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takaraphoenix · 4 years

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Whenever a queer audience complains about the writing/treatment of queer characters, there’s some genius who thinks they’re speaking an ultimate truth into existence by arguing that “gay characters can be bad people too/can die too” like the sole source of the complaints is the community’s attempt to uwufy the gay experience. I always assume these attempts to rebuttal are simply rooted in a place of a whole lotta privilege.

In theory, their statement that gay characters should come in all shades of personality is very true. There’s shitty gay people in real life. Assholes, thieves, murderers, abusers, what have you. Because gay people are human beings and human beings aren’t flawless.

Gay characters are something else though. Because gay characters do not make autonomous decisions. Gay characters didn’t actually lead a life that led them to this point. They were written by someone. Someone who made very specific choices.

On top of that, there are also the circumstances in the specific piece of media that need to be acknowledged; the overall representation of gays.

Let’s take one example. Two TV shows write off a trans woman. If people complain about one of them though, you can’t just blanket say “well, trans characters can leave too, they don’t have to be there start to finish, that’s an unrealistic expectation”.

Because there’s a difference if a show like, say, Pose, where there’s five trans women in the main cast alone, kills one off in a sad, heartfelt manner that fit the plot and setting of its show and has the characters actually deal with that death, as compared to Chicago Med, writing their one trans character off by having her get angry because her CIS sister defended her from her abusive, transphobic boyfriend and then simply never bring the trans character up again.

One of these is about the trans character herself and sets her into the focus. The other one serves the CIS character, to paint her as a CIS Savior, and completely erases the trans character from the narrative afterward because she served her purpose. On paper, in theory, both did the same thing. Both wrote a trans woman off their show. But there’s a difference when you look at each as an individual case.

Gay characters can die. Sure they can; gays are not naturally immortal.

But there’s a difference between a show like Game of Thrones, where absolutely everybody dies, some even more than once, killing off its queer characters among many dozens of characters that die during its run, and a show like Voltron: Legendary Defender going out of its way and only killing off one (1) named character who has a speaking role from the good guys during the war and that one named character happens to be one of the two gays, the one that’s only had a total of less than five minutes screentime at that.

Wars are fought and wars demand losses. People die. That is natural. No one expects that all characters come out of that alive. But if of all of the many named/established straight(-coded) or not specified characters none die, but you choose to kill off one of the two only explicit queer characters? There is a difference there.

And it’s not just quantity or quality. It depends on the writers’ choice.

Let’s take the same situation in two different interpretations again. Two shows that both have one explicit wlw recurring character only, but she has a wife and kids.

One’s Timeless, where Denise Christopher is a main character, who is one of the good guys, the team leader/team mom if you will, whose wife only rarely shows up, but at least she does get one episode focusing on her queerness.

The other’s Titans, where the only confirmed queer character is the evil villain lady, but hey we see her with her wife and their kids in the car once for a couple seconds, where she and her wife exchange no intimate gestures or words, but they’re wives so that should cover it.

The choice of the writer that goes into picking a villain to be the only queer representation in a show is inherently harmful and bad. If you need that explained to you, then you are truly living too privileged. Because it goes into a very clear message that villains are queer... that queers are villains.

It never bothered me on Sailor Moon too much that Kunzite/Zoisite were villains, because we also had Haruka/Michiru, two of the heroes and main characters, who were in a loving relationship. But if Haruka and Michiru didn’t exist? That’d tip the balance immensely.

A show like Shameless is absolutely allowed to make all of their queer characters awful human beings. Because all characters on this show are awful human beings, regardless of their sexuality. It’s not an offensive act that Ian and Mickey go to jail, that Debbie is sleeping around with the daughter of her girlfriend, because everybody on this show does... truly awful things at all times. It’s not only the queer characters doing awful things.

But if your straights are morally upstanding and your gays are deprived and immoral? Then that is a problem and people ought to complain about it.

Representation matters, but it goes beyond that. We don’t live in times anymore where it’s just a “Representation matters”, because with that, Disney gets away with having two unnamed background characters kiss for 0.2 seconds in a Star Wars movie and DreamWorks gets to kill of queer characters and too many TV shows still get away with harmful stereotypes, overused tropes and the barest background characters.

In an ideal world that hot take that queer characters can die and queer characters can be shitty people would be true. And in some media it actually is, because they don’t only target and victimize and demonize the queer characters but actually do bother to paint a broad picture of people, including a broader variety of queer people.

But the matter of fact is that most media doesn’t. With most media there are only one, maybe two, queer characters in it, in total. Not even the main cast. Too many still get away with side/background characters who only occasionally appear.

You don’t get to pretend we live in a utopian future where queer characters are being represented in as broad a spectrum as straight characters are. Because we don’t. And if people get angry that the only queer character in it is a villain, or that only the queer character gets killed off, or that the gay character is burdened with a bunch of harmful stereotypes while the straight characters get to be the heroes who live, with glorious character-traits and impeccable morals, then absolutely no one as a right to tell them to stop complaining.

Because if we stop complaining about bad, lazy and harmful rep... then that rep will only continue and they will continue thinking that all they need to do is this bare minimum and it isn’t, because we deserve to live in that world where queer rep is so present and has so much variety that we can justly say “stop complaining that one of the gays died; it was just part of the plot”, instead of knowing that it was yet another Bury Your Gay.

#LGBT Representation #Rainbow Stuff #TV Shows #sometimes I just really #grow tired of these Hot Takes #that pretend like they're sophisticated #or some shit #just because they think it's more 'diverse'#to have shitty gays #and villainous lesbians #when they are literally just MISSING THE POINT

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binbrookfairqueen · 3 years

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The Homoerotic Subtext In Victorious: Jade and Tori

I’ve done a lot of nothing during quarantine. The same old same old, wake up at noon, eat something, find the homoerotic subtext in every straight film/show/video game I come across. Isn’t that how we all spend our afternoons?

It started with Taylor Swift, and the wlw undertones in all of her newest songs. Despite being in a long term relationship with a man, she penned lyrics like “those days turned into nights, slept next to her, but I dreamt of you all summer long” and “what would he do if he found us out? he’s gonna burn this house to the ground,” So of course I went from hating on all of this straight media, to searching for queer scraps in the background of these art pieces. From the new summer Disney flick, Luca, to the characters in my newest copy of Red Dead Redemption 2 on Xbox One.

I always loved Victorious, it’s been one of my favorite shows since I was a child. The strange humor, the funny remarks. Always wondering why I liked the sassy, demanding Jade instead of the swoon-worthy womanizer Beck.

So, in quarantine, when I heard that Victorious was coming to Netflix, I re watched the entire show and couldn’t help but notice all of the queer innuendos, and rather flirty scenes between female actors. Of course- I’m not the first person to ever notice this. The homoerotic implied relationship between Tori Vega and Jade West had been shipped plenty of times and edited to oblivion by young, gay teens.

Since this is all news to me, I thought I’d go through every episode of Victorious and tell you what is gay about it, from a lesbian’s point of view.

Pilot

I never noticed how queer coded Victorious is, especially this very first episode. The sexual tension between the girls is almost too much, I have to drink some water every few minutes.

It’s clear to me that Jade is taking advantage of new girl Tori, and trying to establish her superiority because of her own fears and insecurities.

[Tori bumps into Beck, spilling coffee all over him] Tori: Oh my gosh! Beck: Ah, it’s cool Tori: No, here- I think it’s coming out. [Tori attempts to rub the coffee stain out of Beck’s shirt] Beck: You might be making it worse, actually. [Jade enters] Jade: Dude, why are you rubbing my boyfriend? Tori: I-I just spilled coffee on- Jade: Get away from him. Beck: Relax. [Beck kisses a reluctant Jade on the cheek]

Our very first introduction to Jade West is her making sure everybody knows Beck is her boyfriend. Multiple times throughout the episode, she cuddles up to him, picks him as her partner, and kisses him in front of the whole class. There’s a straight explanation to this, but there’s also a queer one. Jade is insecure in her attraction to girls and feels as though she needs to prove herself and everyone else that she does, in fact, like men.

Sikowitz: Jade, you will captain the first group of the day. Choose your actors. Jade: Cat, Eli, Beck, and Tori. Tori, why don’t you go wait in the hall? Tori: Uh, okay. Jade: I have great news that’ll cheer up this whole family. I went to the animal shelter and got us a dog. [Pulls Tori into the classroom by the arm] Tori: Uh, yep! I’m the new family dog. Woof. Jade: Uh oh, looks like this dog has bugs in her fur. [Jade strokes Tori’s hair] Tori: Uh, woof? Jade: Oh, it’s okay! I read on the internet that coffee works great for getting rid of fur bugs. Beck: Maybe you shouldn’t- Andre: Jade- [Jade dramatically pours the coffee on Tori’s head] Jade: What’s the prob, dog? [Tori runs out of the room, contemplating quitting Hollywood Arts]

Jade not only wants everyone to know that she’s straight, but she also wants everyone to know that she possesses a dominant personality, and isn’t afraid to get dirty. In this case, she does all that she can to make Tori’s day a living hell, all because she touched her boyfriend.

I don’t recall this as normal straight girlfriend behavior, there’s gotta be a fear of being outed rooted down deep in Jade’s bones- right?

The episode leads to a scene whereas the two girls are arguing, and there are only a few notable lines:

Jade: Just where did you come from? Tori: Kangaroos. Jade: Lousy animals, Kangaroos, they're awkward and dirty. Tori: Maybe they learned from you. [The classroom tenses, the girls getting more and more angry] Jade: No one talks to me like that. Tori: Obviously someone should. Jade: Please run in front of a bus! Tori: Quite obnoxious of you to say.

Jade: Really? Tori: Sure was.

Jade: Thanks. [Sarcastically]

Scenes get tense as the girls grow closer to each other, getting more and more upset.

But it’s also a lot like playing cat and mouse.

Day 1, Jade picks Tori for her team, day 2, Tori picks Jade for her team just to spite her. The submissive trying to declare dominance, whilst the real dom notices the attention seeking. When Jade says that no one speaks to her like that, and Tori proceeds to comment that someone should, a sexual tension is cast into the air. It’s obvious to any viewer.

The condescending flirtatious “Really?” Followed up by the bold “Sure was.” Is very queer coded. No one talks like that to someone they don’t find attractive. C’mon.

Author’s Conclusion: Jade feels the need to be angry and rude to anyone who threatens her heterosexuality. She possesses a fear of being outed, and does whatever she can to maintain a normal relationship with a man. But even her attraction to girls and her dominant personality can’t hide, as her actions reveal the closet to be made of glass.

Tori Goes Platinum

Tori: “Everyone else was coming to cheer you on, so... Figured I would, too. And you look way better in that than I would have.”

Jade: “This isn’t right. This was supposed to be your night. I can’t do that to a friend.”

- Jade is the most concerned person in the room when Tori begins acting differently after landing a gig at the Platinum Music Awards. Leading a class wide discussion, Jade discusses Tori’s change in behavior and provides her own evidence and proof to back up her statements. When Tori enters the classroom, Jade confronts her without hesitation, and seems to be the only person who cares enough about the pop stars well being. (Authors note: Only someone who truly cared about another would notice when they’re acting different and confront them to try and fix the problem...)

- When Tori refuses to wear the ridiculous outfits the record label provides, her opportunity to perform at the Platinum Music Awards is stripped away. Jade is asked to fill her place, and despite saying yes, she hesitates for a moment. These matter of seconds prove Jade has some kind of moral in her mind telling her that doing this would hurt Tori, and hurt their relationship.

- Beck and Tori don’t realize that they are still on video call with Jade, and the two almost kiss. Tori backs away, the following conversation takes place.

Beck: “Then why can’t we kiss?”

Tori: “Kissing your friends ex boyfriend...”

Beck: “Since when are you and Jade friends?”

Tori: “We’re kind of friends, I think. And kissing her ex boyfriend... I can’t do that to a friend.”

Despite the overuse of the word friend, this is still a sweet moment, and when Jade overhears this exchange, she realizes taking this opportunity away from Tori isn’t the right thing to do.

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critroleing · 5 years

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If Campaign 2 went Live in the Middle (like Campaign 1)

Since you guys liked it so much the first time, let’s run through the real world AU where campaign 2 was the one we started in the middle of, but more in depth this time.

There would be a backstory/introduction vid that played in the beginning of episodes and in the break. This is more or less what it would say:

Caleb: All of his backstory will be explained in one chunk, including stuff like the residuum crystals in his arms, his past name, and the concept of scourgers, stuff that was plot twists that came along the way for us. No attention will be paid to how this backstory came out to the characters. Nor who among the characters actually know any of this. We will assume by default that everyone knows.

Nott: this is the story of Veth, mostly. The story of how she got bullied as a child, had a marriage and a baby, got kidnapped and transformed into a goblin but regained her family and now they’re waiting for her in Nicodranas. The story of how she regained them is kind of like the story of how Pike died. Technically it was in game, but it’s so far away it’s essentially backstory.

Beau: The lore we’ve gotten from her is much more sporadic, but they’ll take the pieces of what we have gotten and treat it like the Lore Drops we’ve gotten from people like Caleb and Nott. Her childhood in Kamordah will be explained, along with how she got kidnapped by monks, has a baby brother and mentor named Dairon will all be given as if everyone knows these facts and not like they were carefully dished out to one person here and one person there. (Because of this the fandom’s view of her will be slightly off from who she actually is, and that will lead to a good chunk of fans disliking her, at least until they get the hang of her character.)

Jester will probably be the least affected by this change. We knew her backstory early and met her mother later, which is how this turns out. Her backstory does reach all the way up to include the gnoll follower she met in Asarius and preparations for Travelercon. The Traveler will inevitably turn up somewhere and talk to Jester. He will seem super shady. In other words, nothing much will have changed.

Fjord: Huge changes here. During the time we wouldn’t have seen Fjord has learned who Uk’otoa is, followed him, almost set him free, stopped working for him, lost his powers and started working for another power. That is a lot of developments to be relegated to backstory, and this is on top of the backstory he already had. There will be a brief mention of Fjord having had a different accent in the past, the fandom will not pick up on how big of a deal that is.

Caduceus: His backstory might include the story of the Clays, the Dusts and the Stones, in which case he will feel a lot like Keyleth did. He will sound like he has a Plan, in a way that he did not seem to, watching it episode by episode. We don’t actually know all that much about Caduceus’ personal life, so his backstory presentation might have to go for the big picture stuff.

Yasha: She’ll get her own presentation. We know this because Ashley wasn’t there for the first few episodes of c1 but Pike’s presentation was there anyway. Explanations of her backstory will include Zuala, blacking out and coming to again, the Stormlord, mentions of Obann but not her current situation. That will be explained in the very beginning by Matt, with interruptions form the rest of the gang. The fandom will not understand how serious it is until Yasha comes back.

Molly will not get a presentation. He, in fact, will not be acknowledged until someone makes a reference to him and suddenly the cast will remember that, oh, the audience doesn’t know who he is. The audience understands that this was Taliesin’s previous character, but the extent of his influence on the party will be lost as we have no real feel for Molly’s character or what he could have inspired in others.

Male pronouns will be used when explaining Molly, people will immediately forget that and it becomes pretty common to see and hear Molly depicted as a woman and then people correcting them. The Ruby of the Sea will take some explaining, but she’s definitely one of the people we have to meet as soon as possible. “She’s the best lay ever, you guys,” Laura informs us. We do not get the joke.

Someone remembers Pumat Sol exists. They try to explain him. It’s really hard. Matt does an accent and the fandom enjoys it.

The fact that the Mighty Nein are already established in Xhorhas feels alienating to a lot of viewers. Apparently they’re heroes of the Dynasty? And have a house? With a tree on it? And Beau’s mentor Dairon is there?

So the reason they are heroes is because they gave the Bright Queen some sort of artefact. The fandom is unsure of what it was or where it came from, but it may be that the Empire has another one. The larger lore of how the Dens and Beacons work is largely lost, and with it a lot of understanding about the larger world and the war.

At some point far in the future it comes out that they’ve already met Trent Ikithon, Caleb’s main bad guy. Nothing much seemed to happen. Lots of meta about how that meeting was going to happen has to be thrown out.

Jester has pets. Sprinkle doesn’t get mentioned a lot, but at least he’s on adventures with them. There is also Nugget, who lives Marion and we eventually get to meet. We don’t know where they came from, presumably Jester had them the whole time, like childhood pets.

They also adopted a baby bird for a while. They say it could mimic speech? The people who know what kenku are have their suspicions, everyone else thinks it’s another pet.

Beau has some trauma related to some academic by the name of Professor Thaddeus. Much meta has been written about who he is and what happened between him and Beau.

They know a gentleman who’s blue and sweaty. He is also maybe Jester’s dad. Jury’s out on that one.

The Empire feels so far away, and so Other. People praise Matt for making the humans the bad guys and the Drow the good guys.

The fact that they were pirates once comes up in conversation. A joke is made about it. Nothing is explained.

Eventually it comes out that it had things do do with Fjord’s patron, there was a sexy cult leader pirate with a French accent who Fjord slept with, and they got banished from the pirate island within a day.

They still technically have French accent pirate’s ship. It’s called the Ball Eater. They go there once and we meet the Tortle bagpiper tattoo artist who runs it. His name is Orly. The fandom loses its’ shit.

The ship is named that because of Fjord apparently. He ate some orbs once, so they say.

Fjord also ate a sword once? Was he in a circus? Yasha and that Molly person were in a circus, was Fjord there too?

Jester carries around a an erotica book. Where it comes from no one knows, but it doesn’t seem out of character for her so we roll with it.

They have had an encounter with a dragon, an ancient white one, but they haven’t killed any.

Except maybe they have?

Beau has slept with two (2) whole guest characters.

Jester casts Sending to talk to a guy. Matt answers in a very sexy voice. We think the guy is an NPC. He’s not.

A sweet lady once sent actual letters with actual, physical gifts to them.

After that there are more than a few bets on what other NPC’s are actually guest characters being jaegered for the moment.

Why are they even called the Mighty Nein? The cast explains that it had to do with a session in the early levels when they were rolling a lot of nines, and it sounds funny when Caleb says it. It was probably funny if you were there, but for the fandom it just sounds kinda dumb.

Nott might get some more shipping attention, given that she’s actually a halfling. She also might not, because she’s both married and ugly.

Fjord and Jester still share a deep bond, but the more overt parts of Jester’s crush that were prominent in the earlier episodes seem to have mellowed out by the time we meet them. Fjord and Jester also haven’t, percentage wise, spent more time together as a pair than a group, so that dynamic isn’t really seen. Fjorester exists, but has a very different vibe to it.

Widomauk does not exist.

Beauyasha might exist, if only because they are the only two confirmed wlw in the group. It’s more of an idea until they meet and chemistry can be measured of course.

Beaujester exists, but very much in the ‘look at their emotional chemistry, wouldn’t it be nice’. In a way, not much has changed, you just have less of a basis to ship on.

Fjorclay might be big for a while, given how important Caduceus has been for Fjord’s journey lately.

Videos resurface of the cast playing at home before this campaign became public. Fjord has a Texan accent. Nott calls herself a little goblin girl. That is a really weird Caduceus voice. Life feels strange.

Sam asks Liam on their podcast what would be the worst character to play in D&D, just the worst. Liam suggests goblin. Seems like he was thinking worst as in most morally dubious.

Nott rolls a natural 1 and shoots herself in the foot with her own crossbow. That’s not good, the fandom thinks, what if she got killed doing damage to herself? Besides, that would look really dumb.

We will never know about Spurt.

Jester, Fjord and Yasha got kidnapped by slavers once, we find out alarmingly late. They seem fine though, so that turns into another trivia fact.

Actually no, that’s probably mentioned in passing when they’re explaining how Molly died. It doesn’t really hit home with most if the fandom though.

Unclear where Caleb can teleport to. Generally assumed that he knows at least one teleport circle in the Empire.

In this world Vox Machina probably doesn’t exist at all. At least not online. Maybe they played all of that campaign at home, so we get occasional references to ‘their first game’ or ‘their home game’ but have no context for that either.

In which case you could make a whole category for references to the first campaign we wouldn’t understand.

Like why Taliesin is explaining how the guns work.

Or the ruins of Draconia down south.

Or why the team were so hyped to go to Whitestone.

Or maybe this was their first campaign after all, and none of these things have any additional context.

Nott will be looked at mostly as a halfling mother. Instead of discussions about if she’s even old enough to be an adult she’s considered older than the rest, and a large contingent of the fandom is mad at her for adventuring when she has a child waiting for her at home.

Caleb has at least two homebrew spells. They are eventually referred to as Dunamancy. The fandom realises the level of worldbuilding Matt’s on in that he’s made an entire new school of magic.

Feel free to add more. I’m sure there’s stuff I haven’t considered out there.

#critical role #critical role spoilers #cr spoilers #cr meta #critical role meta #what if cr2 started in the middle #like cr1 did

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lettersandinkstains · 5 years

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(i won’t be adding my tag list to this post as it’s long already and i do not want to randomly ping people and bother them! however, i will add instructions on how to be added or removed from any of my tag lists! i apologize for mobile users if this does not appear under a read more tag for you guys -- and will tag it as ‘long post’ for your needs)

so said the king

genres ; dark fantasy, new adult, coming of age features ; diverse cast and protagonists, LGBT+ main characters, wlw endgame pair status ; in progress warnings ; violence, swearing, sociopolitical issues, mentions of child abuse, political corruption summary ; when the king says everyone shall die for him, so they shall -- as he sits upon his throne of ivory and the crown of thorns break his skin for every sin committed, he is nothing more than a mere puppet for something bigger. when the queen says to stay out of the library, so shall you obey for her secrets are her own -- and her sins much bigger than the kings.

and when the gods command one to kill, so shall you obey or face their wrath. yet, when it comes between the choices of spilling even more blood or trying to find a way around the command when she is shown much more kindness from her target than most have given her. a life for a life -- but should one’s blood be spilled to save millions? nyx is forced to turn her eyes towards the one who is truly the cause of the hell brought upon her beautiful Ilmarya. and she has to wonder:

can you kill a god?

links: spotify | main tag | wattpad | pinterest (tag list is open for this!)

blood upon the altar

genres ; dark fantasy, urban fantasy, vampire fiction, new adult status ; worldbuilding features ; diverse cast and protagonists, LGBT+ main characters, wlw and mlm endgame pairings warnings ; religious themes & commentary, cult behavior, corruption, violence, adult themes

summary ; when sariel died, the world went dark. slowly but surely, elionde had dug itself out of the darkness and rebuilt without their goddess. from this darkness rose a new order, the church of sariel, sometimes called the soldiers of sariel, or the church. they were founded in the belief that a group of magical beings, vampires, had been the cause of sariel’s death and that they can bring her back to life.

when aleksandra, a member of the church, is saved by a sworn enemy, a vampire, within the free lands of aeonia, does the world start to see odd changes. the warm south begins to cool down, and the cold north begins to warm up and sightings of a silver tree is found within unreachable mountains.

links ; main tag - pinterest (tag list is open for this!)

ichor

genre: urban fantasy, light fantasy, deconstruction of the chosen one trope, young adult, dark status ; worldbuilding - outlining features ; diverse cast, LGBTQIA characters, established queer relationships, wlw endgame and continuous pair warnings ; violence, off screen & mentioned child abuse and csa, mental illness, political commentary, real world setting with magic, fairly dark plot

summary ; their lives were not supposed to intersect -- this was not planned by any higher being.

bailee was not supposed to survive the childhood fire that ravaged her home, nor was an archangel supposed to save her. and older now, she tries to pretend that there was no archangel, her survival was just a fluke. but when the stars begin to call out her lover, lucija, she is forced to follow through with the promise she made on the eve of her 11th birthday.

ariana was supposed to listen and obey The Watchers, angels who have weaved her life so intricately that choice was never a thing. but ariana met a pretty eyed boy whose mere presence made her heart flutter, and her days better.

but she survived the fire and ariana tried to escape the intricately weaved clutches of The Waters all because she loved a boy. and at the end of it all, ichor ran poison through their veins and with it, a monster predicted in texts rose to power and they must choose their paths carefully.

links ; pinterest • main tag • spotify (tag list is open for this WIP!)

the three steps of romance

genre ; LGBTQIA fiction, romance, LGBTQIA romance, contemporary, urban status ; in purgatory -- planning / developing features ; diverse cast, LGBTQIA+ centric, WLW centric, pure fluff and self indulgent warnings ; none

summary ; ember has always looked at the world through the lens of a camera, she has always preferred it to living her actual life. she’s always searching for something but she’s not really quite sure what. it has always felt at the tip of fingers but she could never quite reach.

one fateful night, she meets the newcomer in her little warm town by the lake. for the brief night, ember is swept off her feet and she feels as though she has fallen deeply in love with this women.

and one fateful morning, she finds out this woman is her new veterinarian.

links ; pinterest ♥ main tag (tag list is open for this!)

glass walls

genre ; dystopia, future without robots / aliens but with advanced technology status ; planning ; outlining ; worldbuilding features ; diverse cast & LGBTQIA main cast warnings ; political commentary, dark plotline, violence, police violence, political corruption

summary ; she leads the Revolutionaries, as they call themselves. A group of people who live in the shadows and online. Nobody knows their names, they do not even know each others – only calling each other by pseudonyms. Her name is Lilith, and she was always told she asks too many questions, she’s too inquisitive for her own good and it will get her in trouble one day.

That trouble came in the name of a girl who calls herself Charlotte, or Charlie, who had found Lilith trying to hack into the hidden glass walls, to place in a virus.

A stranger who had panicked, a stranger who was going to call the cops and forced Lilith’s hand to break one of the tenants: to harm nobody.

With kidnapping under her belt, Lilith and her friends are forced to push their plans for a large scale fight closer than what they had wanted.And when the soldiers come, armed with their guns, Lilith knows that she will be ready to face them.

links ; main tag (tag list is open for this!)

so the instructions are simple:

Comment on this post (or any post I make for any of the WIP’s above), send a DM, or an ask, or comment in the tags if you wish to be added or removed. If you do it on this post, please specify which WIP you’d like to be added to! Please be sure that you’ve read the warnings!

alternatively, i also have a general tag list for all of my WIPs + my short stories & prompt fills if you wish to be added to that. if you would only like to be tagged in my short stories let me know for that too !

be sure your blog is taggable -- so this means that you must be searchable on tumblr’s system!

stuff ; writing tag - character page - wip page

(created ; 8-20-19 updated ; 8-20-19)

#writeblr #wip masterlist #wip #writing #writers of tumblr #writers on tumblr #writing community #long post #long post for mobile #original writing #wips #masterlist post

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hachibe · 5 years

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11 questions asked and answered (SKAM edition)

Rules:

1. Always repost the rules!

2. Answer the questions given to you by the one who tagged you!

3. Give 11 questions!

4. Tag 11 people!

tagged by @illgiveyouahint , thanks!!!

1) Favourite remake version of each of the seasons? s1 - none, idk i don’t think any remake has made me like their s1 as much as i like original s1. s2 - DRUCK, I have my problems with it but it's the only remake that took it upon themselves to make that season better not being afraid to change things. s3 - DRUCK as well. the changes in the characters made everything exciting to see. every time they did something different we went

and every time it was the same we went

s4 - since so far france has been the only one who went as far as s4 i have to say none, because i didn't like what they did with it.

2)Which characters do you think would absolutely not get along?

I have no idea, really. Maybe all the Noora’s wouldn’t like each other. The p-Chrises as well. In the other hand I think all the Sana’s would love to hang out together. The Chrises as well, they would totally love each other.

3)Favourite non-canon mlm ship? Eskild x Mahdi. SRLY, that pic of them hugging in the kosegruppa christmas party had me sending.

And then we saw them hugging again in the eid party. And some one wrote a beautiful fic of Mahdi realizing he might not be that straight and deciding to try something with Eskild and Isak being pissed at it that I completely love.

4)Favourite non-canon wlw ship? All the wlw ships are non-canon! (sure i’m not considering spain and austin) idk I've been robbed of my Evilde. And I would love for any remake to take notice of this and make it right. Besides that, any wlw ship is welcome.

5)Which character would you like to 👀 guest ⭐ in which remake (other than Eskild in SkamNL)? Anybody in any remake. Wouldn't it be cool if we get random characters in random remakes for no reason whatsoever than our delight? I would love for character to meet. Like maybe take the fact that Matteo is half italian and send him to meet some characters from skam italia. But not Martino, somebody else. Maybe his gradma lives near Silvia's parents or something. With all the Nooras going to Madrid they could meet the spanish people altough i don't care for the spanish people. Maybe someone in skam france is related to someone from SKAM. Oh!!! Make Arthur be related to Stefan!!!!! And since Matteo and David are currently in/on their way to Amsterdam maybe make them meet some of the dutch kids.

6)What would a remake in your country (assuming it would somehow be possible to make it) look like? I guess it depends on which tv company it gets made. But in my dream world it would not be made by any TV channel we have here, but by some production company that keeps it online but invests heavily in advertising (i think here in Brasil the ads would be super important for spreading it), with the enough amount of money to make it justice.

I would love for it to take place in some capital but like in one of the interior states or in the northeast region. Anything out of São Paulo/Rio de Janeiro/South. Something in nordeste would be so cool! Heavy slang/accent not even the rest of the country understands; beautiful beaches; people taking overcrowded buses, people skipping classes, people drinking way too young, carnaval in nordeste ♥, idek what kind of parties teenagers in nordeste have, but i would like to see. Catholic holidays. Afro-brazilian religions, brown people everywhere! one token white guy, Wilhelm probably. Football!, lots of memes! Trying to incorporate twitter in the narrative. Lot's of dissatisfaction with the current government, especially if it takes place in nordeste. give me money i would do it. and i'll even make sure to put some 'ele não' stickers in every single clip.

7)What would a season based on your life look like? What would it concentrate on? Boring probably. Maybe deal with mental health, growing up in religious household, coming to terms with my sexuality. And how everything intersects.

8)Do you have a character you headcanon as aro,ace or nb? I must confess I'm terrible at headcanoning. I usually go with mostly established fancanons. Like, I like non binary Mikael, and aro/ace Lin and theirs remakes counterparts (mostly druck because italia doesn't have one and I fucking hate the french one. is Esra Lin? was there one in skam austin? i dropped s2)

9)Assuming you have 👀 original Skam, would you like the cast & crew to come back and do any future seasons/films to update us on the characters? Yes. Years in the future I wouldn't mind to see a special or a film about them and where they are in life. Skins did it and it was amazing. I'm sure if Julie wants it can be done. (i just hope she doesn't half ass some of the characters like she did in those books like 'you, you and you very detailed future and you, you and you *looks smudge in hand* idk kindergarten teacher'.)

10) What was the order you 👀 the versions in and do you think it influenced you which versions are your favourite? No, I don't think the order in which i watched the remakes has any bearing in my favouritism. But the order I watched it was as they came out. Skam france first, then Druck and Skam Italia. Later then, Skam Austin and Skam nl. It took me a while to watch Skam Spain and I still haven't seen Wtfook. I just got to a point I was so dead tired of seeing the same thing again and again with no significant changes whatsoever.

11) Do you think the fandom is just too negative or do you 👀 it as a valid criticism? I don't like to think about the fandom so generalized like this. I think there can be a lot of negativism but it also there's a lot of valid criticism. And I think both are valid. I mean, and especially with a show with a format such as skam and it's remakes, it calls a lot to instant reactions. A clip drops and we might get mad and pissed by the direction of the plot or characters or whatever, and it's okay. Might we be wrong by tomorrow? Yes. So? ... Like, let people be mad, let people be wrong, let people be happy. You might not agree and that's okay, but let people be. All your sentiments are valid, even if they diverge from other people's. One thing I hate is posts that start like "people need to stop thinking...." or "people need to see....". We need to accept that people are different, people have different opinions, and just because they are different they don’t have a different place in fandom than you. This also leads to people ignoring criticism because if you like something that something must be perfect. And I read a lot of posts with the tone of 'if you don't like it, drop it, stop watching, etc' and I don't think that's the road to go either. So let's be more accepting of each other, i guess.

So, my questions: *i’ll be copying some questions because they are good*

1. What skam and each remake you watched taught you?

2. What would you tell someone to convince them to watch skam and every remake? At least one thing for each one that you’ve watched.

3. Was there any moments that shocked you?

4. Set you would like to visit?

5. What character would you go for advice?

6. Favourite scene in a remake that wasn’t on the original?

7. If you could go on a date with any character, who would it be?

8. If you could make a season for one character, who would it be?

9. Is there a character you didn’t like in original that you ended up liking in the remakes?

10. If you could watch only one episode for the rest of your life which one would it be? (one for skam and one for each of the remakes, it doesn’t have to be the same)

11. If there was a skam remake but that took place in university with one would you like to see?

I don’t know if I know 11 people! aoidoaijdaosidj So i’m tagging these people but feel free to completely ignore me if you don’t want to do this. @fille-lioncelle @hjertetssunnegalskap1 @smores100 @viro-major @tulaqis @procrastinatingbisexual @ilovenyclife @harryxtimmy ANd hey, if you happen to see this post and wants to do it, just go and do it!!!

#mine #skam #skam remakes #tagging game

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jinjojess · 5 years

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hey jess. again i agree with all your points over categate, i just wanted to point out something which is highlighted in an article on the mary sue (don't think i can send links in asks?). to sum it up, the point made is why is cate choosing the "straight actors can play lgb characters" hill to die upon as opposed to the "other issues that lgbt actors face in hollywood" hill? while i actually don't disagree with her, im just surprised by how adamant she is over that rather than other issues.

Anonymous said:excerpt from aforementioned article: “There aren’t even that many major films and television series that will include non-stereotyped, well-written LGBTQ+ characters to begin with, so we’re taking an already small crop of roles and then only considering straight actors? That’s not fair. This is not to say that straight actors should never, ever play LGBTQ+ roles for the rest of time, but it’s a little silly to feel the need to defend it with the statistics so far out of balance.”

I think that there’s nothing wrong with picking up the conversation from here and saying “Well, if anyone can play any role, then why don’t we have more major films that have queer characters in them?” but that quote from the MS isn’t exactly fair or even necessarily true.

Nowhere in the pieces of interview that I read did Cate Blanchett say anything to the effect of “only straight actors should be considered for LGBT+ roles”–if there was a part where she did say or imply that, then I stand corrected, but to my understanding, what was actually said was “this recent trend of thinking that an x role can ONLY be played by a real-life x is kind of ridiculous and goes against what acting is supposed to be at its core.”

That is way, way different than the snippet that’s getting passed around on social media by click-hungry websites.

And she’s right, it is a hotly debated issue right now! Even in fandom, there’s all this stupid discourse lately about who is “allowed” to write fanfiction about queer characters hooking up and all these weirdly prescriptive rules about how to go about it (particularly about m/m stuff), and I don’t see why we as a community are so jazzed about wanting to gatekeep like that. It discourages writers from wanting to talk about anyone besides themselves, which means we all get less of what we want. I want to read more stories about wlw, and I couldn’t give a fuck about the author’s identity so long as they write well enough.

So for me, it’s a similar concept here. If the straight actors were playing these gay roles in a way that was stereotypical and/or offensive, then I could see the outrage, but if the portrayal of the queer character is good and makes the average Hetero Harry and Cis Sally more comfortable and open to watching queer content, then how is that an objectively bad thing?

Yes, there are a lot of out-of-work queer actors. Yes, there are not nearly as many queer roles as straight ones. However, part of the issue with Hollywood is that it perpetuates “movie star culture” where the actors themselves become part of the product just as important as (and often more than) the content of the film itself. Hollywood is all about keeping a contained stable of household-name actors to sell products to the public. What’s the first thing advertised about a new movie coming out? The cast. How often do people go see a film knowing very little about it besides who the lead actors are? Why are they called “Steven Seagal movies” instead of “martial arts cop thrillers”?

There’s a very telling quote in the interview about how it was difficult to get Carol off the ground as a project, even though well-known actors were involved with it. It’s a thing you take for granted with Hollywood–if nobody famous is in the film, then who’s going to go see it? How the heck do you market that to the general public? Especially if it’s focusing on subject matter that isn’t as well-established in pop culture, like queer content, stories about racial minorities, etc.

So in a way you could see Cate Blanchett’s quote as an endorsement for straight actors to not get all “ew, no homo” and throw their weight behind projects like this so it’s easier to get more of that content made. Her statement to me sounds way more like “I am totally secure in myself and I don’t mind a future landscape where every other love story is queer, because I don’t have to be identical to someone else to empathize with them and be able to play their roles.”

Basically I don’t agree with the assessment that she’s dying on any hill here. I don’t think she exclusively cares about straight actors being allowed to play queer parts and nothing else. I think that it was a response to an interview question about something she feels passionately about–if you want to know what she thinks should be done about dismantling the clique-ish nature of Hollywood casting, then…ask? Like people irl generally aren’t spouting off their political stances every second of their lives, guys.

If someone asks me “Do you think that anyone should be allowed to write queer stories?” I’m going to answer with a resounding yes, and say that I think the current gatekeeping sentiments are misguided and ultimately counterproductive. I’m probably not going to then spiral off and discuss how publishers need to be more accessible to LGBT+ writers, because at that moment in time, I might consider it obvious, or not entirely relevant to the question that was asked. Meanwhile, the headline the next day becomes “Tumblr User JinjoJess Passionate That Only Straight People Should Tell Queer Stories” (I am well-acquainted with this phenomenon, given that people take what I say on this blog out of context all the goddamn time, usually because I didn’t specifically reassure them that what they care about is important too).

So tl;dr, I feel like a lot of this is projection–I don’t think that this single response to a question that was asked during an interview encompasses the entirety of Cate Blanchett’s feelings on Hollywood and Representation. I also suspect that people reporting on this have an agenda to push, hence taking the quote out of context and twisting the words to make her look bad, and for many of them, that agenda is “get more clicks”, which has been proven to be easier to accomplish by pissing people off.

#ask #anon #discourse #long post #not cutting this one because I want people to read the tl;dr at the bottom and follow the link #sorry in advance

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tokeepuhappy · 7 years

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Comic Con, Supercorp, Swan Queen and the new LGBT couple in Ouat. I didn’t think this post would get so long, oh well.

I kind of hate CC. Every single year, what I get from it are anticipations for the classic boring hetero couple. And that if it’s a good year, really. Because there are also those years in which cast and producers laugh about something that is important for a lot of people, which is what happened to Supercorp fandom this year, or show runners tell you that what you’re seeing was unintentional, Swan Queen in 2013. I could talk for hours about that “unintentional” and list every moment in which was clear that it was bullsh*t and they were just covering their queerbaiting.I think there are a lot of blogs with collections of all the instances where writing and directing’s choices were taken following the same model used for building a scene for romantic couples, for building their love story in the plot. A collections of all the parallels, of all those moments where it seemed logic that what we were seeing would lead to Swan Queen, like:

“True Love is the most powerful magic of all. The only magic powerful enough to transcends realm and break any curse.” Words told to Regina and Emma only to have them open a portal to another realm one episode later and stop the unstoppable at the end of the season.

This is just one of the many examples. I’ve seen a lot of people ask, from one fandom to another, more recently Sanvers to Supercorp, why would they keep on shipping a “fanon” couple instead of the canon one. Also Supercorp fans being unvalidated for it.

But I mean we enjoy different things. Just because we have so little representation it doesn’t mean that we should be content with anything.  For example, if they had decided to make Dragon Queen canon (Regina and Maleficent) I wouldn’t be happy all the same just ‘cause they’re two woman. (Even though it would have had its importance considering that Regina is a lead, but that’s not the point I’m trying to make). What I’m saying is that the story I love is the one between Emma and Regina, not Regina and Maleficent. I couldn’t replace one with the other.  It would be like telling CSers to be happy all the same if Swanfire had ended up together instead of Hook and Emma. It’s not really the same thing, is it? But their possibility to choose is validated. Ours isn’t, we get laughed at.

Also I think that the “fanon” wlw ships are so loved and successful because most of the canon couples are established almost from the start, you already know what will happen, and usually it happens really fast. That’s the reason I couldn’t really get into Sanvers. While I did appreciate Alex’s coming out arc, and the fact that she’s a main character, that ship never really got my attention, both for personal tastes and because it was clear they would end up together really fast (I mean they got engaged by the end of the season), too fast. I remember an interview of some years ago at Comic con, where Eddy Kitsis said “And if we don't earn our happy endings, then they're not going to mean anything, and then it's like eating too much candy.” ‘Earn’ might not be the right word choice, but what we all look for in a way is the build up, the will they won’t they, it’s what stimulates desire and inspiration.  But almost all the time, with some RARE exception, loved wlw couples with build up (Swan Queen, SuperCorp, Bering and Wells, ecc…) end up as queerbaiting. While the hetero couples by the end (usually, ‘cause you could lose interest if it’s given too soon) become canon. Trying to explain myself better, I think this is why those “fanon” ships sometimes are more successful than the canon ones. Because by bulding that story in time you can create a stronger bond and a deeper relationship between the characters, you can make the desire to see them together grow in your fans, gain their loyalty and affection, get more following.  But they don’t get it, they think that one is enough, that just putting two woman together immediately will be enough because we are so starved for representation that we’d watch anything. So they give us the minimum, essential thing that won’t make homophobes uncomfortable. We have the right to ask for stories like Supercorp, like Swan Queen, to want better representation, to be treated equally to any hetero ship, to be taken seriously. Supercorp let your voice be heard, try to make them understand what the issues are while not being hateful.

I heard that Ouat is going to have a LGBT relationship in their 7th season, and I have seen conflicting opinions in the fandom, but let’s be real, Ouat doesn’t give a flying f**k about representation, or they would have acted differently in the last six years. They excluded us, let us be called delusional and be bullied without ever saying anything, never standing up, unvalidated us and everything else this fandom had to endure almost daily. They can’t be trusted. If they’re going to write this LGBT couple like their hetero ones, no thanks. Also let’s not talk about a possible female LI for Regina (I know a lot of you really hope for it, and I get it, like I really really really do… Lana and Regina are my weaknesses), because as I’ve said I can’t replace one with another, but most of all because we’ve been so mistreated, called delusional, never getting the chance to even talk about Swan Queen in panels, interviews, cons, ecc…, being attacked by other celebrities about it, always considered it impossible for what!? Regina ending up with a random woman instead of the one with whom she had this incredible relationship that created an epic story never seen before, with so much depth and layers and six years of build up!? Why not Emma!? And don’t even get me started on the Emma/Henry - Henry/Lucy parallel, in which he will have a relationship with the mother of his daughter, confirming that if Emma or Regina had been a man there would have been no doubt they would end up canon.

#swan queen #swen #supercorp #comic con

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yesbothways · 7 years

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Below Her Mouth: What could have been made better

I wrote a long post about what I liked in Below Her Mouth. Here’s what I think could have been better. This is chock full of spoilers:

I could be wrong, of course, but I think the greatest improvement that could have been made to this film would have been redeveloping Dallas’s storyline. The casting was really ideal, and the chemistry between the two leads just massive. But I don’t think many viewers will find Dallas particularly identifiable or likable. It’s hard to genuinely root for a character when you can’t figure out how to like who they are or trust them.

First off, I do appreciate that Dallas goes through a transformation as a character. She starts out and then lands in her former girlfriend’s bed, and their two encounters go very differently. You also get the two scenes of Dallas looking at her own face in the mirror. The first time, she seems to be wondering why the hell she doesn’t have feelings about someone else and about her break-up, and the next time, she’s realizing how deeply she does care about losing her love affair with Jasmine. Whereas she dismissed her former girlfriend and belittled her feelings before, she affirms them later and says she’s sorry with genuine sadness over having hurt someone.

I love it when two characters have something together and lose it, but then we see how they were authentically changed by what they had together. That’s the shape of a genuine love story in my book. The process of transformation that takes place goes beyond having the person and being happy then not having them and being sad, which is rather shallow.

However, I don’t really want to see a woman treat other women badly. Or to then have some mysterious shift catalyzed by sex lead her to value one, specific woman for… reasons. That’s the kind of bullshit I see in stories about men, who pursue women, have sex with them, and then treat them like shit until they “fall in love.” I don’t believe it then either. You either treat people well in general or you don’t. I may be missing some thread of LGBTQ culture that would make this relatable, but I kind of think that women who love women are just different than men. So I didn’t recognize this woman or her struggle. She was kind of a dude in a way that I just didn’t buy.

(Her crisis of drinking and backtracking through her past patterns didn’t resonate with me, even though I was trying pretty hard. The scene in the strip club genuinely confused me. She was having some kind of sexual relationship before she got a girlfriend… or something. Not clear what that was saying about her character.)

We get a couple of little details that would help explain who Dallas is. She says she hated being a child and doesn’t seem to miss the home she left in Sweden at all. She says of her two parents, “I wanted them to love each other more.” So, we get the slightest whiff of a person who grew up as an outsider in their own house, such that leaving for another country wasn’t even felt as a loss, and also of a person who lived in an environment with very little emotional intimacy, passion, or connection. So you’d have a character feeling unable to connect to people, unable to envision or desire intimate relationships, and someone wondering, why the hell am I like this?

That could definitely work as a storyline. But it would work much better if Dallas already felt troubled or shitty about how her past relationships had gone. Like if her friend had been like, wtf is wrong with you? And she was like, I don’t know, but also actually cared. Her being dismissive of women and emotionally devoid made her simply not being an asshole into her character development. And I’m just not quite sure that’s a story worth telling or relevant to women’s experiences in general.

However, the story of someone being emotionally closed off and unavailable figuring out how to open up is definitely worth telling and also desirable to women. That does put pressure on the way the filmmakers represent relationship between Jasmine and Dallas to establish their connection as unique in terms of not only physical but also emotional chemistry. But I think this creative team could have pulled that off. She could have been a loner, instead of a jerk.

A lot of people, like me, basically hate the climatic “chase” scene when Jasmine rushes out and Dallas catches her, and then they become lovers. I think that’s because nobody trusts that Dallas understood Jasmine uniquely well. Why should we? We’ve seen her treat other women badly and have sex with a lot of women (four in a film that’s pretty damn small). She seems cavalier. Do I believe that Jasmine wants Dallas? Yes. That’s well established. Do I believe that women can communicate subtly and well and interpret mixed messages? Absolutely. I mean, I have both been a woman and also pursued women myself, so that’s a thing I recognize. Do I believe that Dallas would know how to read Jasmine? Nope. It looks like she was just putting her on the spot more than once to have to say no to see if she could get laid. And the story was right on the cusp of being so much deeper.

There’s this common issue in wlw stories where an already queer woman gets portrayed as this kind of idealized fantasy of someone who will “make it happen” for a woman who wants to be with women and feels trapped in heteronormativity. That’s not a fantasy worth continuing to replicate. For one thing, it’s not very useful to women in real life. I have tried to convince women not to passively wait for what they want to come and find them. Then I have fucking Twilight selling the delusion that you can make no choices and still get everything you could ever want.

I like that this film tried to shift back and forth between Jasmine and Dallas’s storylines. That could have made them seem like equals. Todd Hayes, who directed Carol, says that the best love stories are presented from the perspective of the more vulnerable party. And he talks about how he created a subtle shift in Carol from Therese’s perspective to Carol’s perspective as that changed in their story. And I think this film almost tried that. But Dallas’s storyline and her vulnerability would simply have needed to be reworked.

#below her mouth #wlw #ff pairings

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takaraphoenix · 3 years

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Grey’s Anatomy: Review

Took me four months, but I have successfully watched all 16 seasons of Grey’s Anatomy - and what there is of season 17. Figured it deserves some words.

HOLY SHIT I LOVE THIS SHOW? SO MUCH?

(To set the appropriate mood for this and give you a TL;DR.)

That being said to open it up, it is most definitely not flawless. So let’s start there. For me, the one big flaw it has is really the writers’ cuckolding kink. So. Much. Cheating. And - worse than the cheating plots - the cheating apologism. They echo the exact same sentiment so often, that cheating is only one mistake and humans make mistakes. That’s... at one point, that stops being a plot device and starts to be very telling about the writer, to be quite frank.

That being said, let’s roll out the positive. And let’s kick it off with something that relates to all the cheating; so many forced love-triangles, but they usually don’t include toxic rivalries. It’d be so easy to have the men throw punches over the women or the women pull hair and scratch each other’s eyes... so many other rom-drama shows do it already, after all. But, honestly, the two lose ends on the love V (because these things ain’t triangles) usually have such a good dynamic with each other, ranging from civil to friendships to deep mentor ships - Meredith and Addison, Mark and Jackson, Cristina and Teddy? Seeing these dynamics, quite frankly, makes having to sit through a love-triangle-nonsense actually more than bearable.

The most impressive thing about the show is, to me, the amount of rep on it. I mean sure, the main lead is white and I’d estimate half the overall cast are white, but even from the get go - in 2005 - the ratio of white actors versus actors of color in the main cast was five to four. And they’re not background or side characters - I mean, two of them are, aside from Meredith, the only ones to still be around on season 17. They all have their own plotlines, their own relationships and troubles and struggles. It’s not just the Meredith show, not by far.

And beyond that, the queer rep on this show is... honestly mindblowing? I mean, seriously?

They introduced their first queer character in season 2, in 2005, when other procedual dramas that aired then in large parts just... never... added queer characters. And sure! Joe was only a recurring character and not a main character, but he was recurring for six seasons, he recurred a lot, he got established, he and his husband partook in the plot. And, again, this was just the beginning, back in 2005.

They’ve since then steadily broadened their horizon and become more inclusive.

Recurring and main character wise, we’ve had 5 lesbians, 5 bisexual women, 4 gay men and 2 trans characters over these 17 seasons. That’s a very solid list, honestly. If I look at other shows, again especially procedual dramas that are still largely aimed at a more conservative audience, the fact that we’ve had actual queer storylines in every single season since season 2? That’s amazing.

Even more so on the one-off characters, to be quite honest. Just... casually, this patient has two moms, this man is visited by his husband, here the child of the patient is nonbinary, look this patient is in a polyamorous relationship. Sure, those are only the one-off episodical characters, but you have no idea how much that matters too.

I know I’m repeating myself with this, but especially when compared to other procedual dramas, where the characters are often only queer when it’s important to the plot. He got beaten up and ended up in the hospital because he was gay. She got killed because she was trans. They’re motivational and important to the plot (and also usually used to victimize the characters).

The fact that this show, even 10+ years ago already, just... included queerness as part of our reality, included it casually, positively and repeatedly - really, it’s not just like it’s one episode per season like it’s some obligation, it happens a lot? For no actual needed plot reason, she just has a wife and she’s just happily married to her wife and that’s it, because queer people exist.

And I just, I struggle to express how much this casual rep means to me? And how it becomes even more amazing if you consider how long ago it started? And if you add to it the steady prominent recurring/main character rep?

Sure, it’s not perfect - the majority of their characters of color are black; it’s not overly diverse when it comes to what characters of color it included, it took forever to include the second Asian character and the first Muslim character and it could feature a broader variety of ethnicities, just like it could offer a broader variety of queer experiences, I mean it took them forever to introduce the first mlm main character and they have yet to include a bisexual man, I’d also just love to see an ace character or a polyamorous character, to paint a contrast to the sex-obsession and cheating plotlines - but... it’s doing more than many others and I do think it deserves praise for that and it keeps improving. They didn’t just add Erica and Callie as the first wlw couple and then stuck to only having two queer ladies on screen at the same time and never more, just constantly replacing Callie’s girlfriend. They kept adding more, they keep adding more.

Now, on to my absolute favorite thing about this show.

Because, let’s make one thing clear, I hate cheating and under other circumstances the amount of cheating on this show would have driven me off it ten seasons ago. But despite all of the very forced romance drama and sex obsessed allos on the show, that is not the show’s main focus.

This was never mainly about the romance. It’s always been about the platonic relationships first and foremost. Romances changed and broke up and got complicated, but what prospered were the friendships and found family relationships.

Cristina and Meredith are the defining relationship of this show. They are... friendship portrayed in a way I have never seen friendship portrayed before. The writing on their dynamic is just amazing.

And when Cristina leaves the show, the shift to Meredith-Alex and to the sister-dynamic between Meredith, Maggie and Amelia really works.

Personally, after watching the show, I’ve come to divide it into three arcs, each with a Part A and a Part B.

The first arc of the show - spanning seasons 1 to 5 - are about Meredith, Cristina, George, Izzie and Alex. And they explore the dynamic between those five and the individual relationships between them all, so very well. This was really found family done right.

Arc 2 is what I dubbed the rebranding arc - seasons 6 to 10. In Part A (s6 to s8), we got the focus on the Mercy West merger, ending in the horrific plane crash. While Part B is what I call the outfall, season 9 dealing with the outfall from the plane crash and season 10 being all about that Meredith-Cristina outfall.

I love Arc 1 a whole lot, it’s really good. I think Arc 2 is good too, especially the plane crash and its outfall were very gripping and well done, but I do think that this middle part earns the dub as rebranding because it feels like the show itself is trying to find its footing, trying to figure out a direction after MAGIC graduated into residents (and, inevitably, fell apart with the death of George and the departure of Izzie). It’s a bit unfocused on where it wants to go and I still loathe the big misunderstanding nonsense of season 10 (but am glad that Meredith and Cristina rekindled before Cristina’s departure).

Arc 3 is the sisters arc, where the Meredith-Maggie-Amelia dynamic rules, with a more uneven split between A and B, because A spans seasons 11 to 16 for me and is lovingly dubbed the Merlex arc by me, while B is just... season 17; the corona pandemic is really shifting the tone and focus and it coincides with the departure of Alex.

I’m more mixed on it than I am on the other two. For me, Cristina and Meredith just are the heart and soul of the show, so despite just how brilliantly they handled that all, I still miss them (though I greatly appreciate the fact that she still regularly comes up through phone calls, texts, etc). I greatly disliked Alex’s departure (which is a rant of its own).

On the overall, I would actually rank them in order - the first five seasons were my favorite, followed by the awkward middle because it still added brilliant things to it regardless, and despite coming in last, I do also love the second half of the show with the sisters in the focus.

I do admit that I had high hopes that Jo would become Meredith’s new person in season 17, considering the tremendous growth their relationship had - especially considering how Meredith crawled into Jo’s bed and was the one to coax what had happened with her mother out of her; that was “my person” behavior, quite frankly, and I also thought that Alex’s departure might bring them closer. I truly did not like Alex’s parting words to Meredith that she’s always been her own person.

Well, duh. Meredith Grey is an absolute badass. Which, also a thing I love a lot about this show. She is so incredibly strong and brilliant and takes care of herself.

But the point of her having her person was never that she needed someone else to stand in for her; it was to have someone around whom she didn’t have to be that strong. Someone she could come to to be weak around, someone to have her back when everything became too much. You just... can’t do that for yourself. So that sentiment was just incredible rubbish and I will be very mad if they truly have her embrace that nonsense, because she deserves someone like that.

Lastly, let’s talk romantic relationships. Very broadly, I assure you - I wouldn’t even have the patience to tackle them all, I mean seriously everyone has had sex on this show, or so it feels (no but seriously, the amount of overlapping ships on this show is ridiculous).

The only note I do have on that is that... nothing lasts forever. Quite frankly, the most “endgame” ships on this show are Richard/Catherine and Ben/Miranda (which, bless them, those two are literally my favorite of the canon ships). Everything else is just... fair game? They change, they break up, even if you absolutely hate a ship - don’t worry, it’s gonna end soon.

And occasionally, that... is even more rewarding than seeing a couple you do like get together? I mean, honestly, watching a ship you dislike for x reasons and then having them break up on screen and a character actually listing x reasons to the other’s face? Very carthatic.

I also have to mention the adoption positivity; Meredith and Derek adopt a child, not as a last resort after all else has failed, but simply because they fell in love with that little girl, Ben and Bailey took in Joey, because they have big hearts. So often, adoption is only shown as that very, very last option after you wasted thousands of dollars on all other biological options and then it is like a tragic compromise or something. Seeing them just... fall in love with this baby and adopt her and love her is so refreshing?

This show is just... really, really good? The writing is brilliant. I mean, this show made me laugh more than some comedies have? It’s funny, poignant and... not overly dramatic? I mean, of course it’s dramatic - it’s a drama. But it’s more... grounded. Even with some outstandingly extreme things happening, it is still very down to Earth, compared to other dramas that feel the need to go higher and more bizarre each season. It’s incredibly consistent, it includes so much rep and actual plotlines for every character, it really draws out relationships - familiar, platonic, romantic - in such great details.

I just really love this show.

#Grey's Anatomy #Phoe's Random Show Rants

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