt with a neckline that scooped way too low and exposed too much skin for his liking. His lips pressed together into a thin, tight line as his gaze wandered down further, noticing how the frayed hem of your cut offs fell a couple of inches above the middle of your thighs. “You really gotta fuckin’ wear that outfit every night?”

You glanced down at yourself, frowning. “What’s wrong with my outfit?”

“I just don’t fuckin’ like it,” he muttered gruffly, his fingers holding onto his glass of whiskey in a near death grip. “You’re showin’ off way too goddamn much. Every fucker you served tonight got more than a fuckin’ eyeful. I probably watched ‘bout a dozen idiots stare at your tits and openly flirt with you right in front of me, you know that?”

“There’s a reason why this is the uniform I have to wear, Joel,” You teased with a giggle, hoping to ease the tension that was practically radiating off of the man.

“You fuckin’ enjoyin’ this?” He asked bitterly as he glared at you. He drained the rest of his drink and slammed the empty glass down onto the counter with a little more force than what was necessary. His jealousy was seeping out of him, and you’d be a damned dirty liar if you said you didn’t find it so incredibly hot.

“Mm, just a little bit,” You replied with another tiny giggle. You leaned up against the bar and crossed your arms over your chest, your gaze meeting his; you noticed the way the seething anger flashed in his dark eyes. His raw, raging emotions were only exacerbated by the amount of bourbon he’d had to drink that night. “Oh lighten up, Joel! I’m only kidding and you know that. Listen, the outfit and the flirting, it’s just part of my job as a bartender. It’s something that all the girls around here have to do. I’m just eye candy for the lonely and horny patrolmen who have nothing better to do with their free time. Besides, Seth makes it very clear to all the fucking guys around here that they can look but they can’t touch—”

“I don’t give a fuck!” Joel snarled, suddenly rising to his feet. “I don’t give a fuck if they don’t touch you, alright? I don’t want those bastards lookin’ at you, hell I don’t even want any of them so much as fuckin’ breathin’ in your direction!” He drew closer towards you, his voice going so dangerously low it sent a little chill right up the length of your spine. “You’re mine, you fuckin’ understand me? You are mine.”

Your playful smile faded slightly.

His possessiveness should have bothered you. It should have angered you, even. You were a human being, not his piece of property. But as you drank in the sight of him, the way his hands curled into fists at his sides, the way his nostrils flared, and not to mention that all too familiar murderous look in his eye, you couldn’t help the wanting heat that flooded your lower belly.

“Then take me,” You murmured, your voice soft.

Joel sobered up ever so slightly. “What?”

��I didn’t stutter, Joel. I said, take me.”

Joel stared at you, mouth agape. “You’ve lost your damn mind. We’re in a fuckin’ bar—”

“A dimly lit, locked bar with no one else around,” You smirked, pulling your top down to expose the black lace bra you wore underneath. “You say I’m yours, so show me. Right here, right now.”

Joel’s cock twitched behind his zipper, his mouth going dry when he caught a glimpse of the way the soft, delicate lace hugged the delicious curve of your breasts. He opened his mouth to speak, but words failed him as he watched you bite down on your bottom lip and tilt your head up at him, batting your eyelashes innocently—you knew how to play him just like a fucking fiddle.

“Baby, no. Not here.”

You pouted playfully. “Don’t you want me?”

“Not like this,” he rasped, although the continued straining against the dark blue denim of his jeans stated otherwise. “I’m drunk, I’m pissed off—I just don’t trust myself with you right now.”

You smiled sweetly at him and stepped forward to shrink the gap of distance between your bodies.

You slid your hands underneath his brown jacket and pushed it off his shoulders, letting it fall to the floor. You placed a hand on his chest, right over his heartbeat as your eyes met his. “I trust you.”

He rigidly shook his head. “What if I hurt you?”

“I trust you,” You reassured him. “Please, Joel. I just need you to fuck me, right here, right now. I need you to show me that I’m all yours. Yours and only—”

Joel didn’t even bother to let you finish.

He reached out for you and pulled your body flush against his, his mouth crashing violently against yours; his tongue darted through your parted lips, dominating your own in a way that made you melt into a submissive little puddle right in his large hands. He wasted no time, moving his lips down to your neck where he started nipping and biting at your delicate flesh with his teeth—hard enough that your silky skin would be covered in discolored marks tomorrow. But any worries about him being too rough had gone out the window. He wanted to mark his territory. He wanted every motherfucker in Jackson to know you belonged to him.

“Joel,” You moaned out his name and clutched fistfuls of his dark green flannel shirt.

He said nothing, allowing his mouth to continue ravaging you as his hands started ridding you of your clothes; he broke contact for as second, just long enough to pull your shirt over your head. You aided him and reached around yourself to unhook your bra, carelessly tossing it somewhere behind the bar. Your shorts and matching lace underwear came off next, along with your tan brown cowboy boots.

Normally, Joel would take his time. He’d kiss and worship his way across every inch of your entire body, but not tonight—no, tonight he was going to take you quickly, roughly. Between all the alcohol and his pent up frustrations, being gentle was the very last thing on his mind.

“C’mere.” Joel yanked you over towards a small, square wooden table just a few feet away from the bar, the same damn table where patrons would enjoy their after work duty drinks. He gripped the back of your neck and shoved you down, bending you right over the table; you let out a little gasp as your warm, naked body hit the cold, laminated wood. His rough, calloused hands glided their way down your smooth back and he took a single step backwards to admire the view. “Open up for me, sweetheart. Let me see you—all of you.”

You glanced over your shoulder at him with lustful, hooded eyes. Biting your lower lip, you did as you were told and spread your legs, your entire body erupting in goosebumps as the chilly air coming from the vents of the building hit your throbbing center.

Joel groaned, noticing the way your inner thighs were slick, coated with your own arousal. “Look at you, my pretty girl. Already soakin’ wet for me and I haven’t even touched you yet.”

Giggling, you turned away from him and pushed your feet apart even wider. You then opened your mouth to speak, but instead let out a loud yelp when you felt him deliver a swift but harsh strike to your ass with the palm of his hand.

He’d never fucking done that before.

Joel began kneading at the spot he’d just struck you with his fingers so aggressively that you were certain you’d find bruises there in the morning.

The thought alone made you drip onto the floor.

“Joel—” You lifted yourself slightly off of the table.

“Stay down,” he commanded, pushing you back down.

You nodded and pressed your cheek flat against the table, your wet, aching walls clenching in pure anticipation as you heard his belt buckle clinking followed by the sweet sound of his zipper coming undone. Seconds later, the tip of his rock hard length pressed against your drenched slit.

You spread your legs even wider, prompting Joel to chuckle.

“You want me bad, don’t you my little darlin’?” he nearly taunted you. “Hm? You want me inside that pretty little pussy?”

“God yes I do—please fuck me,” You pleaded him. “Please, Joel. Please.”

He hummed. “Since you’re bein’ an awfully good girl and askin’ so politely…”

Joel didn’t even finish his sentence. There was a momentary pause and before you could ask him what the hell he was waiting for, he slammed into you, sheathing himself in your tight heat.

No warning. No warmup.

No time for you to think about anything except for the feeling of his thick, hard cock filling you up and stretching you completely.

You gasped out as all the air left your lungs. “Joel!”

Gripping your shoulders, he slid himself out of you entirely before delivering another powerful blow, one that had you seeing fucking stars. He didn’t give your body any time to adjust to him as he began to thrust, picking up a wild pace that you felt would split you in half if he didn’t ease up.

He’d fucked you plenty of times before—but never like this.

Senseless.

You gripped the edges of the table, gasping for a breath—you tried to cry out, but when you opened your mouth, all that came out were quick, pathetic little pants, desperate for air.

It hurt.

But the kind of hurt that felt so fucking good that you wanted more and more of it.

“You look so goddamn pretty, takin’ my cock like that,” Joel grunted out. His hands had abandoned your shoulders in favor of your hips, his fingers bruising the soft flesh there. “What a fuckin’ good girl you are for me, baby. Such a good girl—”

Planting your shaky hands on the table top, you pushed yourself up.

Joel’s hands left your hips. He slid an arm around your shoulders, pulling your naked back against his broad, clothed chest where he held you firmly in place as he continued to fuck you into oblivion with his barbaric, almost animalistic thrusts.

“Who do you belong to?” he whispered into your ear, his other hand resting on your stomach. “Tell me, darlin’. Who do you belong to?”

“You,” You somehow managed to choke out a reply between gasps. “I belong to you, Joel.”

“Yeah? You’re mine? All fuckin’ mine?”

You could only nod your head in response.

Joel’s arm around you tightened. “Say it,” he demanded. “I need you to say it.”

“I’m yours, all fucking yours!”

His hand moved from your stomach and dove between your thighs, two of his fingers finding your clit as swollen and sensitive as it had ever been. His digits circled the bundle of nerves, causing your legs to tremble as you felt the beginning of an orgasm coiling tight in your lower belly.

“Oh fuck,” You breathed out in a moan. “Joel, I’m gonna—”

“Come for me baby,” he encouraged you huskily, his breath hot against your ear. “I want you to come all over my cock like the good girl you are.”

Finally, you managed to find your cries inside of you; they tore themselves from your throat where they had been lodged, echoing throughout the entire, empty bar as you came undone, your walls clenching tightly around him.

“Fuck baby,” Joel released a deep, guttural groan and shoved you back over the table, pinning you down on it with both his hands as he spilled inside of you.

He leaned over you, his body hovering over yours as the two of you took a minute to catch your breath. He gave one final gentle thrust, groaning again when he felt the way you fluttered around him.

“Already wantin’ more sweetheart?” Joel planted a gentle kiss on your shoulder before finally pulling out of you. He stepped back, pulling his jeans back up into place; he stopped for just a moment, noticing the way his cum dripped out of you and slowly trickled down the inside of your thighs. Resisting the primal urge to take you all over again, he zipped up his jeans and buckled his belt. He then realized you still hadn’t moved and a frown tugged at the corners of his mouth. “Baby I didn’t hurt you did I—”

“Shut up,” You told him, lazily waving a hand at him. “Don’t ruin it.”

Joel couldn’t help but chuckle as he shook his head. “You really are somethin’ else, you know that?”

“Mhm, but that’s why you love me,” You reminded him, glancing over your shoulder at him with a tiny little smirk.

Joel leaned over, quickly feathering a trail of kisses down your spine before he started walking around the bar and picking up your clothes. He handed them to you along with his jacket and helped you clean yourself up with a clean rag from behind the bar. As you dressed, he disappeared behind the counter once more, returning just moments later with a glass of bourbon in one hand and another clean, damp cloth in the other. “Sit,” he ordered, pointing to a bar stool and you obeyed. You sipped on the hard liquor watching as he started wiping down the table. Discarding the cloth into a garbage bin, he began putting all the chairs up on the tables for you. Looking around, he asked, “What else do you need me to do?”

Setting the glass down, you stood up and shook your head. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll come in early tomorrow and finish up my tasks before the bar opens.” You smiled tiredly at him. “Let’s just go home, yeah?”

“Yeah, you need to get some rest—” Joel stopped, his dark eyes widening when he caught a glimpse of the marks that had already begun forming on your neck. “Shit,” he muttered as he hurried over to you. He moved the lapels of his jacket out of the way and touched them delicately. “You’re not gonna be able to hide these, baby.”

“It’s fine,” You grinned at him. “At least now, everyone will know who I belong to.”

#smut prompt challenge #Joel Miller #joel miller smut #joel miller one shot #joel miller x reader #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller x female reader #joel miller x you #joel miller x y/n #joel miller x oc #joel miller hbo #joel miller fic #joel miller fanfiction #pedro pascal characters #joel miller angst

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simplydnp · 14 days

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hey there!

I kind of consider you the resident dnp expert (at least in dnp culture) so I wanted your opinion on a question that's been building for a while now.

What are the boundaries for dnp now?

There are so many things that I feel have changed even in the last four years: writing smutty rpf was Gross and Weird, along with art along that line, speculating about their relationship was ABSOLUTELY a no-go, all things that I see happening on Tumblr now. And I'm not saying that's a bad thing!! I'm just acknowledging things have changed over time. They're different people now and so are we, and the "we know you know" era is lots of fun.

I was browsing reddit today (bad idea, do not recommend) and came across a post from a new Phannie asking if DnP were in a relationship. And while I agree that we cannot say for absolute certain that they are, the responses had a VERY different vibe than on here, emphasizing how bad the speculation was (true) and essentially saying "don't even think about that, just enjoy their content." (or something to that extent.)

Which... is very different from this here website in which we joke about them being horney for each other constantly lmao.

Being a very rules-driven person, I like expectations to be made abundantly clear for pretty much everything. So that's why I want to ask: Is there a line here? Are we crossing that line? How defined is that line? (All of this, of course, I recognize is your opinion and yours alone, and if this is posted I encourage anyone else to share their two-cents in a respectful way.)

Obviously, trying to find out where they live/things like that is very clearly crossing a boundary. But is there some sort of limit or boundary I (and tbh the rest of the phandom), in your opinion, should be keeping in mind?

thanks xx

hi!

'resident expert' is a hefty title, i'm just here trying my best!

'what are the boundaries for dnp now?' is really a great question. cause the thing is, we used to know. there used to be a fairly well-defined and mostly agreed upon line, and ever since the dapg revival in particular, the line keeps moving.

i'll be honest, i never really saw phanfic as rpf, even though it is. my stance on phanfic is the same as dnps: it's a beautiful expression of art and creativity and is so, so important. they've always been pro-fic (even though we subjected them to some absolutely horrific crack fics), so i don't think 'smutty' fic has ever been gross or too far. they've given their blessing, and, as the conversation has been in fandom communities the last few years, rpf isn't 'for' the people in them, it's for the fans. so i digress.

art is much the same way. they love art! they even included art of them kissing in a tumblr tag video back in the day, so to say that's not allowed especially after they're out is kind of crazy to me.

i think the line with stuff like that was showing it directly to dnp--tagging them in explicit stuff, that kind of thing. but creating it? go for it! it's always been a green light. (i think fans have previously overpoliced this and we lost a lot of great fic, art, and community members over it)

browsing reddit is always a Choice. i've never participated on dnp reddit before but i am aware that it is an entirely different space than here. something that's important, i think (and i think you think this too as you're asking about them), is to respect the fandom rules of the place you partcipate in. tumblr is generally one of the most phan-positive places on the internet, especially publicly facing. we make a lot of relationship jokes, particularly because we run on the assumption it's already true, based on what they've both said publicly (mostly dan).

i won't comment on reddit specifically just because i'm not a part of the community there, but the speculation about dnp online was a Lot for a long time. but the worst part of it was the stalking, the digging into personal lives, the contacting family members--that is what was bad. dnp have always had a connection--and, honestly, they kind of love flexing it and kind of always have. they absolutely play into things now, but they certainly did even way before coming out too. i think a certain level of speculation was to be expected, especially in that era of online fandom. but it wasn't just the 'teenage girls' who cared, the media did too, and so did many others.

i think one of the biggest differences now is 1 the awareness of 'our' past and trying to make up for it, and 2 the broader societal conversations about parasocial relationships.

you see this reflected on the snippets ive seen from dnp reddit and dnp twitter. they tend to be Very 'cautious' about the words they say, often undercutting perfectly reasonable statements with 'but whatever their relationship is'. on one hand, they don't want to cross a line, and i can respect that. on the other hand... it's 2024 babes. they just put out merch of them holding hands. dan's directly, intentionally, and explicitly called phil a bottom on dapg. they reacted to all of the pinofs, made jokes about 'theyre touching', and even joked about the tackle being 'wrestling 👀'. dan posted half-naked catboy pics and showed us phil was taking them. the 'watch your step babygirl' tweet & their reactions to it. phil is credited in WAD. they're making threesome jokes about themselves as a unit. i could go on and on.

to me, there's a few things that have 'moved the line' for us, so to speak.

1 - DAPG returning. for the last few years they specifically were not a duo (for projects) anymore. (and no, not because they hated each other). they just weren't. they wanted to focus on their goals and projects. they didn't have to resurrect dapg, but they chose to. marketing and money aside, they knew that if this went over well, it would well and truly revive the 'dan and phil' brand again. it would be specifically returning to being a duo in the public eye. (however they've also fully embraced this in all aspects, including merch, videos, and general attitude)

2 - pinof reacts. even though they'd been out since 2019, we hadn't had regular joint content from them since before that, therefore, while they had become more comfortable with themselves and their 'outness', we hadn't (in terms of them making explicit gay jokes together). so i really think dnp had to de-fang a lot of the 'theyre touching' of it all, because we didn't really know where we stood on it anymore. i think they succeeded, too. we couldn't be here, with the content of the last 3 months, without them tackling it head on (well, as head on as they're want to do).

3 - dapc. genuinely another big shift. they did this for the real fans. purely a passion project, and a specific choice in doing the handhold. they know what we're like. and this wasn't a brief, unplanned, unscripted moment. it's a specifically blocked out scene. they know it's opening a door, and they chose to. this is doubled by the fucking iconic merch selling, and furthered by phil's twitter likes of arguably romantic phanart, and then dan's full straddle like.

even throughout the current 6 months of revival, the line has moved. i don't know where it will settle. dnp keep moving it, in my opinion, and, genuinely, i don't think it's going to leave much to the imagination. as you say, obviously not the stalking or the contacting, but beyond that? especially here on tumblr? i wouldn't get too worried. obviously people will have their opinions, but as long as you're generally respectful and recognize that humans will see your posts and humans interact with them, i think you're good.

my rule of thumb is anything they intentionally put on the table, we can joke about or at the same level. but in terms of art/fic? go off, live your dreams. dan and phil would want you to.

#i didn't include a cut because people don't always look under them and this is generally a whole statement. feel free to add things.#there's specific discourse i dont partake in. doesnt mean you have to avoid it entirely. but just dont bring it up to dnp and you're fine.#dnp #dan and phil #phan #<- for the fandometrics #c.text #answered

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psychedelic-ink · 1 year

Text

𝑳𝑶𝑽𝑬 𝑾𝑰𝑳𝑳 𝑨𝑩𝑰𝑫𝑬

** gif by the amazing @inklore who made this for me, love u bby thank you so much!!!

pairing: joel miller x f!reader

genre: smut, hurt/comfort

word count: 3.5k

summary: a retelling of the third episode but with you in it. Starts with Ellie reading Bill's letter.

warnings: spoilers for episode three, oral (giving), shower sex, piv, lots of emotions, hugging joel because he needs it, soft!joel

a/n: i'm still fucking crying tbh

“August 29, 2023,”

“If you find this please do not come into the bedroom. We left the window open so the house wouldn't smell. It will probably be a sight. I’m guessing you found this Joel. Because anyone else would’ve been electrocuted or blown up by one of my traps hehehehehehe Take anything you need. The bunker code is the same as the gate code but in reverse. Anyway, I never liked you. But still, it's like we're friends. Almost. And I respect you. So I’m gonna tell you something because you’re probably the only person who will understand. I used to hate the world and I was happy when everyone died. But I was wrong because there was one person worth saving. That’s what I did. I saved him. Then I protected him. That’s why men like you and me are here, we have a job to do. And god help any motherfuckers who stand in our way. I leave you all of my weapons and equipment. Use them to keep—”

Ellie’s voice trails off, making you look up from the corner of the wall your eyes were digging a hole in. She presses her lips together, eyes moving away from the heartbreaking letter. Joel’s eyes snap up, and without saying a word he snatches the letter from her hands and reads it for himself. You have the urge to come close and peer at the words as well, but you don’t dare. You zero in on his expression; the crease between his brows deepens, the corner of his lips pulling down. He swallows.

“Stay here,” he croaks, heading to the door.

It slams shut. Leaving you and Ellie inside, you turn to her, “What did it say?” you ask despite having a solid guess of what the answer might be.

Ellie doesn’t look up. Her stance is relaxed but the tension tolling over her shoulders is visible. She sucks her bottom lip between her teeth and answers, “Tess,” she says. “Bill was telling Joel to keep her safe,”

“Oh shit,” you whisper instinctively. Ellie nods.

“My thoughts exactly,”

You drop your bag, the sudden relief of it being gone making you feel lighter than ever. You know he’ll be mad if you try to talk about it. But you also don’t have it in you to leave him to wallow in his own self-pity. Joel is a protector. And from what you’ve heard, Bill was also one. Protector to protector. The message was abundantly clear and Joel had failed again and again. You hate to word it like that, but you know that’s what he’s thinking. He’s thinking about Sarah, about Tess. About Tommy who might be already dead. Now, he has to deal with you and Ellie. You, he found in Boston with Tess, covered in bruises and cuts, ration cards stolen and beaten to a pulp.

You turn to Ellie one last time, she’s already staring at you, it’s slightly unnerving. “Wait here, don’t touch anything that might kill you. Stock up,”

“Aye Aye Captain.”

And you leave.

The sun is shining, not a single cloud in the sky. Your eyes lock onto Joel as soon as you step over the threshold; his back turned, letter in hand, shoulders slumped. He looks around the neighborhood, then back down to the letter. He repeats the motion a couple of times as if he can’t believe what’s happening around him. You follow the path his eyes draw, looking around and back at him. You wonder if this neighborhood is similar to the one he used to live in.

“Hey,” you finally call out, your voice sounding scratchy. Joel flinches, he crumples the piece of paper and stuffs it in his pocket. “Are you okay?”

“We need to get out of here,” he answers, fingers tightening around the key, he heads to the garage. You follow.

When the two of you are inside, you see his resolve finally starting to crack. He pops the hood open, looks inside, and slams it shut. Pressing his palms into the smooth surface, his head falls, body shaking with his every breath. Your steps are silent as you approach him, your eyes trail over the roundness of his shoulders, the dip of his shirt.

You bite down the inside of your cheek, not stopping until you feel a sharp sting. Holding your breath, you place a hand over his shoulder, gently squeezing.

He flinches, it’s the most minimal reaction, something you only felt because you were physically touching him. “Is this okay?” you ask.

Joel nods, his swallow audible. “Yeah, it’s fine,”

“Can I hug you?”

He tenses under your fingertips. You don’t make a move until you feel the small nod he makes. “Sure,” his voice cracks. “If you want to,”

Some part of you wants to ask ‘do you?’ but of course, you don’t. Of all the months you’ve known him, he’s never once verbally asked anyone for anything. If you give it, he’ll take it. Your hand smooths a path down his arm, the other rounding his waist. You take a deep breath as you press your forehead between his shoulder blades, you feel the steadiness of his heartbeat.

Joel is still tense but less than before. Your fingers curl around his wrist, and your other hand lays right above his heart, nails softly biting into the fabric of his shirt.

Much to your surprise, his hand covers your own, thick fingers lacing into yours. It gives you courage. It gives you hope. You press further into him, hug him with your entire body hoping that the warmth you provide is enough to soothe him, even for a second.

“Sorry,” he grunts out, squeezing your hand, he brings it to his lips. His mustache tickles your skin, and he eases his lips into you, something between a kiss and a press of skin. “I don’t know what to do. I’m so angry all the time, there’s a weight on my chest that never leaves. You understand?” you nod and he continues. “I’m not like Bill. Not in the way he thought that I was. I’ve always been afraid—Even after…”

You feel him shaking his head, and your grip around him tightens. You do understand. You’ve felt it too, but he made it easier, help you lift that weight despite not being a man of many words, his presence gave you strength.

You want to stay like this forever. Holding him, feeling him. He’s incredibly warm.

“I’m not strong enough,” he lastly says, whispering your name right after. “I can’t keep you or Ellie safe,”

You feel the brush of lips over your knuckles. He allows you to cradle his scruffy cheek. It feels like a dream almost, which makes you acutely aware of how much he must be hurting right now. Your heart breaks.

“You are,” you whisper, fingers moving along his beard. “We’re going to stock up, find Tommy, and get Ellie to the fireflies. Then we’re done. Maybe we can even come back here,”

He scoffs, “How are you always like this?”

“Like what?”

“Hopeful,”

“It’s because I have you.”

You know he’s confused. You can feel it simmering under his skin, face heating up under your hand. He’s confused as to how something positive could be spurred from his existence. But it’s the truth. And he needs to hear it. He needs to know that it’s not only grief, and sadness, that follow his every footstep like a shadow. His strength gives those around him a chance to grow, a chance to be more human. Allowing them to live and relax while he carries the burden.

His methods might be brutal, and the words he says might cut deeper than a knife ever could, but it comes from a place of a twisted sense of love.

“We should head back inside,” he murmurs and pulls at your hand. “I’ll make the truck battery and we grab what we can while it charges,”

“Okay,” you take a step back, already feeling the ache of not feeling him against your person. “I’ll go check on Ellie.”

Joel doesn’t say a word, nor looks at you, he only nods.

You still can’t fucking believe it.

Hot fucking water.

You’re impatiently sitting in one of the guest bedrooms, Ellie is downstairs, already taken her shower and Joel is still inside, a soft slow of steam slithering its way out of the cracks of the door.

You sitting there and waiting for Joel to get out isn’t probably the most efficient thing to do but you can’t help it, you feel giddy. Your leg bobs up and down as you wait. The mere thought of having warm water rolling down your tattered skin makes your heart leap to your throat—

The running water stops and your eyes fly to the door. A couple of minutes later it opens. A wet, clothed, Joel makes his way through the steam. It looks mystical, almost.

He stops when he sees you.

“What are you doin’ here?”

“Waiting to use the shower,” you grin, not shying away from openly raking your eyes up and down his body. “Looking good, Miller,”

He rolls his eyes and pushes his hair back, your pussy bottoms out at the way his biceps bulge from underneath the flannel. “Well, I’m done now. Have fun,”

Joel moves towards the door and you jump up barely in time to catch his wrist. He raises an eyebrow, eyes dropping to meet yours. His skin is still damp, if you were a cat you’d be purring by now.

“Sit down,” you choke out. “I—fuck—This is hard. I want to—”

“Don’t hurt yourself tryin’ to come up with words,” he teases and you look at him completely flabbergasted. Joel Miller actually sounds amused. It’s a goddamn miracle. He twists his hand so it’s him holding you instead, locking the door, he moves towards the bed, urging you to follow him as if this was his idea from the get-go.

“What do you want?” he asks, sitting on the edge of the bed. You’re standing between his spread-out legs, a chill runs up your spine. He reaches out and touches your chin. “Tell me,”

Instead of telling, you slowly sink down to your knees, fingers moving to unbutton his jeans. He spreads his legs wider as you tug them down, you trail your fingers up his thighs, feeling the soft hairs tickling the pads of your fingers. Joel’s breath hitches, muscles tensing under your touch. He’s semi-hard when you take him into your mouth. His hips buck up as you swallow, swirling your tongue around the head.

He grows harder with every lick. Your chin strains as you attempt to swallow him whole. You manage to take only half of him, your eyes squeezing shut at the pressure. Pulling up, you gasp for air. You kiss the side and flatten your tongue against it. Joel cradles your head, thumbs drawing slow circles, he guides you back down to his cock, pushing you further down.

“That’s it,” he breathes out heavily. “Just a bit more, always so fuckin’ good to me,”

He forces your gaze up, and his cock twitches above your tongue. You whimper at the way he caresses your skin, so tender, so gentle. “You are too good to me,” he repeats his words from before. “I want you to know that. I ain’t the best with words but…yeah. I’ll try to make right by you,”

If it wasn’t for his cock in your mouth, you would’ve smiled. Your heart feels so full that it overflows, the muscles of your stomach taut as you sink down, taking him until you feel the soft curls against the base of your nose. Joel holds you there, flush against his pelvis, heavily breathing as you swallow around him again and again. Spit trails down the corner of your lips, nostrils flaring as it gets harder to breathe.

When he releases you, you pull away with a pop, your lungs burning at the sudden influx of oxygen. You wrap your fingers around the shaft and start stroking him, he moans loudly, hips thrusting into your hand.

“I want you to cum down my throat, Joel,” you purr. “Use me,”

And he does.

The more desperate he becomes, the more stifled his groans get. He thrusts into your mouth, the tip of his cock nudging the back of your throat. You can’t breathe, you can’t think. Joel fucks deeper into your mouth, balls heavy on your chin as his thrusts become shallow. Your eyes roll back, your consciousness teetering on the edge of blacking out completely.

With a moment of desperation, you cup your mound, rubbing at your clothed clit. The friction isn’t nearly enough and you let out a moan around his length, the reverberations making his hips stutter.

Joel spills down your throat with a grunt, he presses his molars together, rolling his hips into your mouth. You swallow greedily. He tastes bitter, but that doesn’t stop you from lifting yourself on your knees to push him deeper down. He hisses, cock pulsing between your lips.

“Jesus Christ,” he slurs, head falling back. “Jesus fuckin’ christ,”

He pulls you off with a sharp tug, looking down at you between heavy lids. “You good darlin’?”

You slowly nod, lips parting with a soft sigh. Your mind is in a deep haze of lust, your body aching to be touched, to be filled. You want to say something, anything, but you’re lost for words.

“Shit, alright come on— Up,” he grabs you by the arm, helping you to stand on your feet. You shoot him a confused look, which he answers promptly. “Let’s get you cleaned up. Is it alright if I help?”

It takes you a moment to understand the question and answer, “S-Sure.”

You stand in the bathroom naked with your arms crossed in front of your chest. Joel wraps his arms around you slowly, still hesitant to touch you. He rests his chin above your shoulder, his torso bare, you sigh blissfully at the skin-on-skin contact.

“What’s wrong?” he murmurs, moving his hand down your stomach. “I thought you were excited,”

“I am,” you shudder when he drags his nose up the column of your neck, his lips following the path back down.

“Do you want me to go?”

You shake your head, “No.”

He murmurs an ‘okay’ into your skin and gently nudges you forward so you get in. The tiles are cool and slippery. It feels absurd being in such a homey-feeling bathroom after so long. It smells like lavender.

You stand there, too stunned to move until Joel joins you. He stands behind you, leaning over, naked body pressing into yours, he turns on the faucet, playing with the degree of the water until it pours warm over your skin.

“How’s that?” he mutters.

“Good,” a giggle falls from your lips. “It feels so fucking good. Unbelievable,”

Joel starts washing your body, the touch of his hands has fear behind them. A fear that you might vanish at any second. His fingers trail over every inch of your skin, exploring every curve and valley. You close your eyes, relishing in the sensation of having him this close. He washes your hair, taking his time, massaging your scalp. He moves down to your back, running his hands over your spine, kneading out the tension from your muscles.

His hands move to your front, lingering over your breasts, sending shivers down your spine. He takes his time, leaving no spot untouched. The water cascades over your bodies, swallowing you and hiding you both from the tainted world outside. Wet lips trail the slope of your shoulders, fingers slipping between your folds. He drags them between your slit, circles your aching clit, and repeats. Your head falls over his shoulder, your soft moans drowned by the sound of water.

Joel holds your chin and turns you until you’re facing him, he closes the distance, molding his lips into yours. His wet tongue follows the seam of your lips and you open up for him, he moves his tongue over yours, licking the inside of your mouth. He swallows your moans and whines as you start to grind down against his palm.

His tongue presses deeper, and your legs tremble. He grinds the heel of his palm into the sensitive bundle of nerves, groaning into your mouth when slick gushes into his hand. His cock lays above the curve of your ass, hot and hard.

He grinds into you, his cock pressing insistently between your cheeks. His hands grab your hips, pulling you closer to him, and his mouth moves across your shoulder and neck. His lips find your ear.

“Is this okay?” he asks, his breath heavy and hot against your neck.

“It is. I want to feel you Joel, every inch of you,”

His hands reach up, cupping your breasts, massaging gently. His thumbs circle your nipples and they harden beneath his touch, your breath catching in your throat. You roll back into him, your body craving more of his touch— of him.

Joel’s hands move down your body, his fingers tracing every inch. “Turn around for me,”

You move without hesitation. He takes a step back, letting his hands trail over you. You take a step forward, closing the gap between you and he takes you in his arms, his mouth finding yours. His tongue slips between your lips and you moan into his mouth, lost in him.

You allow your own hands to explore his body as well. He’s firm, arms strong and thick, hips narrowing as your fingers trace a path down within the water droplets that cling to his skin.

Affectionately, you caress his stomach. You gently press the pads of your fingers into the soft flesh, loving the way his chest heaves.

The water continues to pour down, creating a soothing background noise. He pushes his cock between your legs, moving through the slickness and sending sparks of pleasure through your body.

You move together, bodies entwined and breaths mingling. He lets out a low moan as you press your hips against his. His hands move to your back, his fingers tracing the line of your spine. He pulls you closer, his lips claiming yours again and again and again— He moans as he fucks your thighs. The bulbous head of his cock catching against your clit, the corners of your vision fade to black. Your head buzzes.

Joel continues to roll and grind, cock slipping between your legs with ease. During it, he slips into you, stretching you enough that the pain easily bleeds into the pleasure. He holds you, cock twitching as your flutter around him. You’re dripping and making a mess of him, he feels it. You know that he does by the way he bites into your skin, his growl vibrating across your body.

“You’re so fuckin’ wet,” he says, licking the water off your skin. “Feels so good inside—Your pussy feels so fuckin’ good. I don’t think it’ll ever be enough,”

“S-Shit Joel,”

Your breath hitches in your throat, your hips meeting his with each thrust. He holds your gaze, fucking himself deeper, harder into you. Pleasure licks the bottom of your spine, heat rolling in your stomach. The water washes away the sweat but you still burn. Joel’s hand moves up to the back of your neck, his hand big enough to press his fingers into both sides of your throat.

You nearly go limp at his hold, knees bucking at the pressure. But you trust him, and you aren’t at all surprised when he keeps you up, pounding into you as his lips slither down your neck.

He moves his hand lower, skimming down your stomach and cupping your sex. His thumb circles your clit, and you gasp as wave after wave of pleasure wash over you.

You’re teetering on the edge, ready to come undone, when Joel suddenly pulls out. His fingers don’t stop, pinching your clit. You cry out his name as your orgasm rips through you, he holds you close as your body jolts. Your body is left confused, empty, yet still clenching as if Joel’s cock is still inside.

It’s so intense that tears roll down your cheeks, pleasure ripples over your skin, unfiltered whimpers falling from your lips. Your gaze drops to his cock, your eagerness to please loud in your mind. You notice that he’d already came, seed mixing with the water.

“I got you don’t worry,” he mutters, lips brushing your forehead. “You’re alright, you’re with me,”

You blink up, eyes finding Joel’s. A lazy smile spreads across your face, the water beating over your skin now cold. “Was that good?” you ask, kissing the bald spot on his chin.

“You know it was,” when you give him a knowing look, he sighs. “It was good, thank you, darlin’”

“I’m glad to hear that,” you grin, hands moving up his arms. “Now let’s get cleaned up one last time and get the hell out of here.”

#joel miller x you #joel miller x reader #joel miller #tlou fanfiction #tlou fanfic #hbo the last of us #the last of us hbo #the last of us #the last of us fanfiction #joel miller x f!reader

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virginmiri99 · 10 days

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Ok. I have a lot to say about this. I think it's been abundantly clear they have been struggling to keep the company afloat, but I also think its a double edged sword bv they bit off more than they could chew in the first place. I've had this opinion for a while but it really cemented since the beginning of Ghost Files. I enjoyed what Watcher was at the beginning, I think they put in good work with Puppet History and it still continues to be their standout show and had a fair amount of "low-budget" shows that filled out the edges like are you scared, too many spirits, top 5 beat down, even their dnd campaign. But as soon as Ghost Files started I began to notice a trend of... idk... bleeding money? Ghost Files was so high budget that I was bored. I get that Ryan wanted to breathe new life into a ghost hunting series but what made bfu so good wasn't the ghost evidence... it was his and Shane's friendship. That's why I liked all their small shows near the start of Watcher--it felt like friends. I think they just continued to go bigger and bigger with more things and more random interns and more shows that it just got to be too much which... led us here. I hate to say I haven't watched their videos in forever, and that ghost files bored me so bad I couldn't even finish some episodes... but thats what happened. I get them moving exclusively to patreon. We all need money. But I wish instead of that, they just focused their energy into their CLEARLY popular series. Puppet History was beyond good--their only series that I didn't mind random guests every episode, in fact it was made better by the random guests--mystery files had potential but came at a bad time, ghost files should've been way lower budgeted and focused on modern house calls TBH! I'm sick of old prisons!!!! And get rid of the fan evidence! Stupid! Also IDGAF about fancy gadgets! All you need is three things and let your humor carry the rest of it. Beyond the "big" series they could have their low budget ones like are you scared, too many spirits, top 5 beat down (the show that I hate random guests for), playing videos games idk man, and like one more or something who knows. But with what they dove headfirst into it doesnt shock me they fell into this hole.... I just wished they realized no one cares about the highest of high budget video series... they care about the dynamic between ryan and shane. Im sick of random ass people in their videos wheres steven lim do a video with steven lim why is he banished to do you taxes. wtf put him in top 5 beat down instead of these random ass random people. the drew gooden one was good though I dont mind actual famous funny people being guests.

anyway those are my thoughts. TLDR they bit off more than they could chew, loss sight of what made them so enthralling, and now are washed up youtubers... saddening

#long post

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mafaldaknows · 11 months

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I just don't understand what his team was thinking when they agreed to this stunt. Exactly how does he benefit from it other then being seen as an uber straight grade-A douchebag? Is this really the image his team wants for Timmy? There's just too much talent and potential there to be shamming with a Kartrashian/Jenner.

Hello, Anon:

It’s absolutely mind-boggling what having more money than God can buy in the United States of America these days: New lips, new hips, and a sparkling new image with a shiny new man who apparently doesn’t even need to be present to win.

The KarJenner PR team has been hard at work for the last few months for a classy reboot of baby sister Kylie, complete with a romance with the internet’s boyfriend, style influencer and fashion icon Timothée Chalamet, who also happens to be the greatest actor of his generation. At face value, it certainly does seem like an unlikely match, given the imbalance of (dare I say it?) intellectual curiosity and preternatural talents between them. But anything is possible, when one has more money than one can ever spend in several lifetimes and the other has greater goals and ambitions than his power and influence will allow at this point in his career.

Both parties involved, however directly or indirectly, can find benefit in being in each other’s orbits driveways, taco restaurants, tarmac, in an image-conscious culture ravenous for juicy content just like this.

One of the pair has received a decidedly more positive boost from it.

The other, not so much, perhaps by design.

He may have extremely valid reasons for wanting to promote that particular “douchebag” image, if he really is willingly participating in what appears to be yet another PR romance. His handlers and PR team probably assume that he must do this in order to continue to level up in Hollywood as the next Leonardo DiCaprio. And they are probably right, given the current wave of puritanical bigotry in the USA and elsewhere in the world. There is far too much money riding on the success of his next three potentially blockbuster projects and too many people with a vested interest in his success for them to allow his image to be seen as anything other than “normal” in order to appeal to the mainstream sensibilities of a global audience. His own ambitions most likely make it impossible to refuse.

Can’t knock the hustle. ✨💃🕺🏻✨ And both of them are hustlers. Maybe that’s what they have in common.

If this were truly an authentic romance, we already know that all they would need to do to keep it private is to KEEP IT PRIVATE: Say nothing to the press, don’t call the paparazzi to meet you in the parking lot, don’t alert the media at all. They both have the means and resources to disappear from public view whenever they want, if they really wanted to do that. It’s not a requirement to begin a new relationship with a press release, not even for celebrities.

And yet here we are, a love story loudly announced in a tale of two cars, maybe three, long driveways but park at the bottom where everyone can see, and taco dates with paparazzi who take photos but only with his wingman.

A story which has made it abundantly clear that at least one of them wants to

MAKE SURE EVERYONE NOTICES their super-duper-uber-private budding romance 🚘🌮❣️🌮🚘

I’m not entirely convinced that he’s even an active participant in all of this, TBH. Many of the details thus far don’t add up to much of anything except a lot of black cars being shuffled around in his driveway published by the trash gossip press with sensationalist headlines and articles intended to plant the idea in the minds of those who want to believe it or need to know it’s happening.

For reasons.

And all of this accomplished without a single decent photo as concrete evidence of this alleged romance between two people famously well-versed in the art of the selfie in the golden age of Instagram.

Not even a fan photo or one “leaked” by their team. Nothing, except some extraordinarily grainy outdoor shots in someone’s backyard where the only easily identifiable person is Kylie Jenner and only because of her unusual proportions, in a town teeming with Teemo lookalikes who would happily stand in for the real thing for nothing but the chance to say they did it.

The Devil works hard but Kris Jenner works harder.

Seeing might be believing, but only if we can actually see what we’re seeing.

Thanks for your comment. 🤔🥔📸🎪🫤🤷🏻‍♀️

#hello anon #timothée chalamet #kylie jenner #range rover rodeo #photos with potatoes #public private romance #douchebag #climber #a tale of two cars maybe three #tacos but bring your wingman #better photos from bigfoot sightings #bigfoot family bbq #kyliegate #seeing is believing #rah rah oh ma ma a #ro ma ro ma ma a #mafalda needs a disco nap #tales from the charmiesphere

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loversj0y · 11 months

Text

'tis the damn season

chapter two - you could call me babe for the weekend

alcohol-induced decisions snowball into conversations about the future, family tensions, poetry, and a serious discussion on the bitchiness of orca whales.

'tis the damn season masterlist

pairing: cc!wilbur soot x gn!reader

this part is primarily fluff! im keeping the list of tws in each part just for the sake of clarity

trigger warnings: reader's mother is abusive (not physically) and father is emotionally absent. this will be talked about in extensive detail. alcohol, some suggestive themes, and a lot of anxiety, slut-shaming

author's note: part two baby lets fcking go!!!! this part is insanely sweet but also there are some.... tenser moments due to families being shit tbh (it also becomes abundantly clear here why i consider dialogue my strong suit and not anything else bc i am Not the best at being Descriptive! ao3 version!

word count: 9.6k

You and Wilbur spent the next four days developing a routine. It always started with butting heads with your family and running to Wilbur’s for solace. You two would spend hours talking before falling asleep together on his bed. In the morning, you would walk back to your house, and the cycle would repeat. On the fifth day of this routine, drinks got involved.

“You brought a whole bottle of vodka?” Wilbur deadpanned.

“Yep,” you replied, “I’m not sure about you, but I’d like to get at least mostly drunk.”

He shrugged, “Can’t say I’m doing anything tomorrow that would stop me from wanting to. Plus, we haven’t drank together in years. Got to carry on a tradition.” You mindlessly wondered if he was thinking of the same night you were. “I’ll grab some cups. Want to drink it straight or with a mixer?”

“Both. Start with two shots and then maybe cranberry juice mixer?”

He nodded, “Alright, to the kitchen we go.”

You both walked to the kitchen, and he grabbed two shot glasses. You poured one into each, setting the bottle down and grabbing your shot.

“Ready?”

He picked his shot up and nodded, the both of you throwing your heads back in moments to take the first one. You coughed a bit after swallowing it. You weren’t really used to drinking much anymore, but from the looks of it, neither was Wilbur. He coughed as well, groaning lightly. After you recovered, you started pouring the second shots, and the cycle repeats once more.

“Fucking hell, man, I forgot how annoying shots are,” you chuckled.

He laughed, “Yeah, though, to be fair, we completely forgot a chaser.”

You shrugged, “True, but we have to stay true to our traditions.”

“Good point,” he grabbed the cranberry juice from the fridge, pouring it into two empty glasses while you washed the shot glasses. He added the ice and the vodka, grabbing both cups when he was done. We headed upstairs, sitting on his bed and putting some random show on the TV.

“Man, this really does feel like school all over again,” he laughed.

“You know what they say, ‘when in Rome’,” you chuckled.

“I suppose,” he hummed, both of you taking sips of your drinks.

After a moment, you leaned against him wordlessly. He gave you a confused look and you just shrugged.

“You know,” you started, “for as shit as it is, being with my parents and all, I’m glad I showed up this year.”

“Oh, really? Why’s that?” He snickered.

You looked up at him, holding your tongue. You were thankful for the vodka giving you an excuse for the redness on your cheeks, but you knew it wasn’t the drinks making you notice just how gorgeous he looked right now. His hair was tousled, probably from the amount of times he would adjust his hair while he spoke. His sleeves were pushed up to his elbows, drawing attention to the carefully crafted veins that followed from his hands up his arms. There was a slight pink tinge to his cheeks, but you couldn’t tell if it was the alcohol or your staring that made him blush. You were only tipsy, but he made you feel completely intoxicated.

In a moment of boldness, you leaned up and kissed his cheek.“Because if I didn’t, I’d never have seen a certain handsome guy again. And even worse, I never would’ve gotten to do that.”

Almost immediately, he blushed furiously, “You get a drop of alcohol in you and get all kissy, huh?”

You shrugged, and the sober part of your brain was yelling at you to shut up before you did something stupid. “Only with you.”

His breath hitched, obviously unsure of what to say. His mind was in overload. The person he loves is actively flirting it seems, and he had no clue what to do. He thought about kissing you every day since that first kiss. Truthfully, he thought about it every day since you’d met. In the past, it was only the alcohol that gave him courage to ask. Now, his courage lays less in the alcohol and more in the fact that you were flirting with him, and he knew there would not likely be another chance like this. He turned to face you, gently reaching down to hold your hand.

“Can I… can I kiss you?”

You nodded. He cautiously pulled you forward, and after a moment of breathlessness, pining, and anticipation, you closed the gap. The entire world came to a stop as your lips pressed together. The only thing you could focus on was his lips on yours, shaky hands pulling each other closer, and the intense beating of your heart.

One kiss turned to two, which then turned to three, which then turned to cups on nightstands, a forgotten show, and a lost count of how many kisses had been shared. You had no clue how much time had passed, the only indication of time was the “Are you still watching?” screen proudly displayed on the TV, bathing you and Wilbur in muted light. You pulled away first, completely breathless and admiring the goofy smile on his face as he panted lightly. He reached a hand up, gently brushing his thumb over a small hickey he’d left near your collarbone.

“Sorry,” he hummed, “got a bit enthusiastic.”

"You're not sorry. I can see how proud you look," You snorted, "But I don’t mind, I just may need to steal one of your jumpers to make up for it.”

He tapped his chin in contemplation, “I like the terms of that deal.” He stood, grabbing a light blue jumper from his closet and handing it to you.

You pulled it on over your shirt before looking down at it, “Will, is this your merch?”

“It may be,” he hummed, “it looks good on you, though, babe.”

You tensed, and it seemed to be more visible than you’d intended as he asked, “Oh, I’m sorry, is that not alright? I can call you something else, or just forego the pet names thing entirely, if that- if that makes you more comfortable.”

You shook your head a bit, “No, it’s… it’s alright. Just not used to it.”

He nodded with a sweet smile, “Alright,” he sat down again, holding his hand out for yours.

You smiled, placing your hand in his. He pulled you forward until you were pressed against his chest again.

“Hi,” he chuckled.

“Hey,” you snorted in response, grinning up at him.

“You’re very pretty,” he hummed.

“So are you.”

“I have a proposition, okay, hear me out, ready?”

You nodded as he continued. “You’re pretty, and you say I’m pretty. And I think, if we’re both pretty, it’d be absolutely beautiful if we kissed some more.”

You burst out into laughter, nodding. “Yeah, okay. I’d love to make something beautiful with you.”

He grinned widely, pulling you in for another kiss. At this point, the alcohol had mostly faded from both your system and his. You two were just drunk off each other, becoming a mess of lips, arms tangled around each other, hands in hair, and matching grins. You never felt more thankful for throwing caution out the wind. When you two eventually tired of kissing, you laid your head on his chest, and he wrapped his arms tightly around you, keeping you as close as possible.

“We should probably talk about this,” he said, staring up at his ceiling.

You sighed, burying your face against his chest, “Probably should. Or, we could wait ‘til morning and just be all cozy and relaxed right now.”

He chuckled, pressing a kiss into your forehead, “Alright. I am a bit tired, anyway.”

You nodded in agreement and let your eyes slip shut. Upon noticing, Wilbur started humming softly until you’d fully fallen into the arms of sleep.

The morning did not end up as peaceful as you’d hoped it would be. You did not wake up in Wilbur’s arms, but rather to the sounds of him frantically moving across his room, clearly panicking about something.

“Will?”

His head whipped over to you, “Hi, darling, good morning, or- afternoon, rather, I guess.”

“Is everything alright?”

He nodded rapidly, “Yep, yes. Yes. I just- I forgot I have an event for stream today and it starts in like five minutes.”

At that, you grabbed your phone to check the time, startled by how late it was. You were even more startled by the missed call and subsequent text from your mother, informing you of the family holiday dinner that your presence was mandatory for. You groaned, burying your face into the mattress for a moment. The idea of spending another night surrounded by your extended family felt less like a chore and more like court sentencing. Not to mention, you could sense your mother’s kindness was a fallacy she created to convince you to visit. Every moment you were around her you got the sense of her old habits refusing to die.

“I have to go, too,” You sighed, pulling yourself to the edge of the mattress.

He frowned, “Family stuff?”

You nodded.

“Well, maybe after, if you’re not too tired, we can see each other again. If not, there’s always tomorrow, so,” he walked over, gently kissing your forehead, “we got time.”

You were acutely aware of the fact that, realistically, you two did not have time. But that point was irrelevant in this context, so instead, you just nodded.

Wilbur helped you to your feet, gently wrapping his arms around you. You did the same, hugging him tightly for a moment. After a moment, you pulled away and you two stood at arm's length.

He leaned down, giving you a gentle kiss, “I’ll text you after the stream, alright? Hopefully, then I can give you some escape from your family.”

You kissed him back, chuckling, “Please, do. I’ll take all the help I could get against them.”

The walk back home was filled with uneventful dread. You had a few hours to decompress and get ready, but you just didn’t want to go to this dinner. You just wanted to be with Wilbur or to be alone. You opened your front door to see your mother standing in the foyer, and she whipped her head around once you walked in.

“My God, Y/N, I had half a mind to assume you’d died! You don’t even bother to text me when you’ve gone out, or when you’ve woken up, let alone answer my calls, I-“ She stopped herself mid-sentence, taking in your appearance with disdain: the oversized sweater, the messy hair, and the slight red on your cheeks that hadn’t quite gone away since you kissed Wilbur goodbye.

“Where were you?” She demanded, “So help me God, you’d better tell me the truth because, I will not have my child being a whore under my roof.”

You groaned knuckles going white as your hands turned to fists, “For fuck’s sake, Mum, I’m an adult, alright? I’m allowed to have my own life and do my own things, and I am in no way obligated to tell you where I’ve been.”

“Are you on drugs? Have you been going off and getting high?”

“I wish I was, Mum, because maybe then your accusations would actually fucking make sense.”

Your mother scoffed, and you watched with horrid familiarity as her facade returned. Her voice took on a new edge when she spoke, one that brought you back to being a scared child, helpless in defending yourself, “Darling, everything I do is for your sake-“

“Don’t give me that bullshit, mum. You did things for me because it was your job when I was growing up, but you haven’t done shit for me except treat me like an obligation since I left to live in London.”

She let out a sigh, clearly trying to invoke your sympathy, “Well, maybe I just miss knowing what my child is doing.”

You wouldn’t give her an ounce of your pity. “Yeah? Well, maybe if you were a better mother, you’d know.”

You left her standing there in shock as you stormed back to your room. Maybe that was mean, but you couldn’t care less. She made your life a living hell, and still apparently attempts to, and at least now you didn’t have to cower around her anymore. You could stand up for yourself. You got ready for the hellish evening that awaited you, popping on Wilbur’s stream in the meantime. Thankfully, you were able to find an outfit that covered the physical evidence of Wilbur on you, given his apparent love for hickeys. You finished getting ready and just hid out in your room for as long as you reasonably could. Wilbur texted you once his stream ended, and the two of you continued to text throughout the night, which provided a nice distraction from the politics of a family holiday dinner. Your mother refused to make eye contact with you, clearly still upset about our argument. You paid no mind to her pointed remarks and snarky comments throughout the night. The highlight of the evening, however, was your younger cousin. He was a small lad, just recently turned eight, and was frankly a major iPad kid. The joy came from passing behind him to see Wilbur on his screen. He was watching a Minecraft video by someone named Tommy, and lo and behold, there was Wilbur. You brought up Tommy to Wilbur, and he seemed fond of him, happily considering Tommy his “favorite nuisance”.

Once enough people had left – and anyone who was still there was too drunk to notice one less person – you took the opportunity to leave. Once you were out in the light snow, you trekked over to Wilbur’s, shooting him a quick text to let him know you’d be there soon. You were freezing by the time you’d arrived, having left your jacket back in your room.

He opened the door, pulling you into his arms, “Darling, you’re shaking, come here.”

You hugged him back tightly, leaning your head into his shoulder, “You don’t know how happy I am to be here with you.”

“It was that bad?”

“Yeah,” you sighed, closing your eyes, “God, I feel stupid”

“What do you mean?”

“I just- they changed! Or at least, they seemed like they did. Every phone call, they seemed pleasant. I only agreed to even come back because it- it genuinely seemed like they’d changed. But fuck man, they’re exactly the fucking same, if not worse now. I can’t even fathom how I let them get my hopes up again.”

Wilbur didn’t seem to know what to say, instead just rubbing your back soothingly. He spoke up after a moment, “‘m sorry. That sounds like shit.”

“It is,” you pulled away, “I’d rather not think about it anymore, honestly. Not much I can do about it right now, anyway.”

He nodded, “Well, c’mon. You remember how you asked about Tommy?”

You nodded.

“I may have told him about you a bit, and he’s insistent on talking to you. Granted, I told him that wouldn’t be happening, but given the bad night that you’ve had? Trust me, he can make anyone laugh, and you’ll love him, I promise.”

“Okay, sure,” you chuckled, “If you say so.”

He took your hand, pulling you upstairs. You chuckled as you followed him. You sat down in the office chair next to him, and he pulled your chair closer to his own, both popping a headphone in.

“Don’t say anything yet, alright?”

You nodded as he rang Tommy.

“Wilbur!” Tommy spoke loudly, which immediately made you cringe from the noise. Wilbur turned down the volume.

“Hey, Tommy! Listen, remember that childhood friend I told you I was reconnecting with?”

“You mean snogging? Yes.”

Wilbur blushed and you stifled a laugh. “Sure, right. You remember how I said you wouldn’t be meeting them?”

“Why, yes, Wilbur, you said it quite rudely.”

“Right, well,” he gestured for you to say hello.

“Hi, Tommy. It’s nice to meet you.”

A beat passed. Then two.

“WILL, YOU BASTARD, I-” Tommy yelled. You were thankful Wilbur had turned the volumn down. He then took a deep breath clearing his throat, “Hello, Wilbur’s friend. Wilbur, I knew you would introduce me, you prick.”

From there, you and Wilbur spoke to Tommy for a while. He and Wilbur seemed to have this odd dynamic that consisted mostly of just poking fun at each other, but you’d be dammed if you didn’t admit how funny the kid was. Even if a good amount of his comedy was just yelling at Wilbur, it did bring a smile onto your face and even made you laugh quite a bit. Wilbur was right, he did strongly improve your mood after your day.

You and Wilbur ended up laying on his bed afterward, your head on his chest. His hands carded through your hair, taking care to make sure he didn’t tug at any knots. He spoke up softly, “I know you’ve had a shit day, but we should still probably talk.”

You groaned softly, sighing, “I hate when you’re right, you know that?”

“I know,” He chuckled, “I don’t love it either, you’re usually the one in the right.” He took a deep breath before moving on to the actual heart of the topic at hand, “You know, I do really, genuinely like you in a romantic sense.”

“I really like you too.” You didn’t like him, you fucking love him. But if you knew where this was going, you didn’t want to make this harder for the both of you.

He smiled at this, squeezing your hand gently, “Suppose we should discuss if we’re official then.”

You sighed, a frown adorning your features, “In the sake of honesty, I don’t know if we can be.” His face dropped, frown matching your own as you continued.

“In a few days, I’m going back to London, and I barely have time to focus on anything other than studying. I’m worried that I’d be neglectful as a partner, and you don’t deserve that. Even more so, thinking about the future scares the shit out of me. I’m scared of everything, Wilbur. Don’t get me wrong, I want nothing more than to be here with you and forget about the world. I want nothing more than the ability to have a happy relationship with you. But- but, Will, I’m scared of deciding to go through with this, and ending up losing you because of it.”

You buried your head against his chest, letting out a shaky sigh. He was silent for a while before he spoke again.

“I understand. So, how about this?” You looked up at him and he brushed a strand of hair behind your ear, “We have this week. These last few days of holding onto each other and calling each other babe. Then, once you leave, and you get settled in, we see what we can do. We’ll see if you can have the time, or if I can do something, or whatever we can do. And if we figure it out, we figure it out. If we don’t, we wait until you finish this final year, and we pick up from there.”

“You’d be willing to do that?”

“Love, I waited fifteen years to kiss you, and another four just to have you in my life again. A year is nothing in comparison.”

You didn’t quite know when you’d started crying. You sniffled a bit, wiping your eyes as you nodded rapidly. “Yeah. Yeah, okay. We can do that.”

He smiled at you, wiping your eyes gently, “Okay.”

You leaned up, placing a hand on his cheek as you kissed him. Your heart felt so warm, but your stomach still felt sick at the idea that so much remained uncertain. Part of you hated the idea that he’d be waiting for you, but a band aid solution felt better than simmering in bubbling anxiety, so you would accept it for now at least.

He held you close, smiling softly. He pressed a kiss to your forehead gently, “Don’t worry, love. This time, regardless of what happens, I’m not losing you again. You’re stuck with me, honestly, so you’d better hope you don’t get sick of me. Because I am going to be a thorn in your side.”

You laughed, burying your face against his shoulder, “I’ll gladly accept that. I think I could get quite used to the feeling of being prodded by a thorn all the time.”

He immediately burst out laughing, and you chuckled yourself, lightly hitting him. “I did not mean it like that.”

He laughed, “Mean it like what, darling? Like this?” He turned, sitting on your hips as he started to tickle you. You squealed, squirming under him and laughing.

“Will! I- I swear to God, mate, I will- I will piss myself, stop it!”

He laughed at what could only be described as your suffering, stopping after a moment and just placing his hands on your sides. He leaned down and kissed you, and you wrapped your arms around him, gently playing with the ends of his hair. He hummed softly, one hand coming to cradle your head, his thumb rubbing your cheek. You were both breathless when he pulled away. A lopsided grin stretched across his face, still panting as he spoke, “Do you think orcas make fun of other whales for not having cool designs?”

You burst out laughing, groaning as you threw your head back, “Wilbur Soot, what the hell?”

“I’m serious!” He laughed, “Do you think they’re mean about it?”

You laughed, adoring just how bizarre this beautiful man could be, “I think some are. I like to think most are kind, though. Why is this important?” You laughed through your words.

His eyes crinkled at the edges as he grinned widely, “Everything has some importance to it. In this case, your opinion on if orca whales are assholes or not. I just like hearing your worldview.”

You flushed softly, “Really? And of all the things you’d ask about, why the bitchiness of orcas?”

He hummed, “Well, one, whales are fucking amazing. They’re gigantic and insane looking, I fucking love them. Two, it’s serious to me, but it's not serious. I know your politics, and you know mine. But silly stuff still reflects you, so I’m curious. Now that I can, I want to know all of you in every tiny detail, I want to absorb everything that I’ve missed in the past few years or all the things I just may have forgotten to time. I want to know the parts of you that you have never shown before, and I want to know the parts of you that don’t exist yet. Hence, asking a question you’ve probably never thought of before. I want to learn you as you learn yourself and show you the beauty that lies in each detail.”

You blushed darkly, left speechless. The word, love, was not strong enough, didn’t feel quite right, to fully define just how much you felt for this man. Telling him “I love you” would never fit how much you truly felt for him. You refrained from saying it for now, eventually just grabbing onto him and pulling him into a tight hug.

“You have no idea just how much you mean to me,” you whispered against his ear.

He kissed the side of your head, whispering back, “Darling, I know more than anyone just exactly what you mean.”

You held him, tighter, as if he’d leave you the same way you left him if you’d let go. After a moment, tears began welling up in your eyes. Not bad or good ones, but ones that signified just how loved you felt and how much you felt for him.

“Darling, you’re shaking, is everything alright?” He pulled away, frowning, “You’re crying, love, what’s going on?”

You shook your head, smiling through the tears, “No, it’s not bad, I’m just- sorry,” you spoke in a light sob, and he shook his head.

“Don’t apologize! I’m just worried, did something happen?”

You smiled widely up at him, “No, I’m just overwhelmed,” you said, and when his expression fell, you quickly tacked on, “Not because of you! You just, um, you make me feel… seen, I guess.”

He smiled, wiping tears away, “I’m glad, then. You deserve to be seen. You’re beautiful, and amazing, and… everything. Even if I am the only one who sees you, at least then, someone knows how grand your existence is.”

You groaned, blushing again, “You can’t just say things like that, you twat,” you sniffled a bit. “It’s too nice.”

“It’s true,” he shrugged, “simply deal with it.”

You laughed, pulling him in for another hug, “I’ll learn to, I guess.”

He buried his face against your neck, nodding, “Good.” He pressed a few gentle kisses along your neck. The kisses started delicately, as if he was worried that kissing you too hard would hurt. As you relaxed further and further into each kiss, you could feel him grin softly against your neck. His kisses slowly became more heated. They became languid and rougher, but never painful. He eventually escalated to covering your neck with hickeys, your hands carding through his hair. You fully relaxed in his arms. You kissed the top of his head, and he looked up at you, grinning softly.

“Sorry,” he hummed, “May have gotten a bit carried away.”

“It’s alright, I quite like them.”

“Oh, really?” He went to add more to the mosaic on you, but you held him back.

“Yes, but I’d much rather kiss you myself.”

He pulled himself up, grinning down at you, “Gladly.”

Things were still and quiet in the morning. You rested your head against Wilbur’s chest, his arms securely wrapped around you. Overnight, it appeared that the snow had gotten stronger, so there was a slight chill in the room that had you moving further into Wilbur’s arms.

Wilbur pressed a gentle kiss to your head, “Morning.”

You hummed, looking up at him, “Morning.”

The room settled into a comfortable silence, both of your brains still stirring awake. His head shifted towards the window, calling your attention to the snowflakes gathering on the sill.

“You know I’m not letting you walk home like this?”

“What, in the cold?”

“Yep. And not to mention you look… a little wild.”

“Coming from you that’s a compliment. I’d argue you probably look worse.”

“I could make you look worse.”

You snorted and laughed, laying your head on his chest again, “You’re in a mood this morning.”

“I’m just happy that you’re here.”

“This isn’t the first time I’ve woken up here recently though.”

“No. But it’s the first time we’re able to kiss and relax when we wake up together.”

You smiled, “True. A nice contrast to yesterday.”

He hummed, “Today will be a better day.”

You chuckled in agreement, holding tightly to him.

He gently rubbed your back, kissing the top of your head.

After a moment, you looked up at him. “We have to get up at some point, you know.”

He hummed, turning you both over to splay his body weight on top of you. “‘m sorry, what was that?”

You laughed, “Okay, okay, don’t crush me, we can just sleep in. At least until like midday.”

He cheered, getting up on his elbows and covering your face in kisses, “Yes! Good! Rest time!”

You laughed, wrapping your arms around his neck. “You’re good at convincing. Helps when there’s something in it for me.”

“Like what?”

“A kiss, hopefully.”

“Gladly,” He chuckled. He leaned down, lips meeting yours in a quick motion. You kissed him back, your hands playing with his hair gently. When you pulled away, he wrapped his arms around you, pulling you on top of him and squeezing you tightly.

“Will! Are you trying to kill me?” You laughed as you asked him breathlessly.

He lightened up a bit, chuckling, “Nope. Just trying to keep you here forever.”

You hummed, sitting up on his lap once he gave you the space. “It’d be an honor to be here forever.”

“In our secret oasis.” His hands came to your sides, lightly rubbing up and down.

“It’s your childhood bedroom, but yes, if you want to give it the dramatic name. Our secret oasis.”

“It’s secret because no one knows we’re here.”

“What about Tommy? Or the thousands of people on your stream?”

“Tommy doesn’t know my exact location. And I’d fucking hope my chat doesn’t either.” He laughed.

You laughed, “Okay, okay, I get it. It’s our secret place. Though I’d argue the back field where we had our first kiss is probably more of our secret place.”

“Oh, god, don’t remind me of that kiss. I was so nervous to kiss you. I practically chugged half the vodka to try and calm down.”

“I was nervous too! My cute, dorky, best friend who I’d secretly been crushing on, wanted to kiss me? Yeah, I freaked out a little bit.”

“It didn’t seem like it! You seemed so composed!”

“Only because I was so nervous.” You leaned down, pecking his lips. “We should try and go back there one of these days. Maybe recreate that kiss with fewer nerves?”

“Would you put your prom outfit back on?”

You lightly slapped his chest, gasping at the implications, “You gremlin.”

“I’m serious! You looked really good.”

“Would you wear yours?”

“Mine still vaguely smells like vomit, so, no.”

“Then I won’t be wearing mine.” You stuck your tongue out at him.

He pouted, “Fine. To be fair, you could be wearing anything and I’d find you gorgeous.”

You flushed, “Even in a dinosaur costume?”

“Oh, especially in a dinosaur costume.”

You laughed, “Okay, Soot. I’ll wear that if we ever go on a date.”

“You mean when. We will be going on a date without a doubt.”

“Oh? And what would we do?”

He hummed, “Well, we couldn’t be out in public. For your safety and privacy. Plus, I know you don’t like fancy places much anyway. So, probably a picnic. But, with some takeout from a good restaurant since my cooking isn’t fantastic. And then, just coming back to my place, or yours, and watching a movie.”

“That… sounds lovely, actually.”

“Actually? Rude.”

You chuckled, “Sorry, I’ve just become used to the idea of a date being ‘come by my place so we can drink surrounded by shitty roommates and trash.’”

Wilbur looked horrified, “Darling, I am going to change that. No more gross college boys. You deserve to be treated so much better.”

You blushed, “Thank you, Will. I’ll be holding you to that, though.”

“You don’t even have to worry. I can’t believe you had to even deal with people like that, Christ. I’m going to raise your standards.”

You hummed, “You already have.”

Pink rose on Wilbur’s face, and he reached a hand up to your cheek, “I’m glad then.”

You smiled, leaning forward and playing with his hair.

“We should go,” you spoke up, “Back to the field, I mean. Might be a nice way to just get out of the house a bit.”

You nodded with a hum. “When?”

He wrapped his arms tightly around you, “Later after we’ve taken a nap.”

“Wilbur, we’ve just woken up.”

“Yeah, but you make me comfortable. Plus we had a lot of fun last night.”

You lightly hit him, “Get your mind out of the gutter, Soot. A nap does sound nice though.”

He grinned, “Doesn’t it?”

You leaned down, placing your head on his shoulder and landing a soft kiss on his cheek. He turned his head to grin lovingly at you, parting the curtain of your hair with one hand while the other held you close to him.

By the time you woke up again, it was well past three. Wilbur was already awake, his hand gently carding through your hair. It was a bit warmer now than when you’d woken up initially. You yawned, stretching as you woke up.

“Morning, darling,” he smiled as he looked down at you.

“Morning, again,” you chuckled softly, sitting up properly and rubbing your eyes.

He chuckled, leaning forward to kiss your forehead. “You hungry?”

You nodded.

“Want to go to the cafe? It’s probably pretty empty right now.”

You chuckled, nodding again, “Yeah, that sounds nice. Mind if I borrow a jumper?”

He hummed, “Go ahead. Take your pick.”

You stood slowly, grabbing a big yellow jumper from his closet. You changed quickly, trying to conserve enough warmth while Wilbur changed as well.

You finished getting dressed, turning to him, “Are we walking there?”

He hummed, peering out the window, “We could, but it might be safer if we don’t. It’s not snowing anymore, but it could start up again.”

“I could drive us then. We’d just have to walk to my place.”

He nodded, “Alright.”

Taking his hand in yours, you walked downstairs and outside into the cold icy streets.

The walk to your house was peaceful, breaths visible in the air, as you and Wilbur walked hand in hand. When you reached your front door, the serene air surrounding your walk shattered upon realizing you had to face your family. You just had to go in and grab your keys. You repeated it like a mantra in your mind. You considered telling Wilbur to wait outside, but before you could, he squeezed your hand.

“It’s alright, I’ll be with you the whole time, okay?”

You nodded, looking up at him as he pressed a kiss to your forehead. You let out a breath, letting go of his hand to open your front door. You tried to make a B-line for your room, but the sound of the door opening seemed to have alerted the home, as your aunt swooped into the foyer.

“Oh, my goodness! Little Wilby! My, how you’ve grown!” She squealed out, the rest of your family coming up quickly. Everyone was quick to dote on Wilbur, having known him for just about as long as you had.

“Sweetheart, is that where you’ve been sneaking off to? You should’ve told me you were hanging out with Wilbur, we could’ve invited him for dinner!” Your mother seemed innately pleased in the notion that you were with Wilbur. It only made you want to get out of there faster. Wilbur didn’t seem too overwhelmed speaking to your family, but you knew that it was starting to get to him slightly so you took charge.

“Right, well, we’re planning to head to the café, so we’d best get going. I just need to grab my keys,” you grabbed Wilbur’s arm, pulling him quickly to your room, and ignoring the calls of protest from behind you.

You let out a breath once you got in, looking up at him, “Sorry if they were kind of all over you.”

He smiled softly, “It’s alright,” he pulled you forward, kissing the top of your head. He was quiet for a moment before a frown replaced his smile. “They haven’t changed,” he hummed, “I thought you told me before you left that they were getting better”

You sighed, “I thought they were,” you leaned your head against his chest, “They only got better because I was there to mediate. Now, they’re just as toxic again.”

“Well, you should grab a bag and put some clothes and stuff in it. That way you can spend the majority of your time not here.” Wilbur suggested, gently rubbing your back.

You looked up at him, a soft grin adorning his face. You smiled back, “That sounds like a great idea.”

You pulled away to start grabbing stuff, Wilbur sitting down on your bed. You wondered what he was thinking about. Vaguely you wondered if he was getting that same feeling you did the night you went back to his room to listen to him play music. You wondered if his eyes roaming around meant that he was also reliving the memories you two had here, the number of times you had snuck out of your window, him showing you random videos to drown out the fighting of your family, complaining over schoolwork or professors, and just existing hip to hip.

Once you’d packed up, you walked over to him, grabbing his hands. “You’re thinking about something.”

He chuckled, “Yeah, I am.”

“What’s in that head of yours, Soot?”

“Thinking about the future.”

Oh.

“Oh?”

“Yeah. I mean, neither of us live here anymore. And you’ll be leaving London eventually. So, I’m thinking about where we go from there.”

“Well, depends on where I get a job, I suppose.”

“Lots of jobs in Brighton.”

“Will,” you laughed, “That doesn’t mean I’ll be able to find one there. I’m studying fucking English. Not much I can do anywhere I want.”

“You could work for me.”

“Will-“

“No, I’m serious. You used to help me with DnD campaigns. You could edit scripts or lyrics. You used to write poetry, don’t think I’ve forgotten.”

You sighed, “Will, I’m not sure that would work. I’m not sure dating my employer is truly the best solution here.”

“For Tommy, then, he probably needs more help with his scripts than I do anyway.”

“That could cause problems with you and Tommy if something happens, and I don’t want that.”

“I’m just saying, there are options. You could do remote work and just live in Brighton.”

“Brighton is expensive.”

“It’s cheaper than London.”

“Not by much. Rent is still insane in Brighton, trust me, I’ve looked.”

“Not if you split a place with me.”

Your breath hitched.

“Wilbur…”

“Just hear me out, okay, we’ve known each other long enough to know how we’d work together. I’m not losing you again. We could find a nice three-bedroom, so we could both have our own rooms and office space, and we could make it work. Then, once we’ve saved enough, we could move to fuckin’ America or something, wherever we want to go, we could do.”

“America?”

“Anywhere you’d like to go, I’d follow you. America’s just my pipe dream.”

You sighed. It could be a good option, honestly.

“I’m just not quite sure yet.”

“And you don’t have to be! You’ve still got a year til graduation. I could find a place in that time, so by the time you’re ready, we can do it.”

You squeezed his hands, hanging your head, “Maybe I’ll think about it.”

He seemed to let out a breath of relief, “That’s all I ask.”

You nodded, placing your forehead against his gently. You and he shared a silent moment, just breathing together. His hands slowly moved to wrap around your waist, pulling you in to tight hug. You hugged him back just as tightly. And though he would never say it, you knew exactly what fear ran through his mind. You knew exactly what he was afraid of. That you refused to be as dedicated to this commitment between the two of you as he was. Because there remained a lingering fear in you that this would not last. This pocket of bliss would rip a seam at the bottom and fall into another void of unforgiving remnants of time where your promises went to die.

You both managed to sneak out without too much disruption from your family. A snarky comment about keeping it clean from your uncle as you shut the door to your house would not deter you, as most things they could say now couldn’t. You two sat in the car for a moment, waiting for it to heat up. He connected his phone, putting on some music to hopefully put the both of you in a better mood.

The drive was short, with little words being shared beside Wilbur singing along to the music. Neither of you wanted to leave the car, despite the slightly tense atmosphere. After parking, you reached over and grabbed his hand, holding it tightly.

You scrambled to think of something to say to break the tension.

Thankfully, Wilbur had you beat, “You used to like filming things.”

“I- yeah. I still do, I guess. Just don’t have time for it anymore.”

“Would you ever want to do it?”

You thought for a moment. “I mean, yeah, maybe. I’d still love to make a music video or something one day.”

He nodded, “You could do it. Youtube and stuff, I mean.”

You sighed, “Will, I just don’t have the time to start. And by the time I can make money from it, it’ll be way too late.”

“I know you want to think about this more, but, all of my Youtube friends need help with people that film that they can trust. If you want to go that route, there are options. Even if it’s not for me or Tommy, I know people. And then it’ll give you time to start your own account, and I can help you with that! I can promote you, even,”

“Not that. If I do it, I don’t want to blow up completely out of nowhere. I’d want to be used to it first.”

“But you’re thinking about it.”

You laughed, “I’m thinking about it.”

He raised his other hand in cheers, “That is a win for me. I’ll take it.”

You laughed, tugging his hand, “C’mon. Let’s go eat.”

You turned the car off, and he quickly bolted out of the car and went to your side to open the door, “Hurry, hurry, it’s freezing out here.”

You laughed, taking his outstretched hand and standing, “You chose to be chivalrous, take your punishment.”

He let out a whine, tugging you into his arms, “Come here, I need warmth.”

You locked the car, letting out a loud laugh, “Okay, okay,” you wrapped your arms around him, rubbing his back, “Let’s go inside, it’ll be warm in there.”

He nodded, letting go of the hug to pull the both of you inside. You both went to order, and he turned to you while you waited, “What do you think you’ll get?”

You shrugged, “Probably just a coffee and a muffin. Just something small.”

“Do you still get them the same way?”

You nodded.

“Alright. Could you do me something then?”

“Uh, depends.”

The person in front of us moved, making us up at the register.

“Could you go grab me a napkin? I think I touched some ice or something.” He held his hand up, thumb swiping over his fingers and palm. You knew how he was when it came to weird sensations, so you quickly replied.

“Oh, sure,” you turned, walking to the sidebar to grab him a napkin. You walked back over to him as he was paying, handing him the napkin.

“Thanks! Also, I ordered and paid for you.”

You stared at him, shocked for a moment. After a moment, you spoke, “Did you even need a napkin?”

He shook his head quickly, “Just needed you to walk away so I could pay for you.”

You blinked at him, lightly hitting his arm, “You ass. Don’t do that.”

“What? Pay for you?”

“Yeah.”

“You simply cannot stop me, love.”

You groaned, “I swear to god. I’ll start paying for your shit too.”

“I’m taller than you, therefore faster. Good luck trying.”

“I hate you so much.”

“Yeah? I don’t think you do,” Wilbur snickered, before lifting a hand to the collar of his sweater. You flushed when he daintily pulled the fabric back to reveal the hickeys you had left on him the night before. You switched your gaze to meet his and he winked, only flustering you further. You pressed your head against his shoulder while he just laughed at you.

You sighed after you’d calmed a bit, “I’ll find a way to pay you back.”

“You do pay me back. Just by being with me.”

You hid the way you blushed, “Sappy.”

“Only for you.”

“Hush. I’ll make you flustered right back.”

“I’d like to see you try.”

“Well, I c-“

“Order for Wilbur!”

The barista called out, saving Wilbur just in time for the not-exactly publicly appropriate thing preparing to leave your mouth. Wilbur walked forward, grabbing the order for you both and walking to a booth in the far corner by a window. You both sat down, and he passed you your coffee.

“Light roast latte with caramel?”

“How do you even remember that?”

He chuckled, “I just do. I said earlier, I want to memorize you, and that includes all the tiny details. Like your coffee order. And the fact that you prefer regular chocolate chip muffins to the double chocolate chip muffins because you think it’s too much chocolate.” He handed you your muffin after, and you flushed once again.

“It is too much chocolate.” You spoke simply, not quite sure how to respond. Part of you felt guilty that you didn’t remember these small details about him, so you continued with, “I’ll have to relearn anything I’ve forgotten about you.”

That caused him to flush slightly, “Really?”

“Yeah. Can’t be sharing the pieces of me to a stranger, after all.”

“I’d argue we’re much closer than strangers.”

“True. But I need to have you memorized as you have me.”

He smiled, a gentle smile that told you he was grateful, “That’s true.”

You bit into your muffin. There was a soft smile on your face that you tried to hide by lowering your head. He saw it, though. You knew he did.

After you finished eating, you took your drinks and returned to the car. You duetting him for the songs you remembered, the old Los Campesinos! he taught you back when Aleksandra was still in the band. You were going to turn to his home but stopped when you saw the street your school resided on. You turned down the street, parking in the old lot between the school and the old church. They were both covered in holiday decorations, a grave reminder of the short time you and Will had together. But you tried not to think of it.

Instead, you looked at the school, thinking of the day you chose to leave.

When Wilbur caught sight of you, he spoke up, “Memories?”

You nodded, letting out a sigh, “Thinking of our last day there.”

He nodded, “That was… a day to say the least.”

“It was a good day, for the most part. We were so excited. I just…”

“What is it?”

“I knew for two weeks that I’d be leaving… I don’t know why I waited until that day to tell you. I spent all day knowing that it was the last day I’d probably see you. I keep thinking that maybe I should’ve told you earlier. Maybe I should’ve done something so that you’d beg me to stay. And things may have gone differently.”

“To be fair, I didn’t exactly take the news well.”

“Well, yeah, but-“

“Do you really think I would’ve let you go? I would’ve been so angry that we wouldn’t have had a good last few weeks or days. I was a petty person, so at least by waiting, we had a good day before the fight.”

You sighed softly, “I guess so.”

He took your hand, going quiet for a moment before speaking again, “I should have asked you to stay. Instead, I just forced you away because of how angry I was. I should’ve tried harder.”

“You know I wouldn’t have stayed. I wouldn’t ask you to wait for me after all. I just… wish you could’ve been happy for me. I know we were both yelling a lot, but it did hurt. It was my only way out of the house. I wish you could’ve at least been happy about that.”

He sighed, “I am, now. Despite the hell hole that London is, it’s better comparatively. I’m just happy for you a bit too late.” He gently reached a hand up, brushing some hair out of your face.

You took a deep breath, leaning into his hand. “We could talk about should’ve-beens and would’ve-dones until we’re blue. Maybe we should just talk about now.”

“You think so?”

You nodded, pulling the lever at your seat to recline back. Wilbur did the same, and you turned to face him, getting comfortable.

“Do you think bees dance to communicate because they find it fun?” He asked after a moment.

“Sadly, no,” you hummed, “I think because they do it for work, they don’t find dancing fun. They probably find things like conference calls fun. Or paperwork.”

“Do you think they operate on a capitalist or communist type system?”

“They don’t have currency, so neither technically, but closer to communism. If they were capitalists, the bees would’ve gone extinct long ago.”

“Do you think they’re going extinct now because they tried to switch to capitalism?”

You laughed, “That I know is not true. I saw the Bee Movie, they’re dying because humans aren’t getting into weird relationships with them anymore.”

That led Wilbur to burst out laughing, hitting the seat of the car as he laughed. You laughed as well, mostly due to how happy his genuine laugh made you.

You glance at him between your own laughter, a fond look taking over your features. Once he’d calmed a bit, he made eye contact and smiled, giving you an odd look, “What is it?”

“Hm?”

“Something’s going on in your brain, you’ve never looked at me like that before.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

“I’m not sure yet. Could be a dangerous thing.”

“Oh, really? Dangerous how?”

“Well, it could make me do this,” he placed a hand on your jaw, gently pulling you in for a kiss. It was a bit awkward, given the lack of support brought on by the gap between your car seats. However, it was warmer than the cold that seeped into the car and that still resided in your chest just by being home.

He grinned when he pulled back, thumb gently stroking your cheek, “You know, since you’re staying at mine for at least two days, you could be on a stream.”

You chuckled, “At least?”

He nodded, “At least. It’s the bare minimum. My actual estimate is for the next five days,” you only had seven left, “you’re ignoring the point though.”

You thought about it for a moment, “Would I have to be seen?”

“Not if you don’t want to.”

“And what would they know about us?”

“Just that you’re my friend.”

You hummed, “Maybe. Will Tommy be there?”

“Do you want Tommy to be there?”

You snorted, “Not necessarily. Plus, you mentioned that he has a bit of an issue with spilling information.”

“Oh, yes, he does.”

“Well then, we’d better make sure that if I do, he’s not there. Don’t need him making another joke about us snogging.”

He laughed, “That’s a good point.”

You smiled softly, “Is your chat nice?”

“To me? No. To guests? Always.”

“Good, I’ll like them then.”

He gasped, “Fuckin’ rude. You’d better side with me. They will try to side with you, so you’d better only side with me.”

“I will do as I so please, Mr. Soot.”

“Oh, is that so?”

“It is.”

“Well, it just so happens that I, too, will do as I please. Which includes this,” he leaned forward, kissing you again.

You kissed him back lovingly, pulling away with your hand on his cheek this time, “Well, it just so happens then that our interests aligned at that moment.”

“Oh? So you’re saying kissing me pleases you?”

He was trying to make you flustered, but it wouldn’t work this time, “Yes. It does.”

He flushed instead, leaning forward, “Well, if it does, then I’m sure you wouldn’t mind doing it again.”

“Not at all,” You kissed him once again.

After a routine of kissing and Wilbur breaking to ask his weird questions for about two hours, you two eventually decided to leave the parking lot. However, you took the long route home, the two of you just driving around to see your old hometown.

“You remembered my love of poetry earlier,” you commented after a moment.

He nodded, “It’s always been big for you, even if it’s something you don’t like to talk about.”

You nodded pensively before continuing, “Have I told you one of my favorite poems?”

“You have a lot so you’d have to be more specific.”

You chuckled softly, “It’s The Road Not Taken by Frost. Have I told it to you before?”

He shook his head, “No, you haven’t.”

You hummed, “It’s much more of a recent favorite. Anyways, I really recommend it. I’d recite it, but-”

“No, do.”

“But I don’t have it perfectly memorized anymore. I used to. I have the last stanza memorized still, but you need the context of the rest of the poem to understand.”

“Let me find it, hold on,” he pulled out his phone and found the poem, beginning to recite it out loud to the both of you. When he reached the final stanza, you joined in:

“I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.”

He was quiet for a moment as he processed the poem. “So what does it mean?”

“Well,” you started, “it's become a recent favorite because of us. There’s irony throughout the poem. The subject is the road he did not take, the choice he did not make, to the point where he says that instead of telling us he took the common path, he should be telling a story years later about how he took the road less traveled by and it changed his life. I keep thinking about how the road less traveled for us would’ve been me staying, and how different everything may have been. Things could’ve been completely different for us.”

“That’s interesting. I like the poem. But, I really like the path you took.”

“Really?”

He nodded, “think about it. We never talked about the prom kiss until recently. If you’d stayed, we probably never would have. We might’ve just been stuck pining for each other til the end of time.”

“So you wouldn’t change anything? Even the fight?”

“No.”

“Really?”

“I wouldn’t, at least not without some sort of guarantee that we’d still end up together. I think we’d always be in each other's lives in some way. But with the way things worked out, we got together, rather than just staying friends,” He sighed appreciatively, “Not to say I wouldn’t be alright with if we’d stayed friends, but at least this way, we have a shot at this. And maybe we would’ve eventually found each other again and got together, and all the hurt wouldn’t have been necessary, but I know I wouldn’t take the chance of changing anything without knowing we’d reach this point again.”

You stopped at a light, turning to look at him, “It was worth it then? All the loneliness and upset and anger?”

He nodded, smiling softly, “Absolutely, if it meant getting us where we are.”

You blushed, looking back at the road. You didn’t think he could still make you shy at this point, yet in nearly every conversation he seemed to one-up himself. “I’m glad,” you spoke quietly. He gently squeezed your hand.

You pulled into his driveway, parking quickly and grabbing your bag from the backseat.

“Let’s go in. I want to get cozy.” You hummed.

He nodded, “Of course. Did you pack your laptop?”

You nodded.

“Want to play Minecraft?”

The two of you rushed inside from the cold and quickly made a matter of getting as comfortable as possible. You snagged one of his hoodies this time, pulling on a pair of nice sweatpants as well. While he went to get dressed, you snuck downstairs to the kitchen to make hot chocolate for you both. He seemed to be a bit distracted with getting his computer turned on and making space for your laptop, but after a few minutes, you heard his footsteps coming down the stairs.

“Darling?”

“In here,” you called out, stirring the milk you’d heated to combine with the chocolate.

He stepped in, wrapping his arms around you gently, “Hot chocolate?

You nodded, leaning your head back against him, “Figured it’d be nice to have a treat while we game. Just like the olden days,” You chuckled.

He grinned, leaning down to place a kiss on your cheek, “Thank you.”

You turned in his arms, smiling up at him, “Of course, Wil. You feelin’ all cozy?”

He nodded, smiling back at you, “Very much so. I got you whitelisted on my server, so we can play together. And if any of my friends join, you could meet them, as well.”

“Oh, yeah? Like who?”

“You could meet my bandmates. Sometimes they’re on around this time. Tommy probably won’t be on, but my friend Quackity might, you’d like him I think. There are some others as well, but some of them I can wait to introduce you to when you visit me in Brighton for the first time, a lot of them live around there. Plus, then you won’t have to see my friend James’s embarrassing Minecraft username.”

“What’s his username?” You laughed.

“JamesDoesMining.”

You burst out laughing, and he did as well. “Don’t even bring it up to him, he will try to defend himself.”

You leaned up and pecked his lips, “I won’t. Can you grab the mugs?”

He nodded, leaving the hug to grab two mugs while you turned off the stove, taking the ladle and pouring you and Wilbur’s cups of hot chocolate.

You both headed upstairs, getting cozy and preparing for a calm night of gaming and being together.

taglist: @shubblelive / @superioritycomplexes / @your-shifting-gurl (send an ask/dm me if you want to be added)

#wilbur soot x reader #wilbur soot #mcyt x reader #dsmp x reader #mar writes #wilbur x reader #tis the damn season au #mcyt x you #wilbur soot x you #wilbur soot fanfiction #mcytumblr #mcyt wilbur

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victimsofyaoipoll · 3 months

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Round 1

Propaganda under the cut

Ginny Weasley

Okay hold on I know Harry Potter is bad its awful I KNOW BUT LISTEN- the way drarries have BUTCHERED and KILLED her character is something that truly needs to be studied because its one thing to make her and harry not date but oh my god they treat her like she is the DEVIL for EXISTING.

Tbh only remember the epilogue where they do a time skip and Harry and Ginny are married then they have a Bunch of kids boarding the train. In fics I see a lot of her either becoming psychotic trying to marry Harry and become lady potter or molly Weasley getting a contract to force a marriage. There’s a lot of m/m ships in the fandom but I think Harry and Draco are the most popular? Just wanted to throw someone different in here

The thing is, the deeper I got into the fics, the worse Ginny got? Like I read plenty of good fics where she was cool, but there was the same amount where for some reason she was controlling, or abusive, or dead. Like for Drarry? Come on! If you think Ginny sucks, I have some *shocking* news about Draco

Erina Pendleton

Erina is SO MUCH MORE than just a "Generic Love Interest" that was brought in the story to continue the bloodline after everything that happens (and it's made abundantly clear time and time and TIME AGAIN that she means everything to Jonathan, to a point that she was his exact reason to standing up against Dio for the first time) but without fail she's only ever allowed to be the supportive best friend. Or a wingman for Jonathan and whoever he's being shipped with. Or simply supposed to sit there and allow her husband to have a male lover (the amount of posts I've seen of ppl using the excuse that 'it was very common back in the Victorian Era for men to keep male lovers that their wives were aware of and quietly accepted so it isn't a stretch to say that Erina and Jonathan wouldn't be the same--especially given how progressive she's written". Or of course my favorite when they completely erase her from the narrative and pretends she doesn't exist Jonathan's got their son for some reason, but nope she ain't there!

a lot of times ppl who ship her CANON HUSBAND jonathan joestar with speedwagon will put her on the back burner of HER OWN CANON RELATIONSHIP in favor of propping up jonawagon, to the point where 90% of the archive for jonawagon/jonawagon(eri) is either erina giving jonathan and speedwagon consent to be happy together while she acts like a #LoveIsLove wingman OR they'll have the audacity to write fics where erina comforts speedwagon at HER HUSBAND'S FUNERAL

Our hero’s hot wife who was the first (and arguably) only person to give him the emotional support he needed. She’s the only person who never expects him to fulfill some mythical role, she just loves him for who he is. She’s been his best friend and the love of his life since he was 12 years old. When it comes to hero/sidekick ship, she’s forced to be a wing woman for her own husband, either nobly letting him go or peacefully agreeing to an open relationship but only for him!!! She gets nothing out of it, she’s just a good Victorian wife who is “ahead of her time”. Usually, just so she can provide a womb so that the hero/sidekick can be dads and she can conveniently be offscreen. OR she’s written as a lesbian in order to completely and “justifiably” take her out of the equation but there’s a.) no other woman in her vicinity to even ship her with b.) there’s vaguely some faceless, nameless woman we’re meant to assume she’s pursuing, not even a real OC for her.

#round 1 #poll #ginny weasley #harry potter #erina pendleton #jojo's bizarre adventure #jjba #phantom blood

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utilitycaster · 1 year

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Ok ok ok I know you said the last post but like... Beauyasha AND fjorester were a thing in the first episode these people are so delusional 😂😂

Not sure which thing I said was the last post on it tbh and like, not going to lie, whenever I say that it's usually "last post for the next 24 hours or so".

I do think that there is a scenario, for what it's worth, that despite the strong Beauyasha and Fjorester indicators beginning as early as 2x1, the characters could have ended up with other people. It's just...that would have required character development and work that simply wasn't done! Beau hits on Yasha in episode 1, but it was definitely possible for her to have actively courted Jester (or for Jester to have decided to actively court Beau, or for Yasha to have made it abundantly clear she did not return those feelings- Fjord sort of made a pass at Yasha in episode 1 and she did, in fact, make it clear she had no interest). But none of that happened - Yasha did reciprocate those feelings, Jester was unaware of Beau's interest, and Beau never told Jester about her crush (and largely lost interest once Yasha was rescued, because Beau tends to tell herself she doesn't want things that she cannot have to avoid getting hurt, and once Yasha became a possibility again she was able to let herself want Yasha again).

"Beauyasha came out of nowhere" is something we can shut down as absolute bullshit because there were hints from as early as episode 1, but it is, in the end, retrospective. Same naturally goes for Fjorester; there's a world where either Fjord chose to follow Uk'otoa for power regardless of cost, and Jester decided she could not go with, or in which Caleb or Beau expressed their interest to Jester and she took them up on it, but none of that happened, and Fjord did tell Jester how he felt, and she reciprocated. Hints were there since episode 1, but there are flirty vibes that never get acted on sometimes. It's just...these were, so acting like that wasn't true does indeed make you look delusional. And I will promise here and now that like...if the ship in C3 I am really unimpressed by happens, depending on how it happens, I may or may not change my opinion on it! But either way I won't pretend like it came out of nowhere, because that would be absolutely stupid.

#answered #Anonymous #cr tag

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spook-e-snail · 3 months

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Yo dude

Opinion onnnnnnnnnn Ram3nN00dles Cass? The one who's really popular

*rubs my horrible little bug hands together* I have. So many thoughts.

There's obviously tons of hate for this mod and I'm just gonna start this off by saying that I'm not crazy about it, but admittedly I think a lot of the reasons most people hate it kinda suck lmao.

Breaking this down and also putting it under a read more because like I said. Many thoughts. A few positive. A lot negative

Now I hear a lot of folks rag on her design in this mod but tbh? It's like my favorite part.

Design:

Like c'mon. This specific image was my PFP on fucking everything for like 2 years. It adds a bit to the original design without changing too much. I will admit however I'm not crazy about the crop top. Some folks claim that the mod over sexualizes her design because God forbid she has hips, an ass and a crop top but again I don't really see it?? It's not my favorite thing but c'mon, it's a crop top it's not a fucking gimp suit lmao.

I will admit in this outfit she feels less goth and more?? Alt?? I guess you could say?? Like again it sticks to the og design but it doesn't really have the vibes if that makes sense??

Another thing I surprisingly enjoy is RN's take on the penilians. Like most folks interpret them as humanoid and tbh? I like the more buggy look better.

The whole abdomen, thorax and legs part is kinda iffy?? Like the phase one design kept her design recognizable with minimal changes but this just feels a bit too far off.

I'll start this part off by admitting I don't know jack fuck about music theory or much like that but like. I do not enjoy 90% of the main mod songs. Possession is one of the better ones of the mix but even then the entire time I felt like I was waiting for some kind of drop that just?? Never came??

Music:

I really hate being negative here but oh my god. Oh my god. Takeover is so fucking bad. It isn't pleasant. At all. Especially in the UTAU update, like bestie that echo is not helping.

I feel like all of the songs in that mod had that same problem where something just felt missing?? Like the voice thingy she has is pretty good and I like that they changed up BF's voice in it but tbh that can only carry a mod so far. Like again I don't know much about music theory but it doesn't really feel like there's much of a rhythm? Like yeah some parts of songs repeat but not really in a fun way.

I will admit though the Ugh cover had me in a chokehold for like a year so. Points there I guess. But again all the original music is boring at best and absolute diarrhea at worst.

Hooooooo boy.

Lore:

Look I could have forgiven the lore if the music was halfway tolerable but damn. This shit is not helping itself.

This mod was made before the April fools update and hot damn is it abundantly clear.

Ramen tried really hard to make Cassandra the good guy, and back in 2021 this was pretty unheard of. Like back then everyone blasted Cass enjoyers on fuckin sight lmao (some were fair, like yeah shooting up a school isn't good obviously. Some were pretty far off though. There was a time when pretty much half of the damn FNF fandom called her a nazi?? Like say what you want but she was pretty clearly anti-facist within the first few seconds of PS). But when he tried making Cass a good guy he kinda butchered the character.

Like the whole possession story arc isn't really easy to follow imo. Like okay the penilians are aliens in this mod. But they possess her like they're demons?? And when they possess her they make her shoot up a school.

In this mod her parents are Daddy Dearest and Mommy Mearest, it just doesn't really make sense that they'd make her shoot up a school and not literally anything else?? Like if they were wanting to just kill as many people as possible why did they possess some random teenager? Like why not possess some dude in the military or with some form of political power? The whole alien possesed thing just doesn't make sense. Plus after the events of Pico's school she just lives with the alien possessing her?? Like apparently PS takes places when she's like 17 and in the mod she's 23. Like holy fuck how has she not done anything else??

That and I'm not a fan of the whole family drama B plot. Like its a neat concept to make her GF's estranged sister but the whole reunion with Cass and DD just feels?? Clunky?? Awkward?? Like it's just not very elegant.

Simply not vibing with it

Creator:

Look I'm not gonna go crazy deep into the drama here but what I will say is it was very clear Ramen was 17 when he made this mod, for better or for worse. He did a lot of dumb shit because he was a kid.

Some folks shit on him because he's trans and obviously that's just not fucking cool, but obviously that's not why I don't fully vibe with him. Like fucks sake I'm like vaguely nonbinary, I get that sometimes people are gonna be nasty to folks like us for literally zero reason.

Misc:

The whole mod has huge PicoxCass connections and again I don't really vibe with it. It's definitely not my favorite ship ever. Like obviously people can ship whatever they want but hot damn I don't wanna see it.

Cass does end up a little woob-ified in an attempt to make her redeemable. Like by all means theres a way to redeem her without making her personality unrecognizable. I feel like this story might have worked with an OC or something but the whole penilian thing just. Did not work in my opinion.

I used to fucking LOVE this mod back in the day but as I've gotten older and understood Cassandra's character a bit more I've sorta fallen out of love with it. Don't get me wrong the designs go hard to this day but some decent art won't save a mod with shitty songs, confusing story and a controversial creator.

#asks #🖤🍎🕷️#friday night funkin #adding this to the main tag because I don't fear god

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imu-chan · 1 year

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Spoilers!!!! for anime below, I’ve only watched up to the end of Entertainment District Arc, so please, no spoilers in the comments

—

Consider the following:

At Mt. Natagumo we see Giyuu physically prevent Inosuke from continuing to fight while wounded; he says something like ‘those who can’t see that they’re wounded shouldn’t be in the fight at all’ or the like, so I think it’s safe to say he is more prone to self-preservation, at least more than, say, Rengoku. On the Mugen Train, it’s uh abundantly clear that Kyojuro goes hard and past his limits, literally to the point of death, to protect others, and frankly, I’m surprised he made it to 20 with the combination of ‘undying need to serve others’ and ‘desire for the approval of distant parents’ and ‘morals’ and ‘love for others’.

Additionally, in the opposite of those examples, Giyuu is kind of a tough love guy (don’t blame him tbh) and isn’t afraid to lecture/snap at those who piss him off. Though, I’m always thinking about on Mt. Natagumo, when he defended the Kamados from Shinobu, and how subtly tender he was in his actions, although he still was his stern, serious self. — And Kyojuro (when lecturing one of the demons in Mugen Train) always has his fierce energy, and his tone is the only slight change (‘this boy isn’t weak, don’t insult him’) like while Giyuu is the reserved, easy to read figure (like you know what he’s feeling pretty much always, ex. ‘I don’t think I’m disliked’) Rengoku is the parent who’s like ‘I’m not mad I’m just disappointed’ and you’re like ‘Aw man’ but then he’s like ‘that was a lie! I’m furious! Please see yourself to your room’ — what I’m getting at is that while Giyuu is more likely to get in a fight, Kyojuro is more likely to finish it (at all costs) so while Rengoku is kind of a pacifier (when needed, and in his special Rengoku way) to avoid unnecessary conflict or bloodshed, once the brawl is on, he is ON, and after like five minutes Giyuu is like ‘okAY, mission accomplished, let’s gO’ cue rengoku ‘he’s still moving!!!! No one will die here!!!!’ ‘I’m gonna kill you myself if we’re late to the hashira meeting’ ‘you’re the one who wanted to fight!’[Very ‘it seems you’ve taken my dislike of causing harm as an inability to do so’ (to be fair where do you think Tanjiro gets it from)]

This post got away from me but yeah. feral but polite rengoku and passive aggressive edge lord Giyuu

#the closed wound and the bleeding heart #the closed wound and the bleeding heart dynamic #kny #kimetsu no yaiba #demon slayer #tomioka giyuu #rengoku kyōjurō #rengiyuu #does this make any sense? no #does this make any sense #i love them

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cookinguptales · 2 years

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as for my thoughts on nandermo... hmm. I mean, there’s still VERY little info, but here are my very initial thoughts:

I am actually very into how much Nandor is doting on Guillermo. I think he’s gotten way more Into Guillermo lately?? And I love that. Him leaping in after him! Taking care of him! Comforting him! Trying to talk to him all the time.

tbh... I really do wonder if they’re going to make it canon on Nandor’s side. I can’t help but notice that he realized how lonely he was after Guillermo left him, and that’s precisely what convinced him he had to get married. It felt pointed.

But then Guillermo! He’s clearly thinking that he’s moved on, but I doubt it. Especially because he instantly got reeled right back into Nandor’s bullshit. Like. Okay if he misses his long distance bf so much, why not go back? I guess we’ll find out if there’s more of a reason there, but I do think that he instantly did make Nandor his uh. Number one. So to speak. Even as he said he wouldn’t. So that was fun to see.

As for Freddie... Hard to say. We’ve heard very little from him. I’m surprised to see the long-distance thing and I’m not sure what to make of it yet. Again, very little information. But I’m actually wary of how OTT lovey-dovey he seems. Is that bad that this show has made me distrust that...? lmao. Guillermo is SO weak to people giving him the slightest scrap of affection that I have to wonder if there’s some manipulation here. And even if there’s not, I do think it won’t work out for a few reasons. The most important is that Guillermo is clearly lying to the man. Later spoilers make that abundantly clear, but he’s pretty obviously not telling him the whole truth even now. I don’t think a real relationship can be built on the kind of lies Guillermo’s been telling him, especially not if it’s going to be long-distance for what’s probably most of this season. If Freddie turns out to be totally above board, I can’t see a truly nice guy being okay with Guillermo’s lies and his life, honestly. I think Guillermo’s going to run into real problems when/if he starts being honest. The second is that um. Honestly, this is WWDITS. haha. This feels like we may have another Jesk situation on our hands.

Marwa... doesn’t worry me. lmao.

As for the direction of the season... I really think we might see a swap in the dynamic. Nandor pining after a seemingly-uninterested Guillermo. I don’t think either of their new relationships are actually going to work out, but I do think the dissolution of these relationships (as well as seeing the other IN those relationships) might push them closer. But, all that said, it’s hard to know what direction they’re going to go here. It’s possible that one or both of these relationships will work out! It’s possible that Guillermo’s just going to get increasingly bitter towards all of them, Nandor included, as the season goes!

But hmm. Obviously I hope not. It’s weird, because even as Guillermo has changed and probably become real-world-healthy, he feels... flatter this season? I’m a little worried about that, honestly. Where is all your weirdness that I love, Guillermo?? The way you’re so violent and so sweet? So overly loyal to those you shouldn’t be? I love his insanity haha. Him just being justifiably angry feels almost too... normal? And while I understand it (especially after hearing his last message in the box) I don’t necessarily find it as interesting. I feel guilty saying that, but it’s true! haha. I love these weirdos because they don’t make sense! And I don’t want Guillermo to start getting more normal!

That said, with both issues of family and love, I think Guillermo’s going to have to find himself making hard choices. Perhaps a choice with some finality in the end of the season. I think that’s what they’re really setting up here. But considering they’ve already been renewed for a couple seasons, I think we know what choice he’ll eventually make. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I’ve said it before, but my greatest fear is them deciding to make Guillermo “normal” and decide he wants to be human and leave the vampire world. I haaaaate that trope, of a character “growing out” of the supernatural world. So it worries me a little to see them leaning in that direction now. I hope Guillermo’s codependence will rear its ugly head and drag him right back down into their insane fucking world!

#long post #wwdits tag #nandermo tag #but it's so early that how can a girl even know

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trustherkindheart · 2 years

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Rapinoe is an interesting case here. She has been great for club but it is very very clear that she is not good enough for country anymore. Club and country are two different levels of soccer. I don’t like that she is being called up a ton when a better, younger player could be called up in her place. However, there was that weird interview or something where she said that she’s going to be more of a “player coach”, to help guide the younger players. Tbh I think that’s partially true and partially bs. It’s an excuse to keep her on the roster.

Here’s the thing about Andi. I get why people think she is a great player. In my opinion she’s just fine, not great. More recently she hasn’t been doing well and I agree she should not have the starting spot. There are two issues with that though: a) we have one other player who plays a similar role, Coffey, and Coffey is not yet ready for the starting role imo. b) Andi has been consistently one of the better players for the Spirit. But like I said, club ≠ country. I bring the points up because it explains why Vlatko keeps bringing her in.

Anyway, all in all we are fucked if Vlatko does not make a drastic change in his managing style, or if he is not fired.

Rapinoe's club play has been so good that I haven't been mad at her being on the roster up until now. But this window made it abundantly clear that every single player on the roster needs to be able to be a starter, and Rapinoe cannot be. I don't know if it's possible to hire her as some sort of coach/staff position while she's still playing league but if there's any time to make an exception, it's now.

I don't think either Sully or Coffey to blame for the issues nor the solution to them. The system really didn't even work that well with Ertz in the 6 (mind she was injured during the Olympics) and no one's Ertz. It's the system that really needs a revamp more than an individual player succeeding or failing in that lone 6.

#uswnt

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harahmed · 17 days

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back on my bs i need a platform to vent and there's something about using tumblr to just throw it out there in the online void vs using google docs. google docs isn't risky enough to motivate me to write down my thoughts in a point in time when I am so inconsistent with writing venting in general. The past few years I've just been bottling it up and being a lot more anxious and irritable than what my baseline used to be until whatever it is that's bothering me either fades away or gets resolved. there's better coping mechanisms than this lol. so here we go, unfiltered, unworried about how my words will be perceived. just me and my feelings baby

getting back into the 'dating' aka finding wife game is so frustrating. i'm so used to the status quo set up by my past relationship and it's become abundantly clear that among my weaknesses are putting myself in other people's shoes, holding my tongue when something is said to me that questions my morality or doesn't take my feelings into consideration, and listening to understand instead of just to respond. that being said, it's so annoying and irritating how your own insecurities and my subjectively benign blunders have shaped this narrative that I am someone I'm not. someone not worth being trusted because you project your insecurities onto the meaning behind my actions when i am literally telling you that the meaning is something completely different to how you feel. it's so annoying that when i try to defend myself you take it as me playing the victim or trying to change the narrative or not taking accountability. like how disconnected can you be? it's crazy that you literally do the same thing to me where I say things and it goes in one ear and out the other and I can't even point it out because then i'm painting you out to be the villain when "i made the mistake." get over it lmao holy shit dude the mistakes i made were because of a lack of forethought not because of how you feel: that i made them out of repressed feelings towards someone else. it's so annoying everytime i try to stand up for what i find important you validate that i don't get that right because i'm the one who messed up. everytime i say anything that goes against exactly what you want to do then i MUST have feelings for my ex as opposed to anything else when i TELL YOU that is not the case. it's not my fault you and your ex had such a rocky finish that you cannot fathom me and my ex ending amicably and wanted to keep ties because we've been each other's best friends for years. it ended amicably and through our own individual choices because we both knew it was no longer compatible with the way we want to live our future lives. so there is no repressed feelings but holy shit do you make me miss her with your lack of trust and paranoia specifically about this. and it's so annoying that in counseling you literally just put the blame all on me as if your reactions aren't at minimum polarized to an outside of standard deviation degree. like you can't take any responsibility for how your reactions have shaped the situation your in and if i try to bring it up i'm putting the blame on you when i'm the one that made the mistake. like how dense can you be...both people are culpable it isn't just me me me everytime there's an issue that comes up. it's so anger inducing tbh and you're so confident that you are in the right wholly and completely that your brain cannot even entertain what i'm trying to say because that will require you to look and reflect at yourself which you feel no need to do because i'm the one that 'made the mistake.' when we barely know each other and i struggle so much with just keeping outside perspectives in mind. no matter how many times i repeat these things you always default back to your original thinking like you didn't even listen to any of the shit i said. then you say "you were talking at me that's why.' lmao what am i supposed to do when you refuse to choose to work with me in a way that requires you to change your own narrative.

you're so convinced that your initial reactions are completely valid and based in reality with like no emotional influence and then you expect me to act as if how you feel is the reality of the situation. if i give any pushback it's me fighting for my ex. like stfu how air headed can you be "oh if he's pushing back the ONLY explanation can be my insecurity projected onto the situation. any challenge of that narrative is me being gaslit because my perception is reality." if i wasn't going to Vancouver i swear i would've ended this by now. you literally pressured me to come and when i book you start acting unhinged to reality. so insecure and jealous. then you say 'i'm confident in myself' like clearly not because this is not how someone is confident in themselves behaves. 'i don't want to feel like i'm in competition' you're fucking not but you make yourself look so bad and give me so much ick when you act this way. i miss my ex so much holy shit you are so paranoid anytime i try to find a compromise it's me having feelings and fighting for my ex. get it in your thick skull that i can feel differently than how you think i feel. i'm so exhausted and sick of having to entertain your ridiculous narrative and act as if it's true because of your own weaknesses and insecurities. you have said so many times 'so i'm not crazy' in therapy when no one has ever said or hinted that you were but i've def been thinking it and clearly your subconscious suspects you are literally unhinged. then you go to a very basic thing like 'Islamically what's the verdict on him staying in contact with his ex' as if i'm trying to be constant everyday friends with her when would talk AT MOST FREQUENT once a month. it's the principle of the thing. obviously islamically i shouldn't be friends with any woman that isn't family or my wife. then you take that as validation for EVERYTHING you are setting an ultimatum for. it's so wacky my god. i wish i didn't tell my parents about you and i wish i didn't book that ticket to vancouver.

i'm so exhausted from dealing with this and dealing with you and your unreasonable thought process with everything. you just want me to do what you want without any thoughts of my own. just marry yourself holy shit you are so heavy hearted and difficult with this. it's sad because you were so light hearted with everything else but you are insufferable with this. i can't i just can't. when i point out inconsistencies in your logic and the reality you have the audacity to tell me ' i don't feel safe talking to you about this anymore' because i don't just kneel over and say you're right my bad when you are so far from having an accurate understanding of my feelings and of the reality right in front of your face. because you get triggered and can't appreciate your own weaknesses and how they affect your perception because *your feelings are valid.* like yes your feelings are valid for you to experience but that doesn't mean your feelings translate as a truth to the reality of what's actually going on you idiot. trying to validate your perception without fail without compromise is so narcissistic. i'm just so anxious and mad about this all the time now. and you're just so good at 'compartmentalizing' you can just expect me to break multiple decade+ long bonds because you're insecure about what they represent because you are just an insecure person that can't even see it. you expect me to cut off ties with a girl i had feelings OVER TEN YEARS AGO that never manifested to anything because you're insecure. like that is why. 'oh it makes me uncomfortable how he handles his past relationship.' no idiot you're just insecure. me talking to someone i had feelings for over 10 years ago once every 3 months makes you uncomfortable because you're insecure. it's not because there is inherently something wrong with the frequency and meaning of that interaction. yet i can't say that because it's toxic and weird that i would feel that way.

you said so many times you don't understand why unfollowing someone from instagram was emotional for you. like that perfectly exemplifies your problem. you say i can't see the bigger picture and i'm not denying that but that's the pot calling the kettle black. the fact i have said multiple times it is not about the instagram unfollow it's about what it represents ie the loss of a friendship and our counselor had to step in and say that to you as well for you to message me saying 'sorry you cried bc i asked you to unfollow your ex on IG' is ridiculous. it's ridiculous after being told multiple times that is not the issue at hand and just a representation of the broader problem for you to not understand it after being told that in multiple ways for 15 min by more than just me while i'm literally bawling that you STILL think the issue is instagram is actually crazy. that you can be so confident in your perception and your ability to empathize that when you can't empathize and your perception is inaccurate it automatically means the issue MUST be something with the other party involved. i'm so exhausted.

the only thing i can say is that we're both trying. i just WISH that in the same way i can take accountability for what my problems represent (without just kneeling over and saying oh you're right about how you see everything which is what you want me to do) you would take accountability for how your own reactions and insecurities feed into this issue instead of just blaming me and my issues every single time. i WISH SO BADLY you could just begin to even slightly entertain the idea that you are contributing to this cluster of misunderstandings and negative emotions towards each other with your own actions instead of it just being a me issue. you misunderstand me and my words and actions so much it's literally impossible to point out all the inconsistencies with what you believe i was thinking or was the motivation behind my words or actions to what i actually feel / am motivated by when i speak or act. you have issues just as much as me but bc 'i made the mistakes' you can't even begin to entertain that because you just validate that what you're feeling and the ultimatums you present to me bc of that are reasonable when they're just not. i hope this works out because everything else is good but holy shit this one singular issue is soooo much to deal with. and i get resentful bc you can just disconnect bc of your own traumas and live your life without being affected by this when i am just rattled with anxiety and irritability because i can't stop thinking about this and it affects everything i do. i know it's not fair to be resentful bc that's actually a me issue and something i can work on but you present the fact you can do that as a power move like 'oh yeah i'm not SO invested that it's affecting me outside of this.'

also it's so sad that you're willing to follow your ex just to spite me for what my original feelings were. idec if you do but the fact that you see that as such a immoral thing to do with me but are willing to present that same situation to your ex who is literally married is just sad to me and gives me so much ick. it's such a red flag that you are willing to break your own boundaries bc you think then i'll feel some type of way if you do that because you can't fathom that i just feel differently about this topic and it actually wouldn't bother me if you followed him. like it's so cringe honestly. you are so passive aggressive and then when i react you just are that pikachu meme of just so taken aback to my reaction when you're antagonizing me with bullshit and can't even recognize it because you feel so validated in everything you do. grow up jfc

i'm just so discouraged with all of this and so exhausted. at first it made me super sad and i would cry just thinking about how my ex treated things with so much empathy and understanding then i look at you and the difference is so vast. i know i shouldn't be comparing but i can't help it, you're paranoid about something that is not there and don't understand me so my anxious ramblings to you just look like my unrepressed feelings clawing out of me which is not at all the case. but you just don't know me and it feels like you don't want to get to know me if it means having to reflect on yourself bc once again you don't see anything wrong in what you're doing. and i'm just villainizing you when i try to point things out that you do that are suboptimal. what an exhausting cycle. i just want to be in a better place or find someone that isn't so distrusting. i've never been this distrusted in my life lol it's ridiculous and so triggering when you say shit like 'yeah so idk if that means he's been talking to her behind my back' or 'we'll see lmao' when i say i talked about unfollowing i can't help but react. i literally bawled my eyes out in front of you and you just have to let out the passive aggressive immature ass response. and i can't HELP but respond. what a petty thing to say, giving the same energy and pettiness of saying you'd follow your ex when idc if you do or don't lmao. then i respond with idw do this but i am being forced to if i wanna keep talking to you so i'm choosing to prioritize this over my relationship with my ex and i got perspective from her and your response is 'i need space' lmfao. i already know what the issue is...how could you talk to your ex about us?!? I NEED PERSPECTIVE WOMAN and ideas for compromise because you are insufferable trying to compromise with on this one thing. it's my way or the high way and i will fight with every fiber of my being not to just kneel over when i'm giving up something so important to me. so frustrating but alhamdulillah i was able to vent for a bit. hopefully next time we speak i won't be so reactive because i just can't help but get annoyed when you start saying some unreasonable shit because your narrative is so far removed from reality and you refuse to acknowledge that possibility in the slightest

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nono-bunny · 2 months

Text

Thoughts from watching the ATLA live action!

Took a bit of a break because writing these while watching takes a lot of time, actually, but! I'm back on my bullshit again, let's go!

Episode 3:

Jet? Is this Jet? Truly wish I could tell, it would be nice if I could fucking SEE ANYTHING!!!

Oh I do think it's just some rando rebels, but looks who's with them, oh my god! Dang dang diggity dand-dang, it's the best villain of the show! Me recognizing her so fast is 100% a matter of me being really impressed with the way she looked in all the official stills and being really hyped to get more of her because of how much I love Azula rather than it being obvious btw, I kinda tried not to watch any pre-release stuff to not get biased in either direction when it came to the actors, like mostly I just read a couple of interviews whenever they popped up for me, so. Genuinely this is gonna be probably one of the only times I'll recognize a character based on face alone when they first appear without their classic outfit (which? Idk how much of that is gonna happen anyway lol), I just!!! Really liked the casting for Azula purely based on the visuals (as I know literally none of the actors in this show, I just know Ozai voiced General Fong and obviously the OG Cabbage Merchant is reprising his role), like I know a lot of people wanted her to still look like a vicious femme fatale or whatever, and like, I get it, OG Azula is hot, we ALL had a crush on her as kids, but. It's vitally important to remember she's a kid, and more than anyone her casting should reflect that given how often I see people say "we should just let villains be villains" when it comes to her. She's a villain, alright, but she's a tragic one, and the entire reason why there are so many Azula "apologists" (like myself) rather than Ozai ones is precisely because of her age and circumstances. So like? Going into this show knowing that one of their prime directives with Azula is to make sure that aspect of her character is abundantly clear was genuinely a real comfort on a personal level. I'm looking forward to seeing her be cruel, but I'm also looking forward to her not being treated as "irredeemably bad to the bone". Anyway! Azula!!!

Oh shit this is a fire nation civilian coup??? Genuinely was sure this was how they skip ahead a bit and reveal that as soon as Ozai heard about Aang he sent out Azula to Omashu for some reason, but her being a domestic spy for him is actually so cool. Tbh I always kinda wondered what she was up to before being sent out, like? Was she still in school? Obviously Mai and Ty Lee weren't, was she there alone? So this is a cool way to show her finding ways to be active even before being given her first big task abroad! Btw, as much as a part of me loves Spymaster Mai, if I'm being honest that job was absolutely made for Azula ngl, she's killing it!! Can't wait for fics showing her reprise that role in Zuko's council after the war lmao (I already read some with a similar vibe and they're always enjoyable, but now Spy Azula is back and I want more!!)

Fire Palace secret entrances canon?!

I don't actually have too many comments on the whole failed infiltration scene, I mostly just think that aside from being very enjoyable, it was also a masterful way to introduce and estabilsh characterization for everyone involved! I do really like showing that there's a rebel presence in the Fire Nation, and how quickly its plans gets snuffed out. It has probably existed ever since the war started, and Aang has only reignited their efforts. There's something I find really interesting here about how Iroh and the rest of the Order of the White Lotus, who seemingly do nothing for so long, are ultimately the ones to succeed- like, is it about patience? Unity among the nations? Strategic placement of the rebellion leaders and their importance? Ultimately, a bunch of old noble men organizing a worldwide network working with The Chosen One were the ones to succeed in their rebellion attempt rather than the many disillusioned (probably) poor citizens that came before them, and like? I get WHY, but. It's genuinely very depressing how realistic that whole thing is. Idek how coincidental it is, me immediately thinking of The Order here when this is an episode that introduces one of the most prominent people in its ranks, because like? That one interview that's about the LA showrunner "being relieved he didn't have to adress Katara's romance" or whatever was actually about a whole lot more, and one of the things they talk about there is explicitly how the way they built up the episodes was by looking at the original and grouping up stories with similar themes- specifically how both Jet and The Mechanic ultimately do terrible stuff because of the war (he put it much more aptly in a way that really made sense but I can't remember the exact phrasing atm) and like? Another theme there is also rebellion vs compliance- so it makes perfect sense to me that this episode also shows the domestic side of that, y'know?

Yo fr Azula's actress is fantastic here??? I just KNOW people are gonna hate how she's more nuanced here, but personally, I loved how it seems she's a bit conflicted when Ozai kills people she knew, yet ultimately lets the sadistic glee and the "I defended my family and my country today" side win out, ending with a smile. It's good! It's compelling! It's... Very different from the way the original show was very subtle about showing how Azula was also suffering right up until the very end- it was still there, of course! She isn't having a good time in the flashbacks to their childhood! It's shown through Zuko's pov though, which inherently makes her seem better off than she actually appears to be, and like. On the whole Bryke really threw Azula under the bus A LOT, even when it doesn't match what we're shown of her, and because her suffering and struggles were less visibly obvious ig it was easy for them to forget/ignore how she was hurt by her situation too. A lot of Zuko's arc comes at the expense of stopping to think of Azula as a human, forgetting that she's also still just a child, and? I like that the LA refuses to ignore that. Her play here was how easily she convinced others the war tore up her family, and you're forced to remember- it did. She's off the mark with who she believes was at fault here and who was wronged, but ultimately... She genuinely has lost so much here, including her childhood and innocence- she was left alone with only bad influences, and when THIS is the kind of thing her father has her do and witness on the daily? Of course she turns out the way she does!!! And given how much people tend to miss that Azula was both a villain and a victim, yeah, I'm fucking glad they're highlighting the victim part!

Okay I officially don't like how Aang teaches Katara bending philosophy. It's weird, it feels off, and while I do like that he seems to be in tune with the whole "the four elements aren't really separate" thing with the way he approaches explaining air bending philosophy to a struggling waterbender... I do kinda feel like it would've hit harder if he had done it while nailing this form like in the show- him just getting it because he's the Avatar and has past life experience feels hollow, but him getting it because he gets the philosophy would actually feel earned, and I wish that happened. I know he doesn't really touch waterbending this season, and like, I know they gave him a reason (an emotionally charge one that makes sense), but. This is a scene that really called for him to try, and he... Doesn't. I wish he did. It makes them seem so much more distant from each other, and next season he's obviously gonna have to get over this and start learning with Toph, so what gives? Is the plan to have him start learning both at the same time and remove Katara's experience as his teacher from the equation in Bitter Work, only show what works best when both attempt to start teaching him at the same time using different styles of teaching? I don't get it. This just really feels too Katara focused in a way that feels a bit jarring because they still inserted Aang into the scene when really... He just takes out a lot of the emotional weight this scene could've had without him interfering- it just feels like a weird time for an expositional trauma flashback. I don't get what this scene was about! I'm guessing Katara is gonna nail the waterwhip later in combat like in the original, but it was just kind of a weird mish-mash of three plotpoints (Aang's refusal to learn without Gyatso, Katara's trauma, and Katara struggling with her waterbending) in a way that didn't really work for any of them? Aang was cute, but. He really felt out of place in this scene- it's literally one taken from the original, but when they take out the reason he was there and instead turn it into a "oooo isn't Katara so tortured by her past" it just kinda... Feels obtrusive to an otherwise cool scene of Katara practicing

Okay so. This scene bothered me so much that I thought I had to take another look at it through a different lens than "this is a weird change from the original" because that's not a charitable thing to do and kind of the opposite of what I'm attempting to do when watching this show, so I rewatched it through the lens that usually DOES make me like this show- what were they trying to say here, what did this change mean? Initially what really bothered me and caught my focus here was Aang's presence and effect being so different than the original, so I tried ignoring how weird it was that he was still in the scene, and just... Focused on what he added to it- which is when I was finally able to get it, I think. So! I think this is actually the show's depiction of Katara's anger, believe it or not! When she attempted to focus on her emotions, she instead kinda defaulted to her memories- of her fear, and helplessness... And anger- which is when she "explodes" her water. Rather than channeling her emotions, she let them control her, and was thus immediately thrown out of balance. This actually kinda checks out with the original show? A more technically skilled or disciplined Katara is actually usually INSANELY powerful, as she channels her emotions to get the water to do what she wants... But the show literally starts with an emotional Katara who has no real skill or control over her powers accidentally doing some really powerful uncontrolled bending. Like? Going by that logic, I can kind of imagine that what makes a master bender is control- that sort of explosion isn't really something that happens to Katara after the NWT, same with season 1 vs season 3 Zuko for the most part actually! And given how Aang, a master, mentioned that his training mostly covered control... I think that's maybe what they're getting at here? Idk, but this also being the Jet episode, aka an emotional one for Katara, really makes me think that this scene was meant to be its own thing with its own message, but just... Had the unfortunate luck of looking A LOT like the scene for The Waterbending Scroll. Anyway I spent genuinely way too long thinking about it so! Moving on!

Cute Sokka and Momo moment!! Followed by primo Water Tribe sibling moment!!

Zuko and Zhao actively working side by side is an incredibly intersection dynamic, I really like it!! Also poor Zuko desperately trying to hold on to the way he thinks he should act...

Why does Jet get to have his instincts while poor Sokka is reportedly removed from this arc?? Yeah so I'm going into this episode very skeptical given how much I like Jet as a Sokka episode but. I'll try to not be too biased, after all it makes sense that he'd be busy with the Mechanic! Still a shame, hope it's been exaggerated a bit.

Oh my god this is still a really fun group dynamic with Jet ngl

Cabbage Merchant!!!

Omg Teo is so cute! And The Mechanist blowing shit up inside a city rather than just in his own place is actually so funny, imagine all the bureaucratic nonsense he must constantly elicit! He must be such a pain to deal with lmao

What?! The Mechanist gets a name?! I'm shook!! Not really lmao, fr he needed one, it's genuinely such a relief. Sai The Mechanist!!

Oh wait this wasn't Sai's fault? I legit thought he just exploded an experiment or something so I wasn't worried, this gives the scene a much more sinister vibe because it's either Jet or legit somehow firebenders!

Yesss go off Teo, fantasize about dropping bombs on your enemies! Lmao that was both a horrifying and hilarious scene somehow

Katara being just... Completely indifferent to the aftereffects of the bombing felt incredibly off. Aang's attitude, while admirable, is strange given that like? Truly, how does he think he can help here? This is... A lot for an Aang that only knows airbending, a Katara that doesn't yet know how to heal, and a Sokka that has yet to show any aptitude for invention. This episode feels like it should've happened just a tad later, or alternatively, have been just a bit lighter and/or right outside of Omashu. It'll probably still work, but. Again, this is... A lot, really fast, and the characters don't feel like they're quite ready for it yet- I hope to be proven wrong, of course, I inevitably will be! But... Idk, again, this is just. A LOT.

So... Ty Lee never runs off to the circus here, or will that happen between seasons 1 and 2? What about Mai? Will she leave with her family to Omashu/New Ozai in season 2? Genuinely interested how they'll handle the change of circumstances here. I like how these two keep their personalities, and I like the fear mixed with loyalty we can see from them already, but... This is a pretty big change that strips them from a lot of the characterization inherent in the circumstances of their first appearance in the original show, so I hope they manage to make up for it and maybe expend on these two a bit more, as they truly deserve it. They too look really young, which is a good thing and works well with Azula!

Speaking of Azula, once again, I adore her characterization here! Bitter, self assured, effortlessly cruel... A villain, but one that I'm sad to see in that position. She's "softer", or maybe I should say she doesn't have quite the same amount of edge, and... I like that about her, because I feel like she's going to earn it throughout.

Damn, Teo is like. REAL angry here as opposed to the mostly naive and peaceful version we see in the original. I don't... know that I like this episode and what it's doing with everything going on too much so far tbh, actually, a lot of it feels barely recognizable, which isn't a crime, it's just... This episode introduces so many things that I don't know that it manages to do ant singular one justice?

Why is Katara the one first finding out about Sai, and why is she not referring to him by name? This all feels so disjointed istg!! This should be a Sokka and Aang focused episode, so why is Katara so prevalent here? The way they shuffle the roles here makes no sense!!

This is... Not the point of Jet? What are they doing here with him? Why is he sparing a traitor? Since when did Jet discriminate between enemies? Or are they going for a "only firenation people are his enemies" kinda thing? Also, where are the freedom fighters? So much about this bothers me, and I get it, I get that they had to merge plots, but. This creates completely different vibes for everything and everyone in a way that wasn't really an issue with the first two episodes. This merger is really doing a disservice to everything, it's just... Depressing and disjointed, and everyone feels ooc for both the original and what was established so far. This is an episode so filled with characters I cannot imagine any new viewes being able to keep up or care, and frankly, I can't either.

Okay the rest of the freedom fighters are here and I am healed. Still kinda pissed about how strangely righteous Jet is rn and how the whole Air Nomad conservation conversation is just. Not gonna happen but. It's cool to see the little guys!

Cool fight scene overall but. God I really wish Aang and Sokka were there, this feels so disjointed for a third episode!! Why are they all separated right now, it hurts the show so much!!! Even if they're all off getting the parts of these episodes that were most relevant to them, the others had a place there too, and. Genuinely hurts that Sokka is just. Cut out of the Jet arc

In other news I hope to god Sokka is being an unreliable narrator, because Hakoda does actually have an interest in engineering (bombs, at the very least lol), but I guess maybe Sokka hasn't really seen that, huh? Hoping this is a set up for Sokka coming into his own and developing real confidence, rather than just rewriting Hakoda and Sokka's relationship. Like, that Sokka doesn't think Hakoda cares about this stuff because he never tried to talk about it with him, and that they'll later bond over it or something.

Sure would've been nice to get detective Sokka in this episode!!!! God I genuinely do think that after the setup for the episode, all of the scenes work nice, but I just. This episode really, really suffers from the separation of the trio, and even though they do a good job at making the different plots work together... This could've been a great episode but it's just. Too much stuff going on, there are like five fucking plots and characters we're following and while they both mesh well and work individually, it's also just that... Theoretically it works, practically it's really difficult to follow, especially as a fan of the original that's already a bit confused by where they're going with all these changes.

Genuinely so weird for them to make Katara's memories of her mother about the sun, aka, the firebender's source of power. Like?? How am I NOT meant to think about Zuko rn??? This scene was so needlessly Zutara coded istg, it's bizarre!! It was a good scene and in line with what I thought they were going for which gives me a lot of hope in terms of Katara's characterization!! Still wish Sokka and Aang were there though.

The Zuko and Azula parallels in this episode!!!!

I don't like that they made Jee actively go against Zuko, ngl.

Good fight between Sokka and Katara!! Once again Sokka is the one who brings out the usually hidden facets of Katara, I genuinely love the way this show portrays their bond!! As much as I like and miss the Sokka we see in Jet that never appears here given how he... Never meets Jet, I do really like the way this became a three way perspective battle with no one really being wrong. Everyone has reason to believe what they do, and this doesn't make Katara look like just a lovesick fool or Sokka like a jealous asshole (which I don't really seem them as but. I've seen people who do)- the original lessons they learn in Jet are kinda... Removed unfortunately but this does make everyone generally look better as a result lmao. I'm not happy about what this episode did, generally speaking, but. This is a good way to reunite everyone imo, it's fun!

I. Didn't realize The Scarf Scene was in the Jet episode?! Holy shit the implications... Zuko trying to hold on to Katara as she's seeking Jet,,, What the fuck were they on about here unless it was some Zutara high??? What the fuck what the fuck what the fuck?????? I am. Not okay. Genuinely why was this here, why does this exist at all, this is so weird!!! I get it now, y'all, I get it.

Holy shit this whole action sequence is fantastic!!! This episode REALLY struggled to set things up in a believable and natural feeling way but I'm glad it stuck the landing in terms of the resolutions!

In other news, yeah, so that dramatic "My Cabbages!!" scene is not gonna make sense AT ALL to anyone who hasn't seen the animated show, huh?

Holy shit Iroh sacrificing himself for Zuko like that is!!! Incredible. He's gonna get out scot free even if caught because of Bumi, so like... There's that, but! Still Incredible. My poor boy was SO confused by it too, Iroh is likely just gonna go have some tea with Bumi for a bit lmao

This was a good way for Aang to get captured though!! I'm guessing Sokka and Katara are also implicated with a plot against Bumi? Honestly it'd be... Incredibly strange if we don't see the characters from this episode in the next one but I'm kinda getting the feeling we won't given that it's the Bumi one? But neither plot has really reached any sense of closure, so... Hoping they do next episode? Idk, all around just. Really strange to have all of this happen in Omashu but. Whatever lol, this episode mostly redeemed itself at the end haha

#avatar the last airbender #atla #atla live action #avatar the last airbender live action #natla

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