#enjoyed that ep even if it was a hot mess lmao

[queenhawke]

must a doctor who episode be "good". is it not enough for it to have sacha dhawan dancing to ra ra rasputin

#doctor who #dw spoilers #enjoyed that ep even if it was a hot mess lmao #rip thassies i feel for u

[mejomonster]

So I started Tomb of the Sea again:

Ok so. I went in fresh instead of "craving" more of a specific dmbj thing and I think it made me much more open to it

I actually love how it opens a ton. Li Cu's life is given to us and it's a hot fucking mess. He and one of his only friends are 2/3 who failed the college entrance exam. His dad is so nightmarish he's got claustrophobia (and learned how to Pick Locks which I'm sure will be useful later). He skips class and is glad his mom ran and I wish he could too ;-;

His "best" friend Su Wan stalks girls with cameras so lmao he Ain't A Good kid, but he is a Rich Kid and puts up with Li Cu since they got a special "wtf are we doing" energy so at least Li Cu's got A friend. Questionable friend. But Su Wan seems open to helping friends and warm despite some Yikes immaturity levels and Yikes choices so li cu can you just run away to live with him?

The girl friend Shen Qiong? I forgot her name sorry you know who I mean. Now with fresh eyes, I really like the 2 bogs "liking her' and the little rivalry about it. That Li Cu seems to like her in the sense of Sincerely caring maybe deeper than Su Wan. But on the other hand Su Wan definitely wants to kiss her more lmao. The 3 of them scream friends since childhood and I picture them as sora riku Kairi now (but who is who I'm not sure). The Little friends with a crush inside the friendgroup plot feels so NICELY like a different genre - like Go Ahead or something that's realism slice of life so parents are potentially abusive or life's fucking Heavy sometimes, but they're still TEENS who care most about avoiding punishment and talking to crushes and being silly alone with friends. It's a taste of what "genre' I guess Li Cu's life would've been if he never intersected the tomb raiders. A dark heavy realism piece like The Bond (starring Bai Yu). But with that human simple joy of friends/found family in the bright spots.

On that note: they paint a picture of how grungy and miserable Li Cu's negative aspects of life are and that works SO WELL. Wu Xies life before tomb raiding? We get the sense Maybe his parents were sometimes absent, and definitely coddled him and picked a life path NOT like the Wu family's and tried to push him. And the whole San Shu abandonment/codependency thing wu xie developed ToT. But overall wu xies family had good money, sent him to a good college, he was perfectly smart, could get his own business, he had friends (although his penchant for tombs means he transitioned to more killer/criminal types over time lol). He had a very nice easygoing civilian life before things went to shit when San shu left him. He craved Excitement, knowledge, danger, curiosity. But he wasn't running from anything and his life would not have been "worse" had he never went into tomb raiding (he'd lack his loved ones who are tomb raiders of course but u know what I mean - he wouldn't know he was missing those friendships). His biggest pain if he'd kept to civilian life (and enjoyed it - but he didnt) would've been his fucking uncle San abandoning him and his pain at not going to look for him. That'd be mostly it though. But LI CU? Even a person kidnapping him is preferable to the 24 hours he goes through in the first ep.

Li Cus apartment window faces a fucking wall, he's got claustrophobia and his dad locks him in, his college prospects are dead in the water, his best friend/crush is going off to college (more on her later), his friends still around keep getting into fights so he's beat up at like 12 midnight with them, his teacher keeps calling his dad increasing the abuse from that, he's broke, his moms gone and he clearly loves her so he's missing her. He IS the kind of protagonist who'd want to leave for any New Life. He loves his friends but if they're taken he'd have NO reason to remain, even with his friends he'd likely leave his dad if given Any decent opportunity like a job with money. Unlike Wu Xie, Li Cu doesn't leave for adventure or trying to find a loved one (San shu), Li Cu is instead trapped and it TAKES absolutely batshit events to "free" him which just put him in a new trap of kidnapping. It's just Very Cool to me to see the contrast.

And to END the ep with Wu Xie saying his name, revealing he's the kidnapper and the spies are his. The stabber who harmed Li Cu was HIS guy. I love the flip from wu xie usually being painted as the shiny kindhearted (somewhere in there) adventurous young man, to this shady cruel (in Li Cu's opinion the source of EVEN WORSE than his ordinary life) man who echoes San shu. It must've been fun to set that up.

The girl. Sheng Qiong?? OK I'm just curious if in another Novel it mentions she ALEEADY went tomb raiding. Or something. It seems Iike she went with wu xie (or other tomb raiders) people while on "vacation travelling" then maybe stole their magic tentacle monster box and. Who the Fuck knows why she gave it to Li Cu... either she hoped to hide it with him, or she intentionally wanted to hurt him (I assume she just wanted to hide it). But yeah she seems to know WAY more about the tomb side of shit. I'm curious if we'll find out more.

TENTACLE MONSTERS WHAT DID I SAY. I still LOVE this shows opening. I love the body horror of the mini version jumping into li cu. I love how genuinely SCARY tomb of the sea is compared to some other dmbj seasons. It looks good, the action looks good, the horror looks good and LANDS <3

The pacing is good so far thank fuck (I'll drift away if pacing tanks tbh)

Ep 1 is Li Cu's no good very bad day THEN when you thought it couldn't get worse it turns out it's just a Normal day for him, and then spies come in so it's Action Adventure now instead of teen slice of life realism, THEN a tentacle monster shows up jumps into him and its HORROR then the guy fucking STABS HIM AND THEN WANG MENG KIDNAPS HIM (go you wang meng you were very intimidating and <3 love u I hope u get paid more. Love the show implying wang meng is so hot he makes doctors forget their oaths). Like... it sure does ESCALATE into a terrifying nightmare esque situation and I love thattttt

#tots #lb #tomb of the sea #dmbj

[oatbrew]

ok! anon requested my thoughts for episode seven. i just finished (before the event rewards timed out) so all of this is still marinating in my head. excuse the mess

overall i found it thought-provoking which isn’t a good or bad thing; just that it made me think a lot afterwards. full disclosure that i am heavily biased and i have a lot of feelings and opinions regarding domestic abuse esp sexual abuse (which was ambiguously implied in this ep). i am very much that kind of person who doesn’t think that the law necessarily correlates with morality though i simultaneously appreciate the effort and the intent of what the law can do and does represent. but in the same vein i think the law has as much power to exacerbate suffering as it does to heal when it elides more ambiguous cases, which results in people falling through the cracks or being penalized in a way that does more harm than good

this is my long winded way of saying that if i was in this story i would’ve been the one helping irene burke flee to another country (lmao can you tell i do not do well with authority?) i think she’s justified in her murder of her abuser and i don’t think it makes her as bad as him. however her murder of her adoptive mother deserves to be treated in a restorative justice light than damning criminalization but that is not a resolution this kind of game is equipped to handle. i thought it was more a case of tragedy than something i can grant clear judgment on. im not in the business of comparing victims even as i sympathize with both jade’s situation and irene’s feelings. at the end of the day, as a child, irene was not responsible for her father’s abuse against her mother and her mother’s subsequent inability to save her. certainly my ideal ending involves jade and irene in a safe place where they can both heal in their own volition (and far away from edwin who’s facing the full consequences of his abuse)

but should the narrative have followed this? not necessarily. if they wrote anything else but rosa and the nxx following the law to the letter i’d have thought it wildly out of character and would have required more character work than what is usually given

but here is my deep deep take w this game in a wider scope outside of this ep. tot deals a lot with cases involving social issues/ills like mental illness and predatory corporations. which is all well and good but tot also operates under this ideology that violence and evil can only manifest in individuals and the culpability of the system is often elided in this conversation (eg “the very concept of major corporations isn’t inherently corrupt and exploitative! it’s these specific individual antagonists heading it that are!”) and ive suspended enough of my own rational brain about this so i can enjoy a conglomerate ceo love interest in a game marketed as a wish fulfillment romance simulator. but regardless, this informs the narrative with a binaristic foundation that people who are on the “right” side of the system are right by default (ie our protagonists) or should be treated w more grace and humanity than those who aren’t

do i expect tot to interrogate that kind of heavy gray? or that the writers even should? of course not. we’re here to make out w hot guys ultimately. i recognize the writers come from all walks of life and have cultural expectations/beliefs that may not necessarily adhere w my largely western-informed foundation (though that’s its own can of worms) but my take is that if the game is gearing to handle heavy topics such as mental illness or abuse and the resolution that comes out of it ends up being simplistic or naive, it can do real disservice to the real life people who may find their own situations reflected in this piece of fiction

what the writers should have done given their framework and without fully upending the game’s philosophy (and what i think was a huge missed writing opportunity) is not changing irene’s fate (as much as i dislike defeatist narratives that surround a lot of abuse survivor stories) but have rosa and marius relate with irene on a personal level and even see themselves in her. what would’ve made this more nuanced and humanizing was if rosa and marius’s conception of their morality and their roles as legal and societal authorities were shaken by a gray matter of someone who is not a “perfect victim”. they did a similar execution akin to this in artem’s personal story but the moral stakes of that one was very cut and dry and this one should have taken rosa and marius a step farther. it should have impacted them internally as it did irene externally. and it would’ve served as solid development for their own relationship (rather than that odd little section where rosa comforts marius after jun calls him out? which seems just so divorced from the theme of the episode and feels like a contrived bonding moment.) but while rosa understood the grays involved she never seemed conflicted; her stance is generally unchanged and unshaken throughout the whole episode as she resolves to convict

the point here isn’t to have rosa arrive to some definite conclusion on whether irene deserves her sentencing but the fact that she would have had to struggle in the first place w her principles and her personal relation to a woman who is both victim and murderer in her journey to do so. the point here is interrogating what you have to risk and lose in the pursuit of the justice you believe in (rosa as legal justice and irene as vigilante justice! ugh could have been so good)

while metatextually the game is sympathetic to irene’s situation the fact that the abuse victims are mentioned once offhandedly, persecuted, or murdered in the end doesn’t paint a great picture for survivors as a whole. which is why i found this ending so fraught. because i understand how the writers arrived here and the context and the factors that led up to it but i also found it impossible for me to suspend my personal principles and immerse in the fiction

anyway i think i need to ruminate on this further. so i’ll stop here and end this off lightly w things about the ep that i did like/appreciate:

marius’s business/negotiation acumen. i really like it when otome show rather than tell how and why an li is skilled and talented. one of my favorite things about marius is this conflict of how actually cunning he is vs how people are naturally inclined to view him (ie a buffoon, gullible) and how he exploits that reputation to his own advantage (although idk how long he’ll be able to keep that up considering that business and upper class society are so insular. then again business and upper class society are full of actual buffoons so)

always fascinated by how the writers construct the mystery of the cases. this genre’s not my strongest as both writer and reader so it’s always fun seeing how it’s constructed and how the complex web is detangled in the end until it all (kind of) makes sense. i will say though that tot relies a lot on coincidence and contrived evidence to make the solution of the mystery work (which is unavoidable in the genre) but it does happen too many times that i have to remind myself to suspend disbelief when artem comes across someone who just happens to have bloodworth’s murder recorded. which is a shame bc mysteries are the most satisfying when it’s solved purely by the skill and observations of the detective rather than luck

but i liked how in the lack of conclusive evidence marius is the one who tells rosa to resort to psychological pressure/manipulation which imo is a very in-character marius thing to do and very much up in his wheelhouse of skills. and it’s also a nice reflection of his relationship w vyn bc acrimonious as they are they have a lot in common

new member of the nxx? yes im shrieking. for me it’s a toss up between vincent and darius but i know that in my hearts of hearts i already know who i want lmao but i think it’d be equally delightful if a dark horse like celestine was the one who came first in the running

#tears of themis #abuse mention cw #i found this ep so timely bc no rules literally has a case similar to this but you’ll see that im treating it waaayyy differently #eta: i meant ep seven not six!

[lilac-5ky]

Hellloooo, how's it going? I've just finished gintama yesterday and I legit feel so empty oml i want to go back to when i started it:((( i remember you saying you're still in the process of watching it so which episodes did you enjoy most? For me, i was absolutely in love with episodes 153 and 156+ The umbrella one, it was oh so cute. Hope you're having a great day!!!

istg, I am dreading the moment I finish it! My pace of watching is soooo irregular because part of me is like yay let's get to the good Takasugi centric episodes, but another part of me is BUT IF YOU DO THAT, YOU'LL BE CLOSE TO THE ENDING AND THEN YOU'LL BE LEFT WITH NOTHING! So, trust me, I feel your pain even when I haven't finished watching it. The fact that I know what sort of happens in the movie DOES NOT HELP EITHER!

Anyways, anyways, I have sooooo many episodes that I've loved! It will take ages for me to list all of them but I'll try to mention some of the episodes I really liked for different reasons. Gonna be a looooooong post but eh, Gintama is pure of epicness, what can I say!

(mostly random order, but I'll give a shoutout to my most favorite ones)

Zura Episodes:

Starting this post, I want to give a special shoutout to some of my favorite Zura Episodes. I started Gintama because of his VA and because I thought Zura looked really cool. I knew nearly nothing about the show but I did end up loving Katsura and up to this day he is one of my favorite characters. His episodes are some of the funniest to me and I always end up losing it whenever he appears.

Anyways, said episodes are episode 13 (Captain Katsura), 25 (hot pot),39 (Ikumatsu), 43-44 (go ninja arc), 64 (the interview), 98-99 (Owee arc), 109 (Jackie's nose and Yamazaki LMFAO)

Other than the hilarious Zura episodes, I wanna mention a few more comedic arcs/episodes that I really enjoyed.

Namely, episode 28 (the one with Kondo and Matsudaira being "attacked"), 35 (Matsudaira's daughter and warrior of love Mayo 13),74 (unibrow pandemic), 83 (Shogun's debut and allow me to say that I can't watch a Shogun episode without cracking up), 151-152 (Barber arc, I COULDN'T BREATHE OKAY), 200-201 (Santa arc)

Next on, we have arcs that were funny to me but weren't 100% pure comedy.

For example, Infant Strife arc (51-52) had its sad moments but it has one of the most memorable Gin/Zura interactions (NYAN NYAN)

Mother arc (54-55) was really enjoyable to me too! I love the concept of Hosts and the whole mix up with who the son was, was hilarious. I'm still not over the Just Do it Gin moment or Gura LMAO

Hasegawa Trial (94-95)arc was also pretty funny to me and although Gin tends to lowkey ruin the man's life, his line about giving him a rope to pull himself up was very memorable and touching to me.

Character Poll Arc (182-184), Hasegawa cosplaying Takasugi, Kondo cosplaying Kagura, Yamazaki going full on villain, do I need to say more?

Yagyuu Arc (76-81) This arc had many funny moments. Princess Bubbles, the toilet showdown, Kagura and Sougo teaming up, Kondo shitting himself. In terms of story I wasn’t super amazed but it made me laugh a lot and is still very memorable to me. I also like Kyuubei as a character and, I liked how we got a bit of Hijikata’s backstory.

Then there are a couple of episodes/mini arcs that were on spot for me and I really enjoyed!

Episode 63 painted a better image of Zenzou's character and considering he is one of my favorite characters, I loved that episode. It was cute af, no denying.

Episode 17 is an episode I also feel like mentioning because it was Takasugi's debut. For me it wasn't love at first sight, I actually started crushing on him during Benizakura, BUT, I've rewatched ep 17 many many times since and for that, it deserves a spot here.

Episode 186-187 aka Rokkaku arc. Sougo tends to look like a pretty messed up person (which he is) but I love the few episodes that showcase how he is more than a sadistic little bastard (love him). And so the next arc won’t be surprising, since it’s

Episode 86-87 aka Mitsuba arc. I don’t even wanna talk about this one, it made me cry, it broke me,I felt depressed after watching it. Yet, it was beautiful and to me it’s definitely one of the best Gintama arcs. The story was great, we got to see another side to Sougo and why he “hates” Hijikata. Plus, it’s one of the arcs that really shows the bond between the Shinsengumi. And, finally, I’ve always kinda liked Hijikata but he was never one of my favorites. This arc made me love him and now he is in my top 5 best characters from Gintama.

Episode 148-149 aka Shinsengumi Death Game Arc. This one is quite simple, I am a big horror fan and I love saw as a franchise so there’s that.

Episode 190-192 aka Kabukicho Stray Cat Arc. I am also a big cat person (I MEAN I LIKE CATS A LOT, NOT BIG CATS SPECIFICALLY. ALTHOUGH BIG CATS ARE NICE TOO. ALL CATS ARE. ANYWAYS!) and honestly this arc was the perfect mix between comedy and drama. I loved Hoichi’s story and in general animal stories get to me.

Episode 215 well, for me this is one of the best episodes for many reasons, the most obvious ones being Takasugi and Kamui. God knows how many screenshots I’ve taken from this episode, I loved the story, I loved their team up, I loved how we got to see some moments between the Kiheitai, it was all sooooo so good! I haven’t even watched any other episodes since because I can’t get over the fact that I won’t see Takasugi for another looooong while lmao. Just great episode 10/10 from me.

And now that all the comedic, small arc, character centric episodes are out of the way, I’ll get to my most favorite arcs of all.

7. Episode 31-32 Memory Loss Arc

Up until that episode, Yorozuya kept getting themselves into random Shenanigans and what not, but this small arc right there shows how much they’ve bonded with one another. It’s the first time they face a kind of struggle in their little family and watching how they are unwilling to give up on one another is heart warming to me, especially Kagura’s speech about the branches and the tree.

6. Episode 40-42 Umibozu Arc

I remember how I was dying to know more about Kagura and her backstory. This arc is proof that sometimes the bonds you create with others can be just as strong as blood ties. Even if Umibozu is her father, Gin and Shinpachi are also her family. Plus, I feel like it’s a very realistic take on families. Oftentimes parents don’t understand their children and what they want, something that creates conflict between them even when their intentions are pure. Umibozu doesn’t know how to be a great father and accepts the fact that his daughter will be happier with Yorozuya than with him. He ends up respecting her decision and tries to turn into a better dad, or at least the dad she needs. People say that Benizakura was the first great arc of Gintama but to me, Umibozu arc did a great job as well.

5. Episode 177-181 Red Spider Arc

I absolutely loved this arc and was hyped from the beginning to its end. We got a better look into Tsukuyo as a person, as well as her master, the man who made her into who she is. Jiraia to me was a very interesting character and although I didn’t agree with his views, I can’t deny the fact that they were pretty original. The concept of utter self sacrifice in order to protect people is something you wouldn’t expect from a “villain” type of character and the fact that he wanted to kill her because he couldn’t bear to kill himself (even if it was proven to be false at the end) was quite unique. Also, we got to see a comparison between Tsukuyo/Jiraia and Gin/Shouyou as a student/master duo and how completely different they were. The scene where Jiraia dies and Tsukuyo carries him while Zenzou and Gin talk about how they were unable to carry the burden of their teachers is heartbreaking. On another note, this arc is another arc that includes Zenzou after many episodes of absence, and we get to see more interactions between Gin and Tsukuyo. I’m not a huge Gintsu shipper, but I find their relationship cute and overall this arc had a romantic undertone that I enjoyed for once. PLUS, drunk Tsukki was priceless, hands down.

4. Episode 139-146 Yoshiwara In Flames Arc

I wasn’t too much into the whole Housen thing, in fact he is one of the characters I really disliked and couldn’t sympathize with. But, this arc introduced us to Tsukuyo, Kamui and Abuto. Now I really like Tsukki and Abuto but Kamui? I absolutely adore him! This might as well be renamed to Kamui’s arc because all I could focus on was him LMAO. I it’s a great arc, full of action and epic moments. I love arcs that include red light districts (f.e. I loved the last season of Demon Slayer) as they have a certain appeal, so this arc resonated with me. A notable moment is how Kagura lost it! Even if she is a bit domesticated at this point, the Yato spirit still lives within her and she is crazy strong. The two siblings just stole this arc for me along with the scenes with the kunai knives sticking to, mostly, Gin. Oh and the metaphors were top tier!

3. Episode 101-105 Shinsengumi Crisis Arc

This arc just like Mitsuba's arc, this one portrays the relationship between the Shinsengumi members perfectly! We see what makes Kondo a great leader, how Sougo is loyal to him no matter what, how Yamazaki plays them all and of course, how Hijikata deserves his spot as the Demon Vice Commander. The premise with the cursed sword is a bit silly, not going to lie but somehow, it all works together? There were many emotional, funny and badass moments in this arc, ngl. I still get goosebumps when I remember how Sougo killed all those traitors or Hijikata's speech near the end in which he included tons of anime references. Even when the sword messed with his brain, he still fought it with everything he had and his speech was very touching although hilarious.

Other than the three of them, of course I have to mention Itou, Takasugi and Bansai. First of all, Itou was a very interesting character and I related a lot to him. I've also found myself looking down at others and have justified my loneliness based on similar criteria to his. It's easy to go down such a road and so Itou's story hit me right in the feels. He is such a tragic figure who only realizes his faults at the very end when it's too late. Still, the ending his comrades gave him got me asking who cut onions.

On the other hand, Takasugi was AMAZING in this arc! He appeared for only two scenes yet they were both pretty iconic imo. His dialogue with Itou showcased why Takasugi is such a charismatic person. He is not someone who only knows how to fight well but someone who is particularly insightful and good at reading others. Like I said, I related to Itou so the things he told him really affected me and made me reconsider my own life a bit and see things in a more positive light.

A final thing I wanna mention about this arc is Bansai and more specifically his relationship to Takasugi. One would assume that their relationship is that of leader and subordinate YET, the way Bansai talks back to him when they discuss how the mission went, sheds a different light to it. Takasugi seems to value and respect his opinion and treats him as an equal, while Bansai seems comfortable enough around him to call him by his first name. Their relationship is very balanced in terms of power and intellect and that is something I really liked!

2. Episode 210-214 Four Devas Arc

This is my second favorite arc in Gintama even though I finished it less than a week ago. Through it we learn of the story of Kabukicho and Otose, who always seemed like a very intriguing and interesting character to me. We'd only heard bits and bits about her husband and how she met Gintoki but this arc perfectly shows why she was so keen on taking him in; because to her, Gin was just like her childhood friend Jirocho. Unlike Housen, I really liked Jirocho as a character. Honestly, Otose, him and her husband could very well have a spinoff of their own, they were that interesting and well written to me. Then we had Birabirabirabirako who was adorable although HIGHKEY a psycho. Somehow cute psycho gingers are my weakness so I couldn't hate her even though she got a bit annoying towards the end but hey, can't blame her! She grew up without a father and to her, it was as if he never cared about her.

Notable moments of this arc were: The cemetery fight scene between Gin and Jirocho (HE DIDN'T SAY A SINGLE WORD, I WAS O_O during the entire scene), their teamup against Kada and Harusame near the end, Kabukicho residents uniting to help out Otose and Yorozuya and of course, the final scene between Jirocho and his daughter.

"I have been called boss, warrior and many other names, but I have given them up. I am the father of Pirako Chin, Jirocho."

Words cannot describe how much I loved this moment. He had achieved so much during these years yet he gave up all of his titles to reconcile with his daughter and be her father. He goes as far as to introduce himself to her because after all these years, they barely knew each other! idk, I really liked Jirocho and he is one of my favorite antagonists of the show. Even though Kada turned out to be the actual antagonist but ANYWAYS!

And my number 1, most favorite Gintama arc so far that I'll probably rewatch over and over again until my eyes bleed iiiiiiis.... *drum roll*

Episode 58-61 Benizakura Arc

Who could have seen that one coming, am I right?

Sigh. This arc is amazing to me and will forever be one of my most favorite anime arcs of all times. It's not just about the arc itself, no, it's about the HYPE! Before Benizakura, I wasn't even interested in Takasugi but the way he was teased in the ending and all those small teasers hinting at his return, made me watch the previous episodes in like a day. I was dying to see him, I was literally foaming and honestly, although I've had characters I've liked in other shows, no one ever managed to capture my attention the way he did in the Shura song. And so, a new love story was created and all that jazz LMAO but anyways, let's more to the arc itself.

Everyone had their moment in it, from characters like Gintoki and Kagura who are expected to be great, to characters like Shinpachi and Otae who don't get as much glory. It was the perfect mix of action comedy and had some mystery/thriller vibes to it with the whole Zura/Nizou thing. Also we got to see Elizabeth in a pretty active role for once, other than just the comedic sidekick to Katsura.

Speaking of Katsura, S H O R T H A I R Z U R A. Enough said.

And, of course, I can't not include Kiheitai. We had seen a bit of Bansai and Nizou before but we got introduced to them properly as well as Matako and Takechi who are two characters I really like. (every time I see Takechi, I get tears in my eyes, he is simply hilarious). Although it's not that evident in this arc, KIheitai are basically Takasugi's own Yorozuya and seeing how there is an anti Joui faction that actively does things to oppose the Amanto and the Bakufu, was very interesting. Like yeah, we have Katsura, but he doesn't do that much terrorism nowadays. Takasugi and the Kiheitai is what you'd expect from rebels. And here is where I'd like to also note that despite the fact that Takasugi is a serious character and all that, his crew members seem to be on the comedic side of things which I do find hilarious. It's as if he is a magnet for funny/'stupid' characters, if you consider his relationship to Joui 4 and his Kiheitai.

Tbh, there is so much to be said about this arc. There are flashbacks between Joui 4, we get to see a bit into Takasugi's agenda and why he does what he does, plus we see the difference between him and Katsura as rebels. Katsura started on the more extreme side of things yet after spending more time with Gintoki, he goes milder. Him and Takasugi have the same type of goals and ideals, however their means to achieve that are completely different. They had the same experiences, yet both of them got shaped so differently and yeah, idk, Benizakura is just great because it hypes the entire plot of Gintama. It's the appetizer to a hell of a meal and you can tell from every single scene in it. Both the movie and the episodes were amazing and although I loved Gintama before Benizakura, this arc is the biggest milestone for me as a watcher. It redefined my standards lmao.

funnily enough I realize how I spoke about Takasugi, Katsura and the others, but I never went into the actual plot of this arc. OOPS! The story of the sword and the two siblings is interesting and nice, but it serves as an excuse imo to finally bring Takasugi back into the show and include him to the story. It's a big irony that the main plot of this arc ends up being its backdrop, but with such an interesting character such as him, such things are bound to happen.

Yes, I went into a lot of detail regarding this and considering the whole show from the first episode up to episode 215 took a shit ton of time. I could have easily given a simple answer but I wanted to review them properly, mainly for myself, I guess. Anyways, I hope that if you read all these random ramblings, they weren't too boring, and that for your sake I highlighted the episode just in case you don't feel like reading walls of text LMAO.

#asks #mirto answers #gintama

[awakenee]

hsmtmts . ep 104

july 8, 11:03 am cst

heya, so before i get into this i wanna let whoever is reading my daily rants know that i'm going to be on vacation from july 11 to july 13 i think? i'll most likely leave my laptop at home and therefore won't be able to post the episodes for those days, and even if i do bring my laptop i'm going to try to enjoy my time out lol. i'll probably just rewatch them early and schedule the posts for those days or rewatch them when i get back. on another note, ep 104 is definitely one of my top 3 favorite season one episodes, definitely excited for this one!

ohhh, kourtney's in costume crew

tbh i kind of agree with her here. for halloween i've thought more than once about dressing up like characters from a musical, but then i realise that they're just high schoolers wearing normal high school clothes. sure, some may be recognisable, but other than troy's red and white shirt and chad's iconic t-shirts with messages nothing really stands out.

that pineapple is great

ej has something on his lip, i assume from when ricky wacked him with a basketball?

"bribing some hacker" nini's an icon

LMAO THERE'S A GUY RECORDING THE WHOLE THING

i, once again, want nini's sweater

nini lowkey defending ricky

nini: summer's over. season three: well, yes, but actually no

carlos screaming

"is that a hot wing?"

argh lynne, words cannot express how much i dislike this woman

hot wing pt. 2

ricky needs therapy counter: 5

ej done effed up

"you're on, lovers!" horrible timing carlos

ricky's face combined with the camera zooming in on him is something else

ricky needs therapy counter: 6

"not a sars epidemic" about that

as someone who was in the lion king, i can say that no one walks with furniture on their head

all of these "downstage" and "upstage" are making me dizzy

seb's smile

big red has realised that theatre is a cult, and if you mess up your lines we'll feed you to the band kids

where tf is kelsi

what happened with the slow, romantic tempo of this duet

okay but hsm aside this is one of my favorite songs/covers in both seasons right next to the mob song

ash's face

you can see nini getting ready to strike

ricky, you dont barge into a rehearsal like that

miss jenn is going through her middle age crisis

SEB IS SO WHOLESOME

ouch

the emotional support coyote >>>>>

rip nini

ricky needs therapy counter: 7

the hamster

miss jenn seeing right through ricky

gina, eff off

i actually feel bad for ej

gentle reminder that portwell is now a thing

oooohhhhhh

plot twist: ej is actually jd in disguise

nini stop

"shopping! ... for a lie detector."

yeah screw tonya

uhh nini... i think tonya's a her

i relate to shiggy

i want the sad-looking bran muffin

i love nini's shoes

"oh."

my keyboard broke

yeah, ej's jd

ricky needs therapy counter: 8

ew

how can big red sleep

ricky needs therapy counter: 9

aw, poor boi

"and after everything that's been going on with n..."

ej why are you stalking her

nini didn't use a period at the end of her text, that's a good sign

i want a bestie like kourt

nini is a mood

how in hell is ricky not freezing

all i want my beloved

oh right, she gets interrupted

"slc pride" this better be foreshadowing

see? nini's not over him

ricky needs therapy counter: 10

aw, he's going to cry

RICKY, NOT THE TIME

oh my god gina

ricky, stop ditching everyone

also how long did it take for nini to get a goddamn pillow

ALL I WANT MY BELOVED

awkwarrrrrrrrrrrrd

what ive been looking for reprise >>>>>

this ending is very depressing

#hsmtmts #hsmtmts fandom

[its-chelisey-stuff]

It’s over!! And I kinda don’t want to let it go :(

UGH. Fine! I forgive you for all the bad cliches, for using the tropes I HATE (looking at you amnesia duh). I FORGIVE YOU. YOU HAVE MY HEART, DRAMA!!

this was four months, wasn't it? That's officially the longest time it has taken me to watch a drama 😂 

I started watching the drama feeling all happy and excited and, surprisingly, I finished it in the same way. No drama is perfect and F4 Thailand definitely had its ups and downs (a whole rollercoaster ride, definitely not for for everyone, in fact, I think a lot of people jumped ship lol) but to me, the emotions a show leaves you with are crucial to how you'll remember it. A bittersweet ending might make you look back on it with sadness, an open ending might leave you confused and you will probably remember it feeling upset. A downright bad, nonsensical ending of a show you truly loved? Well, I was just there last week and for me, it completely ruins the show. Might leave you feeling a tiny bit homicidal (lmao it's a joke I'm not a psycho I swear 😅).

But happy endings that leave you smiling like a fool and a "wait nooo, I wanted more, what happens next?" kind of feeling? Those will make you look back on the whole drama with warmth and fondness. And that's how it is to me with this drama. So, not the greatest show ever made (which tbh it’s subjective), probably-almost-certainly (in the eyes of longtime fans of the story) not the best adaptation and maybe a bit of a hot mess for many even to me BUT overall a really fun drama, with PERFECT casting, great chemistry between OTP and the F4, good music and really good acting (amazing considering 3 out of the main 5 were newbies).

If I’m being honest I would’ve liked for the drama to take the plotlines of the last two eps and maybe have them be explored over four or five eps. Let me feel the angst of Thyme and Gorya being separated over a year. And the angst of Thyme not remembering her (which is a crazy thing to say considering how much I hate amnesia plots lol). The mother having a much longer process to realize that her ways of being a mother were all messed up. Also, more F4 scenes, but the fluffy and silly kind. But yeah, more of all that and less of whatever happened in eps 11-14.

And still, totally recommend it. I'm sure that now that it's all out, binging may very well be a wiser option than waiting a whole week for a single one-hour-long episode. I think the pace of the story and the logic of it might even benefit from watching it all in one go. Who knows. But I'm really glad I watched it and stuck by it in its most confusing, outrageous and crazy bananas moments, because then I got to enjoy it at its most heartwarming, sweet, fun, crushingly beautiful and exciting times. ‘Cause you are my shoooting staaaaaaarrrr~~

We truly needed more of those looks...

Ah. I had this drama for four long months and I'm gonna miss it, my weekends gonna feel empty for a while and that’s truly something I don’t get to say a lot with dramas these days. I'm gonna miss Thyme, Gorya, Ren, Kavin and MJ. (And Kaning too, of course!)

#f4 thailand #bright vachirawit #tu tontawan #dew jirawat #win metawin #nani hirunkit #thai drama #i'm glad MJ got his happy ending too! even if it was in a KFC ad lmao #okay i can say this in the tags #the kisses between OTP were truly awful #i'm glad their last one was practically in the shadows #because i didn't want to see another awkward kiss #and i think they did it to protect Tu's image #if that makes sense #this is her first drama and she's still young #while Bright is well known and has a LARGE fanbase #(not to mention those crazy fans that ship him with Win) #so i guess certain decisions were made to protect the girl from undeserved hate #and those included really bad kisses #i remember watching an interview before the drama premiered #where Tu said her cousin was a fan of win and bright #and her cousin said she was gonna become her anti #wtf?

[lizacstuff]

Sen Çal Kapımı episode 47 asks

Below the read more find asks and answers about episode 47, the fragman for 48 and other miscellaneous things.

(UNDER THE CUT)

Anonymous asked: Hi! I hope you are enjoying your vacation. I remember you mentioned you would be traveling. What were your thoughts on the epi? I think this was one episode where everything was happy! No big problems. The truth about Kemal being Serkan's dad could have been dramatic but Ayse and team wrote it like a romcom. I'm not really feeling the Deniz being the saviour of Artlife like they are portraying in the fragmans but I'll wait for the next epi to make a judgement.

Thank you. Once again, I though the whole episode was a really easy watch and I enjoyed every minute.  

I really appreciate the tone this season, even something as series as Serkan’s parentage is played lightly, as you say very much rom com, and not full of heavy melodrama (as it would have been if explored during the 30s). This is exactly the tone and feel of this show that I want.  

Serkan’s reaction was predictable, but it was also clear that he just needed time to adjust and settle down and he’ll come around. I like that. 

I don’t have time this week to do full episode thoughts, but I enjoyed Serkan and Eda’s morning after conversation. Hilarious that he’d removed all the sharp objects from the room. Loved that after all of Eda’s fear-fueled reticence, once she decided to take the plunge with him, she was all in. Eda admitting that she’d been unbalanced and had been at fault for hiding Kiraz,--and acknowledging that Serkan had been fighting for them and now she wanted to as well-- was very nice. After running a bit hot and cold, Serkan deserved to hear that.  

lolo-deli asked: Hard to believe we didn't get a reconciliation scene in 47... Nobody expected sex but we couldn't even get a hug or kiss when they made up? "I want to see that tattoo" was not the romantic reunion I was hoping for. Were you at all disappointed?

IMO, we did see the important part of the reconciliation, and that was the conversation. Sure, I think we should have seen Serkan and Eda kiss in the last episode. If I were in charge we would have, but I don’t think the story actually loses anything because it’s not a mystery what happened.   

Clearly, he says the tattoo line and they jump each other, make their way to the bedroom, have sex, but don’t really communicate until the morning when she wakes up, and that’s where the show picks up and we get to see those first important moments. 

If you’re looking for romance, then I would point to everything that led up to that tattoo line in 46. That entire episode (and the one before it) was their romantic reconciliation. Moments alone where he takes in her scent and whispers how much he’s missed her, waking up in bed together when they just automatically gravitate to one another, the moments of pretending to be married that were very comedic, but also very soft and romantic (What’s your greatest passion, what’s the first line you ever said to one another), the heartfelt conversation on the bench, the actual tattoo conversation at dinner. That’s the romantic reunion. Yes, if they had just reunited after years (like in episode 40) right before the tattoo line, I  would have needed more romance, but we’ve had 7 episodes of them working their way back to one another. Everything was primed, all they needed was to light the match.  IMO that line did the trick. 

So, am I disappointed? No. I’m happy to go with the flow and enjoy every minute of what they do give us in these last few episodes. I choose not to get tied up in what I wish would happen vs what actually happens. I find I don’t enjoy any show when I put the onus on the show to conform to my wishes. 

Some might be disappointed, that’s their choice, (and make no mistake, it is a choice) but that’s not how I’m approaching this second season which is serving up so much romance, comedy, and domestic family goodness. I suffered through the 30s so I could get to this, I’m not going to waste any of it being disappointed.

Anonymous asked: Idk why this proposal was the most emotional out of them all for me. Perhaps with the other ones I just KNEW the other shoe had to drop because they couldn't let them get happily married this early and this time I knew it was finally it. Or maybe it was the fact that knowing they're married means the show really is ending soon, but I was a blubbering mess lol. Sure there's drama ahead, but it's definitely not a plane crash and memory loss or a "fake" Selin pregnancy!

Yes! Thank goodness we don’t have any of that nonsense waiting for us.  They are really going to be married. 

I enjoyed this proposal very much, it was so sweet the way he planned everything out and had everyone helping, while Eda (and even sort of the audience) was in the dark about what was really going on there.  

For me, as far as the words spoken, nothing really tops his speech to her in 27, but the great thing is that we get them all and this was special in it’s own right because he really surprised her and swept her off her feet this time around.  I loved it!

Anonymous asked: So I am confused about Serkan’s ability to have kids- it’s not a problem now? If him being infertile was only temporary, why did he say it was impossible to have kids and it was a part of why he left Eda in the first place so she could have it somewhere else? They could’ve just waited a couple years to have kids then...? I know he also left her cause he was scared of dying but they really made his reaction seem like he’d NEVER be able to have kids

My assumption is that since they were able to have Kiraz, they know it’s possible, so even if it won’t be easy (and fertility is usually not a hard yes/ no line... mostly it’s a measure of how likely it is) they are choosing to believe they will be able to conceive again.  

If you’re looking to change what his assumptions were when they first broke up and he thought he was unable to have kids (and that there was a 70% chance the cancer would come back) and deciding he should have made different decisions based on the fact that he was able to father Kiraz... to be blunt you’re looking at it the wrong way. 

At that time, he thought he would never be able to have kids. Full stop.  The fact that wasn’t necessarily true doesn’t change what he believed at the time. 

Anonymous asked: serkan being the overly protective, worrying, affectionate baba is EXACTLY what i imagined, as i'm sure everyone else did. who else would worry about the pH balance of the soap at their daughter's preschool?! serkan thinking his angel can do no wrong.. of course it was all can's plan to hide them in the bathroom lmao. i hope, and with how this season is going i think we'll get it, we get to see this serkan in action when eda is pregnant too.. even if we just see a couple minutes of it!

YES! I loved overly protective Serkan. Thankfully, for Kiraz’s sake he has Eda (who might be a bit too far the other way) to balance him out.   I agree that it was hilarious how he was trying to blame sweet Can.  Even without seeing what happened, I’m pretty sure anyone else who had spent two minutes with those kids would figure out who the instigator was.  When rabble rousing is going on, I think it’s fair to point to the offspring of Serkan Bolat and Eda Yildiz as the cause, lmao.

It would be great it we got to see glimpses of Serkan as an expectant father and also the father of a newborn.  I would love that.

Anonymous asked: I see that the "Nitpick of the Week" as I'm calling it, this week is where Serkan proposed. Because Serkan Bolat would neeeeever propose in a "parking lot" .. am I the only one seeing that it's not even a parking lot, it's a road. Like if it is a parking lot where are the other cars then lol?! Putting aside that he's proposing outside their literal wedding venue, their entire story started in a parking lot. He told her he loved her for the first time on the side of a road. I'm not understanding.

You make great points!  Their love story did start in a parking lot AND he was trying to pull off both a surprise proposal and a surprise wedding in one day’s notice. Since we’ve already seen a proposal on a plane, a proposal at a piano bar and a proposal at their place of work, I don’t really have the energy to join the discontented masses on twitter and nitpick the location of this proposal. He could have proposed in front of a landfill and I would have been delighted. 

Anonymous asked: I'm sorry if you don't find it as funny, but people's reaction to this new fragman is so exaggerated like they're about to witness Indecent Proposal dizi-edition that I literally couldn't help but find it hilarious. Like no where is it ever implied that Deniz is offering Serkan SEX, but when Eda says "just do what you have to" somehow that's the first thing everyone thought of?! Not to mention we know this is Deniz's last ep.. the dramatic reactions really have me dying lmao.

OMG! I know. So this is a show that doesn’t show sex, Serkan didn’t sleep with the woman he thought was his girlfriend during amnesia, Serkan and Eda were both celibate for 5 years, but suddenly they’re gonna have newly-married Serkan go to the edge width Deniz?!?!?!  Those people on twitter lost their damn minds.  

On Saturday, I was on vacation and had just popped in to see if the new fragman was released, I was happy to nope right out of there when I saw the insanely melodramatic overreaction to the fragman. 

It’s obvious that since the biggest issue between Eda and Serkan is Eda’s fear that Serkan will always prioritize work over her, as he did on their first wedding day, this story is to show that Serkan will 100% choose Eda over work and Art Life.  Also I’m sure the episode will have the same tone as the rest of the season, which is light and comedic.  

Anonymous asked: sometimes I go back to episode 28 and still can't believe they got that bathtub + shower scene in there with the rtuk guidelines. I've watched a couple more romcoms since starting SCK and have never seen anything close to that. I know they got fined afterwards but they were really like "screw it, we're going it for anyway" 😂

It’s interesting that the production company and network went for it there. But as you say they did get fined, so they didn’t get away with anything.  

#Sen Çal Kapımı #Sen Cal Kapimi #edser #sckask #sck episode discussion #edser discussion #sck 2x47 #asklizac

[morwensteelsheen]

farawyn and borodred for the ship ask game thing?

thank you so much!! :)

okay i’ll start with borodred because for some unfathomable reason i actually got there first —

1. What made you ship it?

One of my favourite Types of ships is the Elder Statesmen Of War-type set-ups, where it’s less about people brought together through theatrical romantic gestures and more about the steadiness of people who are going through similar (immensely difficult) circumstances, who know that in their hearts they’re always going to put their duty to that cause first, but still seek out human comfort in other people who will understand what their priorities are and why.

I think there’s also a lot of similarities about the kind of helplessness they both face despite having this tremendous innate strength. Both of them still have to deal with family dynamics that are complex (made more complex by the war) and that can’t be fixed just by their own sheer will power; both of them die these utterly unnecessary deaths (not that death makes a ship but I think in this instance it actually points to the constant tragedy these guys face); and both of them are meant to be the principal figures of their families and people and are ultimately sidelined by the cruel mechanisations of war and the forward march of history or whatever wanky term there is for it — my apologies to ep thompson's ghost, dont haunt me bro.

Plus there’s obviously the interesting thread raised when Faramir starts bitching about Gondor and likens Gondor (and by very explicit extension, Boromir) to Rohan. That always made me go ‘Hmmmmmm, wonder what else Boromir liked about Rohan,’ lmao.

Anyways for me the ship is the equivalent of Star Wars’ Kanan and Hera or (my OTP to end all others) Luke and Wedge, just people getting by on love and duty and without big ol fancy romance.

2. What are your favorite things about the ship?

The fanon, I think, really makes it, as with so many other LOTR ships. battlefield manners, by themightypen is essentially the definitive take for me on them — these two guys who are just so fucking exhausted, man, but still overcome by defensive love for their families, even if their (foster-)siblings are naïve fools. That I just love, love, love. Plus I think they’re unique for their ability to pretty comfortable explore the relationship between Gondor & Rohan in advance of the Ring War without having to stray too far into AU, which I always appreciate.

3. Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

Not really, tbh, except in that I don’t think Boromir is necessarily as laddy as people like to portray him. I’m happy to play into it in, say, my modern AUs because I think that’s a fun and sweet niche for him, but I am a bit 🤪 about Boromir as this kind of reckless, drunken playboy (not least because I think that’s a much funnier niche for Faramir to fill, at least when he’s younger). Chapter Four of Swaddledog’s Hearts and Minds gets my preferred Boromir characterisation absolutely spot on, I think.

And now, sigh, the ultimate OTP, Farawyn —

1. What made you ship it?

For starters, I think I am obsessed with Éowyn in a way I’ve never quite been obsessed with any other fictional character. I came to reading LOTR at this moment in my life where I was intensely frustrated about everything — trapped inside permanently (helplessly!) because of the pandemic, just starting a new political organisation that I truly believed in but that was still making me feel like shit, facing down an untenable about of work, and, fundamentally, really, really hating being a woman and what that means. And along comes Éowyn, who is bitter, who is cold, who is ANGRY, and who doesn’t perform joy or softness or gentleness just because people expect her to. She’s this seminal Woman Of War in so many ways, I think the kind of person a lot of us wish we could be. She’s got her emotional taps cut off at the source, she holds her head high and faces down unimaginable personal and political terrors, and at the end of it all still has this abiding love for her family that, I would argue, is almost unparalleled by anyone else in the book.

After all that, she gets this incredible moment of emotional catharsis (or what we expect to be emotional catharsis): “no living man am I!” She undertakes THE greatest martial act of the Ring War, and in that moment there’s this unbelievably sophisticated dialogue happening about gender (“Éowyn it was, and Dernhelm also”), and leadership (Merry finding his courage not because of the immediate scenario of the Witch-king, but because he’s spurred into it by Éowyn’s presence), and love and care.

And then we learn that no, actually, this glorious act of violence wasn’t the emotional catharsis we thought it would be. She gets to ride to war, she gets to throw herself headlong at death, and in the end that hopeless act of individualism isn’t really what does it for her. She’s still left desolate and despairing, and actually all of her problems haven’t gone away.

And then we need to rewind a bit, because along comes Faramir, who is gentle, and is kind, and does seem to believe in joy, but not because people expect it — actually it's made abundantly clear nobody expects it — but because it’s something quite innate to how he figures the world. And he’s a huge fucking nerd too. I have a lot of thoughts on Faramir’s flaws and why I find them endearing, which I won’t put here, but almost immediately you get this sense of a guy who’s quite melodramatic, good humoured, and very much not made to live in a time of war.

But he’s also clear-headed about war and what it requires (tactically, if not strategically, though that’s a post for another day), but who is kind of cynical and weary of it in his own unique way. And it’s a unique cynicism given his personal circumstances because he’s the second son of The great family of Gondor, he’s apparently — though with some big ol’ question marks hanging about the extent — very able to command some of the elite units in the realm, and what’s more than that, he’s got all these fantastical powers (the light mind reading to start, to say nothing of this apparently magical ability to command animals too. bruh.). By all accounts he should be this brazen hot mess, but he’s not. He’s desperate to claw his way out of this war-torn cage of expectation his people have for how a man should comport himself in time of war. Is it a little naïve? Sure. A little fussy? Absolutely. But does it point to that same desperation that Éowyn has? Yes! But also the practicality, like, neither of them are really enjoying the circumstances they live under, but good fucking god are they both able to Make It Work.

So finally we get to the Houses of Healing and what is the finest and most aggressively romantic writing of LOTR. Seriously, it’s so fucking much. It’s breathtaking. It reminds me quite viscerally of this fabulous quote from Les Mis:

The power of a glance has been so much abused in love stories, that it has come to be disbelieved in. Few people dare now to say that two beings have fallen in love because they have looked at each other. Yet it is in this way that love begins, and in this way only.

At some point I will devote more time to talking about the two reasons line, and the blissful Queen of Gondor speech, but I think to me that big, important line is: “And then her heart changed, or at least she understood it; and the winter passed, and the sun shone upon her.”

It’s not about Éowyn changing herself entirely (though, I think, it really does bear mentioning that she does change, and that’s every bit as important to understanding that scene as it is romantic), it’s about Éowyn coming to terms with how to live with herself as herself, and how to live in communion with someone else. She can’t just cut people out anymore, and she can’t just treat them as objects of infatuation as she did with Aragorn, she has to reckon with people as they are. And that’s sort of the moment where I knew I was about to plunge fully off the deep end with these two and never know a moments’ peace again, lmao.

2. What are your favorite things about the ship?

Someone on here once called Farawyn a love letter to women and, by god, yes, exactly that. I love the capacity for emotional intimacy, that is beautiful in ways I can’t express. To me, though, my favourite thing is the promise of life they speak of. Not as in oh they shag loads and have babies (though not opposed to that, obviously), but in the sense that unlike Aragorn and Arwen, who are always going to be buried under/burdened with the crushing weight of history and tradition, Éowyn and Faramir are going out yonder those hills and they’re going to do some real cottagecore farming shit. Obviously with all the trappings of rank and nobility and whatnot, but they, unique to anybody else in the books, get to sow this new idea of what life should be. They are, outside of Aragorn, the single most powerful people in Gondor. Éowyn’s got the ear of a king, a steward (which is essentially a prime-ministerial deal here), and functionally her own prince (if the hobbits are to be believed when they refer to it as essentially hers). I suspect that, in life, there were remarkably few arguments she wasn’t winning, and that Ithilien probably trended towards the jumped up noble hippie camp Tolkien so desperately wanted Oxford to be (or, in other words — Cambridge, lol).

3. Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

Yeah, man, everybody stop treating Faramir like he’s a big fucking crybaby and Éowyn like she’s some kind of shrieking 2010-era tumblr girl.

One of the single most important lines defining Faramir’s character is when Denethor roasts his ass for always trying to appear noble and lordly, if you ignore every other piece of textual evidence we have about him, what part of that line makes you think Faramir’s some simpering daisy? And why would you want to link tremendous emotional intelligence and care with being too limp-wristed to function, lol??? Like I struggle loads with writing Faramir, because I have never once in my life tried to be noble or self-restrained, so find it hard to get into that mindset, but better, I think, to imagine him too closed off than to do this wilting flower song and dance lmao.

And stop making Éowyn out to be this over-emotional angst machine. She’s got problems, yes, and she’s sure as shit got a lot of angst, but at almost every point in the book where we’re overtly dealing with her emotions, she’s sublimating them into something else. One of the most serious times we see her cry is when she’s fighting with Aragorn about riding out, and after that moment she literally tries to kill herself. Those tears aren’t standard, man, that’s a real watershed (lol) moment for her. You have to read around what the text is saying to get a better feel why everybody’s constantly calling her cold and distant.

#god this is probably obnoxiously long because i can't do cuts on my phone #but refuse to open the tumblr website on my laptop lmao #faramir #éowyn #boromir #théodred #farawyn #borodred #god sorry for these fucking tags man im just trying to make my blog slightly more organised #i just have a lot of thoughts #i should really write more metas it would probably help my writing out quite a bit #asks #meta

[angelhummel]

So I saw a post about the eras of the Glee fandom and I am in the Resurgence Era. I began watching the show back in May 2020. I know people like to make fun of the show a lot, and I totally understand, but I unironically enjoy this show. Well maybe not a majority of S4-S6, but I like the music, the comedy, the heartfelt moments, the zany characters. But I can also see how even in the early seasons, which people hail as Glee's Peak, how it could have been better. (1/?)

With the exception of a few song changes and polishing clunky dialogue, there isn't much I would change in S1 or S2 (although I would cut down on the cheating plotlines in S2). S3 should have been about the club finally being unified with almost no infighting, and they shouldn't have tried to cram so many PSAs into one season AND Santana's coming out story should have had more focus than it got (and it should have been handled more sensitively period) But the music in S3 still rocked.

In S4-S6 I can see almost exactly when people began dropping from the fandom and I understand why. S4 through S5 (especially S5) seemed to be flailing for some sense of direction with the characters and juggled too many nonsensical (and often tone deaf) storylines for it to be coherent. S6 saved it from ending disastrously, but by then it was too late to truly save the show. Not to mention Ryan Murphy's unprofessionalism leading to actor drama and just butchered story lines.

But I can see how the show could progressed coherently and satisfyingly. In S3-S4 the New Directions should have become the champions for the underdogs. In S4 with most of them graduating, they should have had the theme of branching out into the big world beyond their small, closeminded town in Ohio. S5 could have been them getting too big for their britches and then failing because of arrogance. Then S6, they go back to Lima as a humbling reminder of where they started.

In S6, with the allotted 22 episodes they should have had, they could have started up the Glee club again, and be reminded why they joined in the first place. It makes me sad that bad writing and Ryan Murphy's unprofessionalism tanked a show that had all the groundwork for being absolutely amazing. Glee is many things: wacky, musical, bizarre, heartfelt, frustrating, insensitive, sometimes all those things in the same episode, but when it was good, there was nothing else like it.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

I mean that last plot is basically what they tried to do but just with Rachel while everyone puttered around for ten episodes before they wrapped all the pointless crap up. I mean I was never a fan of them having to go back to Ohio in the final season just bc they’d already done it multiple times by then and it’s like can we please see something new?? All I wanted for the last two seasons was all my faves and a few guest stars in NY lmao. It’s still an ensemble show with like 7-10 characters and some good guest stars, right?? 

Also like I’ve sort of said this before lately but. S2 is a hot damn mess. If you didn’t have Kurt or Klaine and you didn’t have Santana or Brittana?? That season would be nothing lol. Maybe it’s just me but idk all the het nonsense that season really drags it down for me. And s3 is fucking awful but that’s what so many people cite as their favorite. Which to me it just proves that people talking about “it was really good at first then sharply declined when everyone graduated” is complete bullshit and it’s just people looking at the seasons they actually watched through rose colored glasses and just saying it got 100% when they stopped being interested in it. 

And I swear I’m not trying to just shit on everything you’re saying lmao but again people saying s3 had the best music of all but like. I dunno I think DWS had the best music and was the best actual tribute ep. Michael also had really good performances. Then there’s maybe five other performances I’d put in the iconic tier lol. Idk I think it’s overrated all around and I just hate s3 so damn much (: But yes it does have some good music

But anyway your last paragraph. If I could rewrite Glee with 20/20 hindsight I would have the s4 and s6 newbies switch. So the new and interesting characters for s6 are introduced earlier and actually bring something new to the table. And then in s6 we get the wannabe copies of the oldies so that when all the alums are there, they pick out the person that reminds them most of their high school selves to mentor them. So like Thanksgiving but for like half the season or whatever lol. And it’s like sweet and nostalgic for them to sort of see themselves at the start of their friendship again and to give everyone the advice they wished they knew back in the day. Stuff like that. Could’ve been cute

And idk I don’t agree with everyone else saying s5 sucked lol. I mean obviously one of the contributing factors to the strangeness and sloppiness was one of their main characters dying and having to write around that. And poor Sam having to fill Finn’s crap shoes and become Finn 2.0 and I think you can see that best with the nurse Penny stuff. But idk I mean there’s twerking and puppets which are nonsensical and only one of those things comes off as tone deaf to me. I don’t think it’s as bad as people wanna say. But after the boringness of them coming back to Ohio for the glee club in the middle of the season?? And then my favorite characters are in NY after that?? Those are some of my absolute favorite episodes. I mean I’m in my top 40 glee ranking episodes and I’ve got 5 eps just from the back half of season five to go. I love it. It’s some of my favorite Glee

Although I still agree that s1 is the best. And that’s with the show focusing mainly on Mr. Schue, Finchel, and Quick. And I still adore it as much as I do. Season one really is something special. I mean just about every season is like watching a different show. And no one is going to agree on what they like best or why. But idk I’m just glad everyone in the fandom has something to hold onto. 

#glee #asks #answered #long post #my thoughts #oh and rm letting cast drama fuel his writing choices #fuck him for that #i didnt need a pezberry feud just bc nr was sick of lm's bullshit #seasons-of-stories

[ryoceann]

Walker- 1x04 ~spoilers~

I know i’ve said this a dozen times...but Walker just keeps getting better and better and better! With every. single. episode. I loved everything about this episode so much and again! Jared live-tweeting it was the best!!! I watched this episode at 3 am lats night again help.

~spoilers~ last warning!!!

OK SO CRDIREZ BEAUTY EPISODE!!! YES! I loved loved loved loved the development of their friendship in this episode SO MUCH! 

First scene Cordirez and them badass rangers catching bad guys together YES!!! Walker trying to find out Micki’s middle name is so cute pls. 

I really enjoyed the case they worked here as well. It was both deep and emotional and that twist! YEPPPP SIGN ME UP.

THE BAR SCENE WITH WALKER AND MICKI. AGAIN THEIR FRIENDSHIP! The episode title fit so well here and I’m glad Micki and Walker have really reached a good understanding on a friend and partner level. THEY\RE THE CUTEST PLEASE I LOVE THEM. 

‘‘walker where’s my drink’‘ ok every word micki and cordell exchanged with each other was the best??? 

WALKER AND HIS KIDS AND BROTHER UNPACKING TOGETHER!!! I asolutely adore their relatioship. AUGUST IN THAT BLUE HAIR AND SUNGLASSES DHJHHF AUGUST I FUCKING LOVE YOU CAN I ADOPT YOU.

I really adored the tiny exchange between Stella and Walker. Speaks volumes of how much they’ve progressed since the pilot. Walker and Stella’s dynamic I ADORE so seeing them at really good terms is just beautiful.

Annnddd now August is being the rebellious kid. 

I’m glad they brought up Belle’s case here as well bc i thought they’d completely overshadowed it. STELLA AND BELLE ARE SO CUTE! I WANT SO MUCH MORE OF THEM

OK NOW IK I SHIP CORDIREZ TOO BUT I SHIP TRICKI TOO. GOD.

They are so so so CUTE WITH EACH OTHER AND TREY IS JUST THE BEST I LOVE HIMMMM. 

Micki is such an epic artist??? HOLY SHIT GIRL HOW MUCH TALENT DO YOU HAVE HIDDEN IN THERE.

Micki and Walker working the case ‘off the books’! YES PARTNERS IN CRIME. or well soving crime. i didn’t like monty shaw too much anyways...idk bad vibes. WALKER DEFENDING MICKI AND SAYING SHE CAN FEND FOR HERSELF. I COMBUSTED.

THE CORPSE LADY WAS THE SAME ONE FROM SUPERNATURAL’S NIGHTMARE 1X14. HOLY SHIT.

*sigh* The Harlan Family. Classic Rich People.

‘‘can we keep this one off the books’‘ ‘‘OFF THE BOOKS???’‘ ‘‘are you kidding me off the books is my middle name. Just kidding it’s Beauregard what’s yours’‘ HHAHAH NICE TRY WALKER I LAUGHED SO HARD THEY’RE ADORABLE.

Cordell Beauregard Walker- such a fucking handful!

THE INTERROGATION SCENE. WHEN THAT GIRL WINKED AT WALKER AND HE JUST FLINCHED AND TURNED AROUND LMAO. WALKER WHAT HAVENT U HAD PPL HIT ON U BEFORE.

‘‘You got it ranger rick!’‘ PLSJJCDDFJFD. ‘‘that was so satisfying’‘ same micki same.

‘MICHELLE FLORIANA’‘ WOW??? I LOVE IT.

ALSO MUSKRAT! ADORABLE SO ADORABLE I WANT CORDELL TO CALL MICKI MUSKRAT ALL THE DAMN TIME.

‘‘on a scale from micki to muskrat where am i’‘ ‘‘floriana’‘ THAT LOOK THO.  HSHSHSHS DONT WORRY WALKER YOU’LL GET THERE.

-I love how this show is really taking the time to address the difficulties someone like Micki- A Female Latina would go through- the sexism, blatant disrespect and disregard. Micki’s character is also something that’s very well written and acted(Lindsey ily) and portrayed extremely well. One of my favorite things about Walker is how he really trusts Micki, views her as an equal, and wants to earn her trust, not demand it. It’s perfect(cordirez breakdown time). Micki is also slowly letting her fences down around him and it’s a huge and very delightful to see step. I love and adore their friendship and chemistry so much. 

MICKI SPEAKING IN SPANISH IS AN OFFICIAL TURN ON FOR ME BYE.

ALL OF THEM SOLVING THE CASE TOGETHER!!! NOT JUST CORDIREZ BUT TREY TOO! WALKER AND TREY MEETING TOGETHER WHEN.

Trey is such an amazing boyfriend truly! THE TOWEL ON HIS SHOULDERS DJSFDJFD AND AH THE COMIC MICKI DREW??/ ADORABLE. Also love how encouraging and supportive Trey is. The men in this show are the best.

LIAM AND WALKER SCENE. I love their dynamic too and i wanna see moreee. Also more micki and liam scenes yes please.

‘‘thanks brother very supportive’‘ i sobbed when he called him brother. i just. *screams*

Ok so Abby and Bonham really had a bad falling out huh. Abby was in an affair with someone who still misses her??? Damn, can’t wait to see how this one progresses. ALSO WALKER FINDING THAT LETTER FROM GARY TO ABBY IN THE BASEMENT I FREAKEDDD,

THE ADDRESS. ON THE LETTER. IS THE SAME. AS THE LOCATION. OF JENSEN’S BREWERY. THE SAME BREWERY. WHO’S FIRST KEG OF BEER. WAS GIVEN TO JARED. BY JENSEN. ON HIS BIRTHDAY. HELP. HELP. HELP. NOT ME HAVING A J2 BREAKDOWN IN THE MIDST OF A WALKER EP AT 5 AM IN THE MORNING.

Aight so August and Ruby is a biG NO OK. Like idk idk idk just idk.

WALKER HAD AN AFFAIR(after emily so ok but still) WITH SOMEONE ELSE WHILE UNDERCOVER??? WAS IT JUST UNDERCOVER OR REAL??? I NEED ANSWERS STAT.

THE PHONE THAT WALKER HAD. ONE OF THE CONTACTS WAS WINCHESTER AUTO. W I N C H E S T E R  A U T O. Jensen coming to the show owning this shop and Walker going to him to get his car fixed when Jared Padalecki.

MICKI AND CORDELL(AND TREY!) SOLVING THE CASE TOGETHER!!!

‘‘micki gives a play by play of the security footage’‘ ‘‘we’re watching the same thing micki’‘ *bitchface* PLS I LOVE THEM.

Holy shit Mrs. Harlan having an affair with Monty??? ENZO BEING BOB’S SON??? HOT DAMN THE CASE CONTINUES. Again. LOVE THE WORK/FAMILY BALANCE.

OK OK SO THE SCENE IN WHICH MICKI AND WALKER CONFRONT SHAW AND THE LOOKS THEY GIVE EACH OTHER BEFORE MICKI GETS IN THE CAR WITH SHAW WHEN THE MUSIC STARTS PLAYING!!! YES. YES. MY SOULFOOD.

I loved the way they worked it out. Phonecall, recording everything, THEM PARTNERING AND WORKING IT OUT SO BEAUTIFULLY I NEED SO MANY MORE CORDIREZ CENTRIC EPS YALL DONT EVEN KNOW.

‘‘walker! bulldog it!!’‘ HSHJDSHDSJ YES.

PLS I SCREAMED WHEN SHAW PULLED THE GUN ON MICKI.

BUT SHE IS SUCH A FUCKING QUEEN BADASS I LOVE HER.

Success!!!! The Micki and Walker and Larry scene at the end was so cute! I like how they’re actually invested in their jobs and want to do good it’s so heartwarming.

WALKER CALLING TREY TO FIND OUT MICKI’S FAV THINGS!!! I LOVE HIM SO MUCH! Also I genuinely love that Trey wasn’t weirded out by it or jealous or anything.  Can’t wait to see them interact I NEED IT!.

‘‘thanks for believing in me’‘ ‘‘i didnt. i trusted you.’’ HELP STOP MY FEELS.

‘‘thanks beau’‘ don’t mention it flor’‘ I DIED I DIED I DIED. MICKI AND WALKER I LOVE YOU. JKSJD MICKI WARMING UP TO THE MIDDLE NAME. THEIR FRIENDSHIP IS THE BEST.

That last scene with Walker and his mom was so touching. Walker’s relationship with his parents is so sweet. His mom hugging him and comforting him when Walker said he missed emily so much *cries* I just wanna hold him please. 

August being worried for his father’s happiness I JUST. YOU SWEET BOY. I really think messaging Twyla was a baaaaddd move though.

WALKER AND AUGUST SELFIE. The way Walker so easily just picked his son and brought him to him, made him family photographer and that scene. THE BEST. 

I genuinely don’t think anything happened between Twyla and Walker. But we’ll have to see.

oKAY SO. Captain James??? It’s just an on and off thing. Do I trust him? Do i don’t? Why did he take those surveillance vids out??? I trust Liam with it and i’m glad he’s looking into it and all. Hopefully it doesn’t backfire badly. I have a very bad feeling that James had something to do with Emily’s death.

THAT STELLA AND BELLE INTERACTION. SO CUTE. Stella giving that jar of jame to try and make up and Belle being all cute and funny I love them. For a sec i was so scared Belle might yell at her but I’m very happy to see that they’re going strong despite all the circumstances- Belle’s parent’s deportation.

ALSO TREVOR IS SO HOT??? I like him and Stella they’re cute. Stella so obviously has a huge crush on him and they ride horses so well together. HHAHAHAH THAT DANCE STELLA DID WHEN HE FOLLOWED HER ON INSTA. SO RELATABLE.

The last Tricki scene mY HEART. ‘’you wanted a hero so you drew one. then you became one’’ Micki is going to be such an inspiration I love her. And the way they interacted, Trey getting a job!!! And Micki’s excitement, THEIR HUG!!! ‘’hugging is one of my superpowers’’ TREY BARNETT I LOVE YOU.

THAT LAST SCENE WHY LEAVE IT LIKE THIS. WHAT IS HAPPENING WHY DOES WALKER OR DUKE APPARENTLY HAVE TO GO BACK.

Anyways! As you can see the entire episode was so enjoyable and I loved it. The best part of this was definitely the Cordirez friendship development and i cannot wait to see where it goes from here!

Speculation/Thoughts for Episode 5:- So it’s for sure that Walker is going back undercover as Duke who’s a baseball...person? Idk he was wearing a baseball hat so :) Walker’s past is now very much mixed in with his present and I AM SCARED. What he’s doing is yet to be revealed but Tywla is coming back and that will just. mess. things. up. The scene in which Walker is yelling at August GOD SO NOT READY FOR THAT. It feels like him and his kids might go back to how they were before. I really don’t want that to happen. Also why am I expecting a major cliffhanger. 

HEY BUT THERE’S SHIRTLESS WALKER AND! MICKI RIDING THAT MECHANICAL HORSE IN A BAR OR SMTH AND MORE INSIGHT INTO WHAT TREY IS DOING SO IM VERY EXCITED ABOUT THAT.

And it’s going on hiatus. Idk how to deal with that. :(

#walker #walker episode 1x04 review #walker spoilers #thoughts #jared padalecki #cordell walker #micki ramirez #captain larry james #trey barnett #liam walker #august walker #stella walker #abeline walker #bonham walker #cordirez #avery's walker thoughts

[wickedlehane]

WHAT’S UP FUCKERS, I FINISHED ALL OF BUFFY FINALLY AND IM FEELING ALL THE THINGS

some housekeeping first: over the thanksgiving weekend I’m gonna overhaul my rules page and about faith page to account for any new information I’ve received in these episodes. I’ll post when those are updated! woo! no more hoping not to get accidentally spoiled!

secondly, i have now created the tag for my final canon verse- v: hot chicks with superpowers, which covers everything from the end of Angel: Orpheus to the end of Buffy: Chosen. The final piece of my canon character development puzzle (apart from the Dark Horse comics which tbh I’ll probably incorporate into another type of verse) is now in place!!! AND I WANT ALL THE SEASON 7 THREADS

ok all my thoughts are under the cut

There is no real wisdom down here i’m a fucking incoherent mess, i watched empty places-chosen tonight

ALL THE FAITH STUFF

fuuuuuuuck the scythe is so cool

robin and faITH ROBIN AND FAITH

if marvel did the Defenders in the early aughts, Eliza Dushku and DB Woodside are my ideal Jessica Jones and Luke Cage sorry lmao i’m predictable

THANK FUCK FOR THE MAYOR SHOWING UP

ANYA DESERVED BETTER

god i seriously feel awful i didnt even realize that was apparently anya’s dead body they just kinda breezed over it

there’s definitely a scene in Empty Places where Faith looks like she has a lower back tattoo (in the kitchen with kennedy, while she sits on the counter) but I NEVER saw it again (and it’s not one of eliza’s tattoos) so either i’m having a fucking stroke or her pants never got low enough again but I’m gonna incorporate a lower back tattoo into my faith portrayal lmao it’s so trashy and great

i love giles so fucking much and god yes the dad energy

faith and buffy are bisexual moms taking care of all their little slayer daughters i won’t hear otherwise

im sorry i love watching faith get the shit beat out of her and also ALWAYS BEING IN A COMA

i truly did not enjoy kennedy im sorry i really tried but good for her with the pierced tongue

rip in fucking pieces, spike

NATHAN FILLION WAS SO GOOD HE WAS SO SCARY AND EFFECTIVE IN SUCH A SHORT TIME

that was my favorite appearance of angel in ALL of this series, like god he had a personality

au where the guardians guide the slayer instead of the watchers PLEASE

JUST GIVE ME ALL THE SEASON 7 SCENES AS THREADS NOW

xander’s eyepatch was dope

everyone was so horny in that one episode and i support them

except for buffy who was horny for emotional support which i identify with

WE’RE ALL SLAYERS NOW

faith trying to make a prison trade with her chips was amazing and also THE HOT POCKET DEBACLE

andrew was fabulous honestly

attagirl, willow

faith said so much ridiculous shit like “beaucoup d’mojo” and “rock’em sock’em” and “yo”- WHERE DID THE YOS COME FROM

ultimately im glad buffy didnt end up with spike or angel, i felt it best for her to end as a complete person by herself (that being said, if i can’t have fuffy, those last few eps made me root for bangel)

kicking buffy out of the house was so hard to watch ugh

hey back to dirty girls for a sec, yknow how spike was like “ah this is faith, she has doe eyes” BUFFY DEFINITELY TOLD SPIKE FAITH HAD DOE EYES THEY BIG GAY

seeing felicia day kept taking me out of the moment lmao

DID NO ONE EVER FILL FAITH IN ON DAWN’S WHOLE DEAL, I WANT TO KNOW WHAT ALL THEIR FABRICATED S3 MEMORIES ARE LIKE

ok im done for now but holy shit i loved that im dying and now it’s on to angel where i will ignite my darling fred muse

#ooc; copacabana?

[scarasenvy]

I wanna ask again if that ok haha 2, 18, 28 :))

GIRL yes thank u!! :’D i’m so sorry i’m late to answer this pls forgive me i have been quite busy 😔🤲🏼 AAAA BUT

2. (first anime crush): i think my first anime crush was kaneki ken from tokyo ghoul??? IDK I JUST REALLY THOUGHT HE WAS HOT BACK IN THE DAY AND WAS SO JEALOUS of him and toukas relationship even tho i shipped the hell out of them too lmfao

18. (10 worst anime you’ve ever watched): o god ok i don’t wanna shit on any of these anime because some i actually really did enjoy these are just my least rated on MAL (which btw if anyone wants to follow me on there my user is nadada 😌) so no hate but anyways here we go LOL these aren’t in order btw!

hametsu no mars (this is an obvious cult fav to hate on so i watched it just because it’s one of the worst rated anime on MAL and i just wanted to see why dhsh)

DEVILMAN CRYBABY IDCIDC the animation style is cool and the ending really fucked me up (which i liked, the plot twists were insane) however it was so sex and drug fuled which made me feel kinda nauseated n what not so i really did not like it as much as i wanted to if im being honest

jibaku shounen hanako-kun (i would DIE for the art style it’s so cute and the music and characters were cool but for some reason i just couldn’t get super invested in the story?? i felt myself wanting to finish this anime quickly for some reason)

BNHA season 4 (i’m so sorry i just didn’t like it it just felt kind of bleh to me except for the fight with kai as well as the ending which was epic, but comparison to season 3 WHICH BTW WAS HYPE AF i just didn’t feel super invested while watching it)

no game no life (just like JBSHK the animation was sick, but idk definitely not my fav anime. however the movie was good)

japan sinks 2020 (was really good the first like 5 eps and i liked how spontaneous and unexpected it was which made me super excited to see what would happen next, but then it just got confusing and weird and too expected also the animation was sloppy at times)

TOKYO GHOUL:RE need i say more

perfect blue (only putting this here because it messed me up for days afterwards)

akira (a classic and animation was clean however i just HATED the plot and it was so confusing and bad lmao sorry maybe i’m just not an intellectual)

THE HXH MOVIES LMAO (we all know i’m the biggest mf hxh stan HOWEVER these movies did not compare to the 2011 and 99 shows at ALL they were really disappointing in comparison sadly but still animation was good)

28. (most upsetting moment in anime and why): *BANANA FISH, HUNTER X HUNTER, AND SNK SPOILER ALERTS BEWARE* i have a few but the first one definitely has to be when ash died when he was supposed to go to japan with eiji or say goodbye to him 🥺 i was like ARE YOU SERIOUS i genuinely didn’t think that was the ending. i was really upset for like days. the second one would have to be in snk when levi had to choose between saving armin or erwin, as well as when everyone was giving their all to fight the beast titan but so many died regardless. the third one is in hxh when gon basically died and was on life support and killua was losing his mind as well as komugi and meruems death which hurt alot but yeah lol 😔✌🏼

#ROSE IM SO SORRY for this being late i love u thanks for sending more this was fun i love doing these :’)) #hxh #anime #also im sorry for writing so much LMAO #we all know i cant help it #hunterxhunter #anime asks #ask game #anime ask game #get to know me #get to know nadi #hxhkin #hunter x hunter #ouran #tokyo ghoul #bnha

[lemoncakepanda]

Top 50 NaLu Anime Moments {Pt 2}.

Read pt 1 here.

Without any further delay, let’s get back to my top 50 anime nalu moments, and today we cover moments 40 up till 31! This part of the list is probably the most fluffy one, as it’s about to get kinda angsty from the next part on, but hey, let us enjoy our small moment of happiness.

40. Lucy's naked bell roll with Natsu. (Ep 194).

And we starting off kinda kinky, but hey, it’s a form of love, lol. Anyways, I truly love this moment because it was one of the first where you could start seeing that Natsu was actually attracted to Lucy. The anime didn’t include it (idk why) but in the manga he gets all blushy after having his face and hands rubbed in every single inch of naked Lucy, and I loved seeing how he reacted to it. And the first official boob grope (!!!) that results in Natsu getting slapped, which he deserved, lol. While not the only one, this is probably the most fanservice NaLu moment you’re gonna get on this list, so don’t worry, I didn’t include all the boob/@ss gropping scenes, I just really love this one especially.

39. “If any of you bastards hurt Lucy, I will turn all of you to dust.” (Ep 83).

Okay, but listen! As... as an honorary Natsu fan, I love when he gets all serious and goes all out on his enemies, and this scene, esp for someone who was slowly losing hope on this ship, really fired me up! It’s moments like this one where you can see how Natsu really cares for Lucy, at the point of injuring himself in the process. And the line, I love that line so much! I often use it in gifsets I make because I adore how protective he is of Lucy, even now that she’s able to fully defend herself, he still... wow. At last, I like this scene because it showcases how close they are and how much Lucy means to Natsu; ofc he’d be upset if any of his other friends got hurt, but y’all know he’s especially protective of Lucy and has been for a while, even back when the ship was only platonic, and there is a reason for it.

38. “Someone give us hope.” (Ep 119).

As I’ve commented on this moment before, I don’t have anything much different to add this time, only that it gets to my heart how much trust these two have in each other, and how much they inspire each other. I chose this moment because it’s one of the most obvious to how Natsu and Lucy’s relationship works: they give each other strength. When one is feeling down or hopeless, the other will step up and stand by their side. It’s a beautiful cycle between them. Zeref commented once that Lucy was a cheerful person, who had a huge impact on Natsu’s growth, and he ain’t wrong about that. This moment is proof of it.

37. “Let’s reform our team.” (Ep 109).

Or in Kain’s words, Natsu and Lucy getting all “flirty and hot”. God, I love Tenrou Island arc. Not only it’s what turned me into a hardcore nalu shipper, but it’s also great storytelling, and very compelling fights. The choice to combine Natsu and Happy with Lucy vs Kain and Ultear was a great one, considering they’d been kinda distant from each other since Edolas and had not really interacted much, and even during arcs like Oracion Seis and Edolas, which had been successors of the Fantasia and Tower of Heaven arcs, which barely had any Nalu in it, it felt like a breath of fresh air to see them together again and staying together, like the team they’d been since the beginning. It also showed how in sync they are with each other and how well they work together. Truly one of the things that made Tenrou Island such a great arc.

36. “Lucy, come home already.” (OVA 4).

Words cannot describe how much I cherish this omake, or in this case, the ova, where Lucy follows Natsu to find out where he and Happy live. For those of you who have not watched it, it’s set in a flashback where Lucy tells the girls about the day she followed her two lousy friends to get revenge on them for always breaking in her house; she successfully finds their house, and there she finds out Natsu keeps memories of all the jobs he’d gone to, two of which include the first job he and Lucy ever went in together and her old maid outfit, which brings a sweet smile to her face. Despite finding their house, Lucy’s plan to surprise them fails because they never show up, so she goes back to her apartment. And, surprise surprise, that’s where Natsu and Happy had been all this time. And we’re left with the heartwarming conclusion that, although they annoy the fck outta her, eat all her food, mess up her stuff, and hog her bed all to themselves, Lucy loves having them around. They turn her house into a home, they give her someone to come home to, they give her all the company she never had when she was a child. ‘Twas a very nice conclusion to the story, and served as a nice confirmation to something we’d always suspected.

35. Watch Out for the Guy You Like! (Ep 50).

This, in my opinion, is one of the most hilarious FT episodes; even though it results with Lucy finding out all her delusions of Natsu were, well, just delusions, and Natsu just wanted her help to dig a hole, I have so much fun watching those delusions, watching Lucy stop for a moment to actually consider being with Natsu; I think it’s what opened the door to her crush, even if she completely closed her eyes and tried to ignore it. Also, shoujo-like Natsu was a blessing given to us by Mashima which I’m forever grateful for, lmao. But really, I think this omake/episode is actually very important to Natsu and Lucy’s relationship; it showed that all her delusions depicted Lucy’s idea of how a romance should be, and then (spoiler) in the end, she kind of gets that romance, but not in the way she imagined, and it turned out to be exactly the way it needed to be. So, for that, I really like this and find it essential to the ship.

34. Their reunion. (Ep 276).

This moment, originally, was not part of my top 25 Nalu manga moments, and that’s because, while I do love it in the manga, I love it so much more in the anime. It felt more dramatic, with the camera shifting from Natsu and Lucy finally locking eyes after one year apart, and they’re both so goddamn shook! I like that they added this detail in the anime, because you could really feel like it was two people who used to always be together, and then spent 365 days without seeing each other, being only there ever in thought. I also like how they’re both blushing, that little showcase of how happy they are to see the other again, and the small tingle of bittersweetness because we know it’s not 100% okay between them. You know drama’s gonna follow because actions have consequences. But for that one moment, you’re just as happy as Natsu and Lucy to see them reunited once more, the way it’s supposed to be.

33. Lucy makes her choice. (Ep 49).

While I feel that this one goes without saying, the reason I chose it can be explained in two sentences: 1) Lucy has met a guy who’s like the male version of her, is kind, a gentleman, and has a nice vibe with her, but she puts all of that potential aside for the one thing she is sure of, and that’s her partnership with Natsu. 2) Have you seen Natsu’s face when she shows up in that train, ready to leave with them? He’s so shook, he blinks like three times, as if trying to make sure she is really there, that she’s real. And then he just opens the biggest smile, because she chose to be there with them; it’s the first time they’re not dragging her to a job, she simply chose to come along, and you can almost hear the sound of Natsu’s heart going all fluttery when he realizes she cast her ‘date’ aside to go with them. Another moment that, I feel, helped deepen and shape the relationship these two have today.

32. “Make me purr!” Drunk Lucy round 2. (OVA 9).

Again, nothing really different to add on this moment, only that I like how the ova extended and showed Lucy jumping on Natsu in the most s&xual way ever, and how Natsu has all the strength in the world to remove her from him, but “supposedly” is unable to do that when she’s all over him touching him in a very intimate way. Aham. I see right through you, dragon boy. Also, isn’t it interesting that Drunk!Lucy directs all her attention to Natsu if he’s around? Nvm that there’s other guys around, all she cares about is him. I love that. It says a lot about Lucy’s hidden feelings.

31. Reaching out for each other before being separated. (Ep 247).

Tartaros is my favorite FT arc, despite not having that much Nalu in it, it’s probably the arc with most emotional weight, because of everything the characters went through and makes you really feel for them. And although I love the ships, I love the story 1st and Tartaros was indeed amazing story-telling. With that said, I also enjoyed very much the little/subtle/few Nalu moments the arc provided, and one of them is the scene where Natsu and Lucy are being pulled in by the Alegria, and they reach for each other. It’s commonly said that when things get tough, you focus on what’s important to you, and it was very sweet/heartbreaking to watch Lucy and Natsu struggling to get to each other, as they were both unaware of what was going to happen, they were just trying to stay together. You can easily say it’s only because they were alone together, but hello, Mashima did not need to make it like this. It was his choice to make Natsu and Lucy reach out for each other in a way that’s mostly seen between couples, esp in shõnen, and the anime made it even more beautiful.

Part 3 will come up tomorrow!

#nalu #natsu x lucy #fairy tail #top50nalu #sorry guys if I wrote something wrong i'm just really sleep rn lol

[unproduciblesmackdown]

anyways my Musings on rian and winston’s dynamique in 5x06.......

first and foremost it’s truly wild that there wasn’t at least one more scene ft. either of them in this episode. that felt like Setup that like, i’m sure will be more Followed Through On in the next episode, but also really easily could’ve (and i think should’ve lol) been also followed up on in this episode......it really just doesn’t feel like yea we can just leave things at that for this week!! but we did

anyways like yeah @arabellaturner3 was saying how maybe winston wants to Impress rian here but natch it’s combining with some jealousy maybe, b/c even if [the glances] happened, rian was still meant by one person to Replace him and it’s probably not easy to drop any sense of like, comparing yourselves and feeling like you’re positioned like anything she can do is a Challenge or implicitly understood by others to be her being Better than you or whatever......a little weird to just be back in this quasirivalry territory after last week seemed to have that over with by the end of Day 1 lol, but still makes sense / understandable i Suppose........and really i think they could just enjoy talking math shit together truly if not for this lingering contention lmao.......

like i said winston silently looking over at rian for a moment before talking to her while looking at his computer is Funny and we love an implication of “i might be paying attention to you at a particular moment in which i’m also trying to act like i’m not really paying attention to you”......while rian’s just completely rolling with this lol no moment of giving him a Look like “what are you doing weirdo” or w/e

and this hardly seemed too heated or saturated w/ any genuine antipathy, just a bit of pettiness here, and while they’re indulging said pettiness they’re both exercising Some restraint about it all. like, seems like rian finds him fun to interact with still, and like this is akin to her calling him a douche last episode lmao where it was a little lingering + her looking at him, like that was also just her wanting to get a reaction out of him there. and she’s also sure like, deliberately prodding him a bit in this exchange lmao but also not exactly like either of them are out for blood here and willing to just escalate this w/o limit, more like they both want each other’s attention and want to interact and this isn’t really about winston thinking that what rian does is like, redundant / irrelevant / insignificant or whatever, or rian thinking that winston is in turn useless or incapable or whatever, like yeah they might wanna prove their mathematical / Ideas capability to each other b/c they Were just basically pitted as competitors five minutes ago (in 5x05 lol) but also it’s just like. seems like they’re both just needling each other a bit and the “argument” here is somewhat beside the point

b/c i mean, i’m sure Average Billions Viewers will continue to take [saying anything negative about winston] at face value as Factual / accurate, and while i guess winston brought up what he did for taylor last episode b/c that’s the only thing rian was present for, that’s probably the only thing billions viewers will remember either l o l. but even if he did only bring it Once, say, when he singlehandedly did the work of 50 phds apparently and crafted a market-crushing algorithm for taylor which allowed mase cap to exist in the first place and thus for mase carb to exist (not to mention how the nlp stuff he did paid off And also led fairly directly to mase carb, so) and like, that was Also when he thought he was working for taylor under axe cap and was alone in a semifurnished basement nigh the whole time, so that ability And willingness to do that kind of huge project to that caliber is like, yeah if that was still the only Especial Thing he’d done ever, it’d still be worth keeping him on truly lol. and like, something like that sure is Valuable and yet not Simple (i mean idk maybe his coding is really Elegant, who can say lmao)........but also i doubt rian was just truly like arguing about pasteurization and stuff b/c like, this isn’t either of them bringing their best epic debate skills here, they just kinda Want to elbow each other here and will maybe ramp up their own arguments a bit to do so...........but yeah the point is more about them like, not really wanting to leave each other alone vs what they might be saying in the course of doing so, though natch what they’re saying does seem to establish like this feeling of competition / rivalry, but even that is hardly that Unrestrained, rian’s still got this vibe of more messing with him than feeling any real animosity, while winston’s maybe not just filled with happiness here but also would probably be fine with it all if wendy hadn’t just been considering winston disposable and rian his replacement (and ostensibly taylor as well, which like, even w/ the Glance can’t be fun to have that be the idea that’s Out There rn)........and he’s hardly acting like he’s just outright seething either, just Also wanting to interact but also not exactly being thrilled with the fact that she’s supposedly the superior option here, and where yeah like maybe a mixture of “hey i’m also good at math :)” and “hey i’m also good at math >:(” lmao like, this is all a bit messy

i still sure wouldn’t call this Intense, Horrible, or Passionate lmao, aaand i guess 5x07 is the only thing which could change that, since 5x08 wasn’t even written, much less filmed........like, i’m guessing that the Simmering Tension set up here will be built on in the next episode, and idk, maybe they’ll be arguing harder, maybe they’ll be striving to show each other up, who knows, and yeah i’m still pretending my expectations are just “ep 7 will not leave us off on any kind of satisfactory point with these two and let’s say winston will only ever be engaged in one-sided pining” but i think we could get to kissing in just two scenes. or fuck it, even One scene, but two is more likely, and it’s reasonable to think they could have two scenes. and same as last week i guess there’s the worry that anything that happens could Really be a disaster which makes us regret these two having a dynamic of any kind at all lmao, but i think it could be a bit of A Hot Mess of this tension / rivalry bubbling over and still like, not be 100% unfortunate lol........this is billions, this situation is so far absolutely Not at all that bad

anyways yeah lol seems like they’re both just gently nudging each other for Attention even if it’s not heartwarming at this juncture.....it’s also sure not all that deeply bitter or caustic and it feels a lot closer to Messing With Each Other territory than it does like, fighting b/c they hate each other or anything.......dialed-back bickering that dies off after 12 seconds is not the most foreboding thing, and neither is the idea that these two get off to a messy start (and could continue to), but fingers crossed still..........that Developments of greater significance happen next episode and that they aren’t a nightmare. the low bar we have to have with this series i s2g. billions Please

#winston billions #riawin #i don't wanna rialose.......

[its-chelisey-stuff]

Guardian eps 31-40... I knew what was coming and still shed tears lol

So... Yeah, that happened. At the start of these last ten eps, ShenWei was being kept as a hostage (chained up to a pillar and everything, so kinky) by his brother and Yunlan had to deal with a bunch of craziness and somehow ended up being a person of interest/a fugitive and there was even some sort of car chase in there. Yunlan ended up rescuing his boyfriend and at least him and ShenWei had some happy shippy moments before doom fell upon them.

I'll be honest and say I could, more or less, follow the plot of the drama for at least the first half, but on this last quarter everything was bananas borderline ridiculous for me. I was kinda disappointed that Yunlan wasn't really Kunlun's reincarnation while in the novel he is and the way they explained the “I waited 10000 years for you” hmmmmmm but I guess that fell under censorship territory? Which makes me confused, because they did allow the time travel thing and I thought that was banned as well? I shouldn't think too hard about this lol not because of the nonsense of the story but because censors are so often inconsistent and an enigma, basically. Their spectrum is wide and mysterious, like a black box.

The acting

And to be honest I finished this for BaiYu and ZhuYilong because well, God knows I wanted to give up a few times but whenever those two were on screen, together, I'd go like "oh damn, they're both hot af and so freaking talented and I really cannot look away from this mess. I owe it to them" and so, that was exactly what I did. It wasn't that big of a sacrifice to be honest (the masters of sacrifices were our two leading men 💔😭) but damn, what do you call it when you know something bad is gonna happen that's gonna make you suffer and still go through with it, enjoying every moment? Because that's what I had from the start hahahaha

Anyway, the most important bit for me was the romance. I can't even be funny or play coy anymore and pretend to call it a bromance, after how blatantly obvious it was demonstrated that it wasn't that, AT ALL, to the last freaking second of the drama! Yeah! That last scene?? Ummhm excuse me your honor of censorship, these men are in love and so gay for each other! You could see it in their eyes, you could feel it in the tension between them and it could be read between the lines (without much effort) in their last words to one another! And it squeezed my heart with their angstiness and heartbreak. The actors even said that they did read the novel and I mean, no wonder because those longing looks and all that flirtiness couldn’t have come from them just from reading the script because it wasn’t that good

That ending

I have no idea why the drama had such a bittersweet ending (I chose to call it that because they made a promise to meet again) when the novel definitely didn’t have that feel, at all. The ending of the novel gave a feel of hope, a new beginning, good prevailing over bad, love conquers all etc and Yunlan regained all his memories and powers as Kunlun!! How epic is that?. And the extras? It’s basically just confirming all that along with HEA for OTP. It was *chef’s kiss*

(And like some sort of twsited cosmic joke lol I finished Guardian on the same day Cherry magic ended and wow it's not easy to see one OTP get their sweet happily ever after, while your other OTP it's given death and tears, a truly memorable Christmas Eve for me lmao)

I don’t recommend it... except I do lol

When it comes to recommending this drama, I think I wouldn't do it BUT I'd definitely recommend watching BaiYu and ZhuYilong acting alongside each other lol I know it sounds like the same thing, but it isn't. You could ff all of the things that don't have the two and it would be a joyful watch without missing anything important from the lol “story”. Now, I don't think it's always a good idea to watch a drama merely for the main couple and their chemistry but if somehow that can carry you through the whole thing, I guess it's a worthy ride. In my case, it was. And this drama has been my second time doing that haha

So, not a waste of my time and I mean I'm a fan of both actors now and I'm ready to check out some more projects of them (especially BaiYu's, because holy cow, I don't know what is it about him but my hormones go crazy when I see him on my screen 🙈😍)

Anyway, thanks Guardian, for breaking my heart, thanks for that CRAZY chemistry, the fun dynamic between the leads and those longing looks... Well, basically, thanks for putting Zhu Yilong and BaiYu in the same drama🤣. It was a delight. Also, I really really liked the novel.

#guardian #zhen hun #cdrama #zhu yilong #bai yu #zhao yunlan #shen wei #weilan #sigh if only they had been allowed to do the story right #with all the fantasy and mythology elements #even without the BL theme #it could have been a masterpiece #also if only they had a bigger budget lol #bai yu and zyl saved the drama

[sunsetsover]

Talk about yesterdays episode.. tell me everything you enjoyed in detail lol.

first of all lemme just say i’m SO SORRY this took me so long to get to i know i said i’d answer this like last sunday but sometimes shit happens!!! but you asked for me to go into detail so i very much went into detail so!!! buckle in!!!

i’m doing this in bulletpoints for clarity otherwise it will just be an incoherent mess lmao

(also for reference this is abt the 8th nov ep aka the ‘you’re my boyfriend’ ep!)

ok so let me preface by saying i fuckin adored this ep it’s like god tier for me rn i love ben and pam’s relationship so mf much i hope she comes back soon

like the fact that she just knew!! she knew smth was going on w callum and ben more or less straight away and ok granted those two were not exactly being subtle what with the domestic they were having in the middle of the albert but u know... for all she knew callum was straight and had just broken up w whitney so the fact that she knows ben well enough to just be able to Know smth was goin on despite all of that?? i love that it says so much abt their relationship!!

and then her being the nan that she is and taking it upon herself to fish for information with jay like ‘callum seems nice.... shame abt whitney 👀’ and then jay covering for their asses by not saying anything but pam is Not Stupid and jay was also tellingly vague so she was instantly like i see 👀👀

and then ben entering the parlour shouting about ‘bring out your dead’ or w/e it is he says like the little shit he is and pam rolling her eyes and just the easy affection of that whole interaction like her gently slapping his face and calling him a little devil like ur damn right he is!! almost literally!! but there’s sm overt affection and love there and it’s so nice to see bc ben doesn’t really get that from anyone else (he does from callum now, and jay in certain situations, but it’s just different u know?? like u dont even see that energy from his own mum v often so it’s just... nice to see idk)

like i just love her she has such nan energy and it’s so comforting and warm and she needs to be around forever not just for ben but for jay and lola and also callum like ? pls come back forever pam

ben innocently trying to help callum out by getting him promoted to manager when he hears jay is gonna take a step back like!! he was really just tryna help bc he knew callum was struggling w money... and alright, he probably shouldn’t have meddled and i get why callum wasn’t happy abt it (i’ll get to that) but i also truly believe that that wasn’t him tryna control the situation or interfere or whatever but him genuinely trying to help out his bf and jay was gonna take a step back anyway so it wasn’t even like he was the one to suggest it or anything idk i just thought as misguided as it might have been it was very sweet and thoughtful

also the fact that ben’s reaction to jay being like ‘i suppose callum could be ready to be a manager’ was basically ‘yeah man have you seen him in that suit!!! he makes my dick hard!!!’ like !!!!!!! he was so sincere and enthusiastic as well like he’s fucking diabolical i love him sm ..... pair that with jay’s reaction basically just being like ‘........................ anyways’ sdkfjsdkfsl iconic scene

and then later!!!! you’ve got ben practically chasing callum into the parlour when he sees him go in there!! he’s so excited to see callum and tell him the good news abt the promotion!! bc he’s done good!!! he’s helping!!! bc he knows damn well he’s in the doghouse bc of what had happened with pam and like the energy he radiated when he walked into that parlour was very much ‘i am coming to u w my tail between my legs bc i know i fucked up but instead of saying sorry i’m going to give u the sad eyes and hope u relent’ and like u can see he was practically buzzing out of his skin as he waited for jay to tell him abt the promotion and he’s looking at callum like ‘look! look at what i did!! i’m fixing it! i’m making up for my mistake!’ bc this is obviously how he thinks he can fix things instead of idk having a conversation and talking abt things but!!! i love it ben’s so cute

but ofc it backfires bc callum doesn’t want ben to fix things!! he doesn’t need ben fixing things!! he can look after himself! and we the audience know it wasn’t like ben went to jay and was like ‘you need to promote callum bc he’s struggling with money’, it was more of a two birds one stone situation. but ofc callum doesn’t know that, and it comes across very much as ben meddling and also - as callum says - very hot and cold. like ben can’t tell pam abt their relationship and will ignore him for hours but will (seemingly) wade in like some kind of knight in shining armour bc callum said he’s having money troubles? nah. i said it at the time but i completely agree w callum’s reaction, i would have reacted the same way if i were him. and maybe on any other day callum wouldn’t have reacted so strongly, but after what had happened that morning w pam it’s completely understandable why he goes off on one.

and like poor ben is so confused like he obviously really thought this would be good news and put him back in callum’s good graces but ofc it doesn’t bc what callum needed was an explanation and apology. and you can see how confused and crestfallen he is bc he doesn’t want to fight w callum and he really didn’t want to make things worse but he evidently has and not only that but jay is there witnessing his massive fuck up in action. and u can just tell from the body language that he straight up doesn’t know what to do or say so he’s just kinda floundering bc he really thought he could fix what had happened with pam bc what? he half talked jay into giving callum a promotion? bless him lmao

then he goes full grovel mode - even if he is still very ben about it - and is leaving him voicemails (meaning he’s tried to call him multiple times, he probably tried texting too lmao) and moping abt in the cafe looking all sad and stressed and it’s just so good bc he knows he fucked up and he’s trying not to let it fester which is a v good and v adult thing to do. plus the juxtaposition of ben being like ‘u know ur gonna forgive me so stop being a diva and call me back’ and then that soft little ‘please 🥺’ tacked on the end??? delicious

and then pam walking up to him and standing there and just sighing. like not a word, she just stands there and sighs like dkjfkjsdkfjlsdkf mood !!

no but ok that whole scene of ben and pam in the cafe really had me welling up like just. everything about it. the layers to it all. and i won’t sit here and dissect every little thing even tho i probably could bc we’d be here all day but like just. all of it.

like pam’s exasperation at ben not telling her about him and callum (bc obviously she’s found out from someone - probably honey, who wouldn’t think to lie abt it if pam asked outright), ben not even being marginally surprised that she knows bc even he must know how obvious he’s been, and she was bound to find out from someone. the fact that he jumped when she raised her voice and pointed at him - i could make a whole separate post about that honestly that just. says so much about ben. but yh.... the fact that she knew without him even having to open his mouth that ben was gonna say it was to spare her feelings (like that’s essentially what he says to callum later in the ep). the fact that he didn’t really have a good excuse to offer her and he knew that. his sad little face and the fact that he made himself smaller and ducked his head like just his body language in general (max bowden is SO good at playing on that shit, he has a way of making ben seem physically smaller in certain situations and i love it sm). ben being like ‘idk i thought it’d be easier’ and pam immediately being like ‘yeah for u not callum!!!’ like the ‘u silly boy!!’ was so heavily implied throughout this whole scene u can practically taste it.

and pam! pam manages to effectively have a go at ben and call him out on his shit without belittling him or being cruel or nasty (and no naming names but like. certain mothers could learn a thing or two 👀) and actually have ben listen to her. because she listens to him and hears him and respects and loves him and he respects and loves her so she can have a go at him and his back won’t go up and he won’t lash out because he knows she’s not going to try and hurt him or be unnecessarily harsh. and that’s why their relationship is so special. also i’m still v bitter abt the way kathy handled calling out ben’s shit as opposed to how pam handled it but 🤷🏻‍♀️

like it’s such a little thing but it’s the way she waited for ben to speak. ben said ‘i didn’t-’ and then cut himself off, obviously either struggling to find the right words or struggling to say them out loud, and she just waited for him. waited for him to find the words, to figure out how to say it. she didn’t rush him or try and put words in his mouth or anything, she just sat there quietly, patiently waiting for ben to explain himself in his own time. that is the difference between her and everyone else, and that’s why ben listens to her. because she listens to him - and i mean really, actually listens rather than just hearing the sound of his voice ygm

and then they get too the root of it all: paul. he says he didn’t want pam thinking he’d forgotten paul - which is only half true, imo. i think he was (and maybe still is) just as scared that he’s going to forget paul. i think he has a lot of unaddressed issues when it comes to paul and what happened in general. and i think he definitely needed permission specifically from les and/or pam that it was ok for him to move on now - bc other ppl have tried to tell him that but u can tell from how he’s reacted in the past that he doesn’t like ppl who didn’t really know paul talking abt what he would or wouldn’t want. but pam did know paul, probably better than anyone. and she’s telling him that it’s ok. that she wants him to be happy, and that’s exactly what paul would want too. and she would know - she’s his nan. so ben can allow himself to listen to her. he trusts her, trusts that she would know what paul would want, how he would feel. and now he has permission to let go of the past a little bit and finally start moving on.

and that’s hard!! like as much as he might like callum, that’s still a hard thing to do for him!! you can see on his face that it’s hard for him to digest and accept what pam’s telling him - that maybe it’s finally time to let go. it’s just as hard for him to confess that yeah, he does care about callum - he gives her the tiniest nod of the head because he can hardly even bring himself to say it, but he can’t deny it either. and it’s hard for pam too, is the thing. you can from the way her voice shakes as she tells him it’s time to start showing callum that he cares how hard she’s trying not to cry. not because she’s not being sincere, not bc she doesn’t mean it or she doesn’t want ben to move on and be happy, but it’s still a hard thing. the world has moved on without paul, and now ben - the last link to him in a lot of ways - is too, and as necessary and as good as that is for him, it doesn’t make it any easier for them. grief is a weird and difficult thing and i think they both did a good job of portraying the struggle of it in this scene.

and then them having this moment right at the end at the end where they’re just smiling at each other w their heads rested together and it’s not an easy thing and they’re both obviously a bit upset and broken but it’s so sincere and warm and she just pulls him in and kisses his head and he just lets himself be comforted by her and by this point i had a big lump in my chest bc it was a very real and important and sweet moment and i was a lil overwhelmed

the tiny mick and callum scene!! i want more of them!!! we haven’t had a proper mick and callum scene since before the wedding i think and i know realistically it’s bc danny dyer has been doin other stuff and hasn’t been filming much and then when he has been filming obv the focus has been on the ollie/linda stuff but!! i miss them and it was so good to see them acknowledge that they haven’t seen each other much and for mick to acknowledge callum’s relationship w ben (calling it ‘matters of the heart’ 🥺️) it was just Good i love their relationship sm and i miss them and i need more!!

mick being so happy to see pam was just !!!!!!!!!! like everyone loves pam!!!!!!! please can she come back and stay forever pls

ben’s face when he tried to approach callum only for callum to turn his back on him like that boy was CRUSHED and he didn’t know what to do like he just stood there for a moment unsure what to do w himself and it was Gud

the shot of callum drinking his beer looking all mopey and dejected with ben staring at the back of his head obviously pining even if he wasn’t in focus and then pam telling ben to basically get his shit together and fix this and practically shoving him towards callum while ben’s lookin like he’s trying to psych himself up and mick’s just there looking between all of them trying to figure the whole thing out??? high art

ben approaching callum looking visibly nervous and out of his depth... and then callum seeming genuinely surprised that ben had come over... bye

the fact that the first thing ben said was ‘i’m sorry’!!! ben saying he understands why callum flipped out the way he did!!! callum saying he understands that ben was just trying to help!!!! ben acknowledging that callum is hurt and upset and then explaining why he did what he did and how he felt but still acknowledging that he hurt callum!!! the fucking communication!!!!!!!! like honestly it hasn’t been smooth sailing for these two so far but they always seem to be surprisingly good at communicating and talking when smth is going wrong, at least after the fact (esp ben) and i LOVE that it’s so healthy!!

callum doing the very callum thing and being like ‘it’s fine, i get it’ even tho he’s clearly still upset bc he doesn’t wanna rock the boat but then ben being like ‘no, it’s not fine! what i did is not fine! you don’t have the pretend that it is!’ and callum seeming lowkey taken aback by that :-(

(pam and mick just watching on in the background of all of this like the pseudo parents they are like honestly??? maybe the best part of the scene LMAO)

that little bit of nervousness before ben says ‘you’re my boyfriend’ like he said it in a very sure way but you could tell he was nervous bless him... and then the way callum’s face lit up but he tried to hide it and not smile and play it cool with his ‘you’ve never called me that before’ but then it cuts back to ben who has the biggest smile on his face but u can tell he’s tryna suppress it a lil too but failing miserably AND THEN shy ben makes an appearance w his little ‘well you are, aren’t ya?’ like he just wants to be sure!! he wants to ask so callum has the opportunity to say no (though judging by both of their faces he knew callum wasn’t gonna say no lmao) but he’s still ben so he’s gotta ask in this roundabout way... man it’s so cute

combine that with callum’s little pout and squint like he was pretending he really had to think abt it and the tone of his little ‘yeah’ like he was like ‘i suppose so’.... the subtle banter of it all i love it.... but he can’t keep it up for long bc then he’s the one with a massive smile on his face like bro... the sun doesn’t even shine that bright

and then ben’s little disbelieving ‘yeah?’ like he had to make sure :-(

AND JUST PAM AND MICK BEING LIKE AWWW WHEN THEY KISSED AND MICK BEING LIKE ‘HOW LOVELY’ AND JUST STANDING THERE SMILING AT THEM IT TOOK ME OUT FR

ben asking callum if he’s happy and callum tapping ben’s chin and telling him he is...................... the two of them looking at each other Like That....... talented brilliant incredible amazing etc

pam being like ‘my work here is done’ i love HER

ben making a point of being like ‘pam i want you to meet my boyfriend’ he’s so fuckin cute i love him

the whole pam and callum exchange from the hug to her holding his hand and telling him how lucky he is to have ben and then telling callum that ben has the biggest heart of anyone she knows but saying it to ben bc she knows he needs to hear that too bc like... when has anyone EVER said that about ben?? when has anyone ever thought that about ben?? but she sees through all the bullshit and sees him for the kind, soft-hearted, loving but equally damaged boy he really is and she wants callum to know and understand that but also for ben to know that too and i’m crying just thinking about it bc you can see ben’s face change and how emotional he starts to get not only bc it’s pam and everything that must be going through his head abt paul, but also just?? someone being kind to him?? saying smth nice?? god i’m broken

like pam really almost had me in tears in this scene genuinely esp when she was clearly getting emotional (as was ben) and she took both of their hands and told them to look after each other, given everything that happened with paul, and them both saying ‘we will’.... like that really fucked me up.... it felt like a Moment.... and then follow that up w pam and ben resting their heads against each other and whispering ‘i love you’ and it was so warm and full of love and adoration .... the ‘i hate goodbyes’.... the palm kiss.... the fact that ben looked like he was abt to cry as pam left... i was a broken woman truly

and then they just went on as if nothing happened and they didn’t just have a very significant relationship moment with the ‘i am lucky’ ‘i’m glad you realize it’ banter lmao

ben being like ‘u have the support of ur boyfriend 🥰️’ when callum was explaining he wanted to leave the parlour like he really couldn’t keep that word out of his mouth huh 🥺️

and the way he grabbed callum’s hand but only managed to get 3 fingers and then callum putting his hand on top of ben’s like for some reason that really fucked me up......... like gays and hands am i right

the journey ben’s face went on when callum told him he wanted to join the police.... the way it went from ‘haha good joke’ to ‘..................... wait he’s being serious’ to ‘oh god what the fuck’ was amazing lmao

and then him interrupting jay and lola w his massive dramatic freak out was so fucking funny like the way jay just shoved lola off his lap when ben come in KILLED me honestly and like ben’s on the verge of a breakdown and his brother and the mother of his child are just taking the piss and laughing at his expense.......... i love family

yeah so perhaps i went a bit overboard w this one but i did make you wait like a week and a half so perhaps this will make up for it lmao ??? but rlly tho i loved this ep sm there was so much good abt it and i want to keep pam forever thank u for ur time 💖💖

#ballum #eastenders #i fully went overboard with this looking at it now but i have a lot of pam feelings allow me #anon #question