#i can’t imagine anyone else as luke and it’s very obvious and apparent he’s getting better with every role he takes

[the-edge-of-great]

can you do 14 with alex finding out that gay marriage is legal maybe learning about other wholesome lgbt+ progress since '95

(there’s a weird glitch or something on my feed where the ask isn’t showing, so just in case, this is for @lemonwilford)

so after finishing this, I have four tabs open for formal dresses, wedding venues, and lesbian wedding aesthetics on Pinterest AND I have an article from 1993 about gay rights (started as a reference but then it got interesting so really, it’s my fourth article)

in other words I kinda get obsessed and distracted with researching and referencing for anything that I write, so, TL;DR enjoy :)

also juke is totally established in this cause I said so

14. “That’s legal now?”

-------

“Ready?”

“Ready!” the guys call back to Julie. They’re in the studio, patiently waiting for the surprise she wanted to show them. She was eager about something when she came home from school and told them she couldn’t practice on Saturday. They might’ve been bummed had she not been bouncing with excitement. Alex had smiled fondly at her; excited Julie was his favorite Julie.

She promised to show them what was happening Saturday before leaving, and now they’re eager themselves.

Julie throws open both studio doors with a type of dramatic flare that Alex can respect. She saunters in wearing a gorgeous golden dress with lace shoulders, a sweetheart neckline, and a hem stops just above her knee, matching heels clicking across the floor. Her hair bounces against her shoulders: big and curly and gorgeous, like always. She’s wearing red lipstick, and her eyeliner is sharp and precise; Alex thinks it’s called a cat eye. There’s so much lingo he still needs to catch up on.

He meets her halfway with a grin and offers his hand. “You look beautiful,” he says, spinning her in a circle. She twists on the toe of her heel, and her dress flares. There are sparkles in the intricate design across her chest that glisten under the studio lights. Alex catches her around the waist when she stumbles to a stop.

“Yeah,” Reggie agrees. “You look amazing.”

Alex joins Reggie as Luke approaches. They share a knowing smile.

“Where are you going looking so good?” he asks, arms wrapping around her waist and pulling her close.

Julie beams at him. “A wedding for one of my friends from music class. Her moms are getting married.”

Alex blinks. “Moms?”

Luke frowns. “You mean… two women?”

Like a switch, Julie’s bright demeanor falters. She pushes against Luke’s arms, frowning as she breaks away from him. “Yeah,” she answers, eyeing each of them carefully. “Are you guys… okay with that?”

Alex makes a noise—somewhere between a scoff and a snicker. Okay with that? Of course he is. But confused? Yes. Very.

Reggie nods, chewing on his lip. He’s trying not to smile—Alex can see the corners of his mouth twitching. “Yeah,” he says. “Of course we are, we just—”

“That’s legal now?” Alex blurts.

A second passes, but Julie’s eyes widen with realization. “Ninety-five,” she mutters to herself, nodding slowly. “Right.” Louder, she explains, “Yeah, gay marriage was legalized, like, five years ago. Actually, a lot’s changed since the 90s.”

Luke snickers. “No kidding.”

“Oh my gosh, wait until you see Pride in June! LA has the best celebrations.” She shifts her weight, smiling sheepishly. “Not that I have experienced any outside of here to compare, but, you know what I mean. It’s so much fun! Flynn and I went with Sarah and her moms last year—Sarah’s moms are the ones getting married today.”

Julie is looking at him more than she usually looks at Luke—and she catches herself every time, quickly averting her eyes back to him and Reggie—which is really saying something. She can’t possibly know though, right? He certainly didn’t tell her. He knows neither Luke nor Reggie told her. Is it really so obvious, or could she perhaps… actually be a witch? Was Reggie on to something?

Alex rolls his eyes; he must be having an off day or something to really consider Julie being a witch and Reggie to be right.

“… Or not,” Julie says, rocking on her heels and twisting the ring on her finger. She’s looking at him again, much less sure of herself than before. Reggie and Luke are staring too; Luke elbows him in the side and glares.

“What?” Alex whines, pushing him away. “What are you—Oh! Oh, I wasn’t—I didn’t—” He shakes his head at Julie. “I wasn’t rolling my eyes at you! I just… had a dumb idea… Anyway, I’m sorry, what did you say?”

“She said we could go with her,” Reggie explains. “To the wedding, if we want to.” He raises his eyebrows knowingly. How come everyone is so knowing toward him all of a sudden?

“You should,” Julie persists. “Sarah showed us pictures of the venue today at school. It looks gorgeous in the daylight—I can’t wait to see it tonight.”

Luke grins. “Of course we’ll go.” He chuckles at the guys. “I mean, what else do we have to do?”

So, that’s how they end up in the outdoors of Orange County. The guys ride in the back of Ray’s car—apparently, ghosts can ride in cars. Flynn doesn’t carpool with Julie; when the girls reunite, she explains how her mom decided last minute that Flynn’s hair would look better in a bun rather than her regular braids.

They pose for pictures from Ray and the wedding photographer. Then Sarah, Alex thinks—a teenage girl with fair skin and copper red hair in a neat plait against her shoulder—rushes over with the biggest grin on her face. The girls gush over their outfits, the night, the decorations, etc etc. They’re cute; Alex shares a fond smile with Luke and Reggie.

“This place is pretty,” Reggie admits, turning in a slow circle to take in the scenery. They’re in a forest, surrounded by towering pine trees, and there are lights everywhere. Streams of globe bulbs are strung up from tree to tree, creating an arch in the center where a long, white rug leads to a stage filled with golden flowers. The sun was already setting when they left Julie’s house, so by now, the reception is a warm glow in an otherwise dark forest.

“Alex,” Luke mutters, as if anyone could actually hear them, and nudges his elbow into Alex’s side, “look around dude. Most of these couples aren’t straight.”

He noticed when they first arrived that men mostly stayed with men and women mostly stayed with women, but now that Luke has pointed it out, Alex is noticing that the guests are actually couples. A couple to their left is discussing the food. One man feeds the other a bite of a sandwich and gloats when his partner admits it’s actually not bad. To their right, two women are posing in front of the wedding photographer. One is kissing the other’s cheek.

“I think this is the most…” Alex pauses, trying to both find the right word and take it all in because, really, this is a lot. It’s a good amount of a lot, of course, but… These people are openly showing off their partners. They’re happy. They’re proud of themselves. And the straight people aren’t saying anything rude? No one is cursing at them? Claiming they’ve damned themselves?

“Alex?” Reggie asks softly.

“I know a lot is different from, you know,” Alex begins, “but I think this is the biggest change I’ve seen. I mean—” He gestures wildly at the scene before them. “This is legal! This is legal. It’s accepted. They’re just—Everyone is just—themselves! They’re themselves, and it’s okay.”

“I was gonna ask how you feel about it, but—” Luke shares a laugh with Reggie— “I think I have my answer.”

“I feel…” Alex rocks on his heels, considering his answer. He chews on his lip. “You guys will probably think it’s dumb, but—”

“You know we won’t think it’s dumb,” Reggie argues immediately. Alex glances at him. He’s giving Alex this look with a raised eyebrow, like he can’t believe he would even think that. Which is valid, you know, because they’ve never been anything less than supportive of Alex. Of course they haven’t; he really lucked out in the friend department.

“I feel safe here.” He shoves his hands in his jacket pockets. “Like when I could finally leave my house to go to practice, and I knew none of you guys would judge me if I told you about a guy that I thought was cute.” He finds Julie in the crowd, chatting with the lesbian couple he saw earlier, posing for pictures—selfies—with them and laughing when the woman’s partner hid bunny ears behind her head. 

Alex rubs the back of his neck. “I just… don’t think I could’ve imagined feeling safe around people who aren’t my friends.” He finally turns to Luke and Reggie, who are watching him with wide grins. Alex huffs a laugh. “Stop looking at me like that.”

Reggie chuckles. He slings an arm around Alex’s shoulders. “We’re just happy for you, man.”

“Yeah,” Luke agrees. He hums. “Can’t wait to see what the whole thing with June is about.”

“Yeah!” Reggie exclaims. “D’ya think it’s a few days? A week?”

“We can ask Julie later,” Alex suggests.

Reggie snickers. “If she doesn’t stay with Flynn.”

Luke hums. “Yeah, I’m gonna… go convince her to stay home tonight.” He pauses to squeeze Alex’s shoulder before leaving them for the dance floor.

Alex suddenly steps away from Reggie. “I, uh… I’ll be right back.”

“Where are you going?”

“I just—I want to find Willie. I want to talk to him about something.”

“You’re really going to leave me third wheeling with jukebox over there?”

Alex snorts. “Jukebox? Have they approved of that name?”

“… They don’t know about it.” Reggie pauses, then adds, “And you’re not going to tell them.”

“I promise.”

Reggie chuckles. “You better. Now go, find your boy.”

He’s at the museum, the first place Alex looks. He’s just leaving actually—as soon as Alex arrives at the building, Willie is phasing through the door, about to skate down the street.

“Willie!” Alex calls. 

Willie steps off his board. He turns to him, and instantly, a smile spreads across his face. “Hey, Alex. What’s up?”

“So,” Alex says, stopping in front of him, grinning, “tell me about Pride.”

Willie’s eyes shine at the request, just as beautiful as the lights from the wedding. 

“I’d love to.”

#Julie and the phantoms #JATP #JATPprompts #willex #willie jatp #willie x alex #Alex jatp

[ieatmypizzawithaforkandknife]

MAG 020 - Desecrated Host (part 2)

Summary: Jonathan reads the second half of the statement of Father Edwin Burroughs, regarding “his claimed demonic possession.”

I’d like to propose an alternate title for this one: “Bartleby”. I couldn’t help but see the parallel between Bartleby the Scrivener’s “I would prefer not to” and Father Burroughs saying, “seeing those bound corpses before me, I made the decision to take no action ever again.” Ah, Burroughs! Ah, humanity!

I mentioned in my last post that this episode was very heavy in the “altered reality” theme. I’d like to amend that: this entire episode was one long, terrifying fever dream. I’ve never been high but I think this might be what a bad trip feels like.

Jonny Sims et al. really outdid themselves on this one though, in both the writing and the performance. So many episodes really suck you in (not literally, fortunately - we’re luckier than some of the characters that way) and grip you ’til the very end. But this was one of the best so far for that. We get more than standard descriptions of things - we get things like that small, whispered “it was bright...so bright” in Father Burroughs’ description of the “church” and the resounding, gonging bell sound accompanying the bell-speech Father Burroughs hears. You can almost feel his throbbing head and blurring vision, and at times it just feels so real.

But it wasn’t. At least, not in the way that we like to think of reality. Whatever an outside observer might have seen that night, this statement was Father Burroughs’ reality. We do know that at least some of this episode was real in the normal sense of the word though. There are snippets, like Father Singh’s reaction to seeing Father Burroughs in the small chapel, and Father Burroughs later seeing Father Singh in the hallway, that seem like they were part of objective reality. Was this slip between reality and the illusion just so that we, the audience, knew that it wasn’t real? Or was it because whatever was affecting him couldn’t keep an airtight grip on his senses? I’d like for it to be the latter, but I’m worried that’s not the case. I do not like how powerful this thing seems to be.

During the “confession”, “Father Singh” recounted all of Father Burroughs’ past sins...so this thing either actually knew about all of those events, or it made Father Burroughs imagine that “Father Singh” was naming all of his sins (a la the psychic paper in Doctor Who). Also disturbing was the detail about its accent during the “confession” - it had “a crisp and clipped RP accent”, as opposed to Father Singh’s Indian one. The change in accent made it obvious for us that it was not Father Singh speaking, but otherwise it just makes no sense to me. Was it unable to imitate Father Singh’s accent for some reason? That might fit if it’s the same thing that spoke in a “low, grating voice” to Laura Popham in episode 15. But those are the only two times (that I recall) that the person making the statement has noted a change in the person’s voice when that static appears.

There are two possibilities I’m seeing for how this thing operates. Either it’s little more than an illusionist, or it can actually alter reality itself. The first would certainly be easier to deal with, but I’m leaning towards the latter. My main reason for thinking that is not strictly things seen in this episode, but more how things in this episode seem to relate to things in the rest of the season so far. We hear that recurring creepy static/interference twice in this episode, once when Father Burroughs reads Genesis 4:14 (after opening his Bible to Luke, no less) and once when “Father Singh” says, “Spiritual pride that has led to quite a fall.” And of course we have another appearance of creepy eyes: “the church’s large round window shifted as I watched, as though it were a tremendous eye that were turning to focus upon me.” The eye and the staticky voice tie these events to many others from the first half of this season, including a few times when reality itself seems to have been affected, rather than just people’s perception of it.

There were two Bible passages referenced in this episode. The second was Mark 9:14-19, which appears to be a pretty straightforward reference to Father Burroughs’ situation, as that passage tells the story of a boy “who is possessed by a spirit that has robbed him of speech” (NIV). But the first, as mentioned in the paragraph above, was Genesis 4:14: “Behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the Earth, and from they face shall I be hid. And I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the Earth, and it shall come to pass that everyone that findeth me shall slay me.” And the writing around it seemed to swirl and was “obscured by dark stains”. This is obviously significant, given the static and the unexplained stains and the fact that this verse is actually quoted in the text (unlike the passage from Mark also in this episode, which was referenced but not quoted). But I can’t figure out the significance of this verse. Cain says the text of this verse to God after God banishes him for killing Abel. Cain is more or less saying that his punishment is too much to bear and that he fears for his life, presumably from others who will surely be angry about him killing Abel. The only possible parallel I can see between Cain and Father Burroughs is that they’re both cut off from God. If there’s anything more to this verse, I’m not getting it.

I’ve also been wondering about the various figures Father Burroughs sees throughout this hallucination. He sees shadowy figures along the street that “were always gone when I approached” - and then there were the parishioners in the pews at the “service”. Were the shadow figures the parishioners? Or were the shadow figures actual, real people, and his inability to reach them just a reflection of how trapped in this hallucination he was? And why did the parishioners come and go like that? Why were they leaving before the “service” was over? If they were real people then I think they had to have been members of the People’s Church of the Divine Host (episode 9). I just feel like there was something else going on at the “service” that Father Burroughs wasn’t privy to.

At the end of the episode, Jonathan calls attention to the man who met Father Burroughs at the Oratory door: “the altar server he described seems out of place with most of his other delusions, in that he appeared to have active agency.” We aren’t given much of a description of the “altar server” - he is tall, pale, and has thin, bony arms. None of that rings any particular bells (haha) to me, but I guess I’ll be on the lookout for a tall, pale guy with thin, bony arms. *shrugs*

“Cause of death was listed as blood loss from multiple lacerations all over their legs and torso, as well as removal of both their faces with a sharp blade, possibly a scalpel.” However, no tools or weapons were found at the scene, and “at no point did he perform any actions that might be analogous with the binding and actual murder of the students,” leading Jonathan to believe a second person was there. HMMM. I WONDER WHO THAT COULD HAVE BEEN.

The cause of death is very unusual, though, when you consider it from a real-world standpoint. It’s pretty easy to die of blood loss if, say, your carotid or jugular is cut. But lacerations on the legs and torso? Those lacerations would have to be extensive to cause fatal blood loss. It just doesn’t sit right with me - and it reminds me of another death we heard about previously. In episode 8, Ivo Lensik says his father was found dead in his study “with deep gouges along his wrists and arms”, and the coroner couldn’t identify the tool used on his arms. Robert Montauk (episode 9) also bled out, but that was after being stabbed 47 times, so it’s similar but not quite the same. The common threads I’m seeing in all three deaths are (a) cause of death being blood loss and (b) the idea that someone committed the murder who was not known to be there at the time.

Coincidentally, Father Burroughs was imprisoned at Wakefield Prison, the same place where Robert Montauk died a few years prior. I thought something might be up with that prison, so I did a quick search and apparently it’s a high-security prison for those who’ve committed crimes such as murder, rape, armed robbery, and kidnapping (Wikipedia). So there may not be any kind of supernatural connection there, but now I’m wondering if we’re going to get statements from or about anyone else in that prison.

One last observation. The sickly yellow color seen so many times in episode 18 made two appearances in this episode. Father Burroughs describes the parishioners at the “service” as having “fevered, jaundiced yellow” skin, and the stole that Mystery Altar Server gave Father Burroughs was “a pale, sickly yellow.” Oh, and that stole from Father Burroughs’ fever dream? An identical real one was delivered to the Oratory a few days prior to these events by Breekon and Hope Deliveries. And it must have been one of their last deliveries, since they liquidated some time in 2009, the year these events occurred.

Curiouser and curiouser...

This post is part of a series where I write my thoughts about each episode and obsessively connect dots in an effort to figure out The Big Mysteries of the series. All posts in this series are tagged “is this liveblogging?” Comments and messages are welcome but I have only listened to season 1, so I ask that you not spoil me for anything beyond episode 40. In the words of Jonny Sims…thanks for listening!

#personal #liveblogging #is this liveblogging? #The Magnus Archives #Bartleby the Scrivener #I'm tagging that in the hopes that some poor soul looking for help or commiseration on their high school English reading assignment #sees this post and is like 'what. pray tell. the fuck'

[ayellowcurtain]

Spare us some LuKes romance fics?

Part 1

The loud music is starting to get under his skin. Maybe the best was to stay home, enjoy his...birhtday gift somehow and called it a day. The last thing Kes wanted was to have an entire night to see Isa making out with fucking Gijs at his own house, acting like she owns the place and like she and Kes didn’t broke up only weeks ago.

Kes pushes people aside to finally get to Jayden right in the middle of the dance floor, being loud and obnoxious as always, he puts his hand in every pocket he can find in Jayden’s clothes, searching for a small bag with something fluffy inside.

“Hey, hey, bro! Just ask...jesus fucking christ.” Jayden shoves his hands away from him, frowning as he finally grabs the plastic bag, offering it to Kes that takes it right away.

“It’s all mine, I’ll pay you later with interest.”

“Yeah, you will.” Jayden raises his eyebrows, winking and going back to talking to whoever he’s talking.

As Kes is going to the bathroom after the kitchen, he notices Lucas in a corner, drinking his beer, not talking to anyone, just watching as the party keeps going around him.

Kes makes a sharp turn to his direction, noticing how Lucas stands up from the wall he was just leaning against, putting his beer down.

“I’m gonna go smoke, come with me.” And he doesn’t check, but he knows Lucas is following him.

The kitchen is filled with people, nobody that Kes knows personally, just people that his dad payed to make tonight’s food. After that, there’s the space where some employees stay for the night if they have to.

Kes doesn’t really know what’s a normal house, but he imagines it something like this - if Jayden’s house is something to be considered normal: a small living room, a bedroom with a double bed and in between the two, a normal size bathroom, the employees use their kitchen to make their food.

The bathroom is usually locked, the employees have the keys, but Kes and all his brothers and sisters have the same group of women constantly taking care of them to this date. Fleur is the oldest and she obviously has the keys and Kes is obviously her favorite and so he has spare keys too for whenever he needs to escape from his family and work.

He unlocks the door and opens it, letting Lucas go in first, following him closely, locking the door, turning the lights on. His old bathtub is still there, a good memory of when he was young and spent way too many hours inside, playing with his toys.

Lucas looks around, but doesn’t seem too impressed, sitting on the sink, watching what Kes will do next. He shows the bag to Lucas and goes to sit inside the bathtub, settling everything in his thighs, rolling a joint.

“Do you even talk?” He decides to ask when he’s finally done, lighting his joint, looking at Lucas.

“Yes...”

“Not much then. You’ve been here for a couple of hours now and I still don’t understand. How are you so fucking chill about this?” He takes a deep breath in, feeling the smoke fill his throat, instantly going up to his brain. “You know you’re a payment, a birhtday gift, for me. And you’re just there, not giving two shits about it.”

Lucas relaxes, leaning against the mirror behind him and he just shrugs.

“See? I think you’re crazy or way too fucking naive.”

“Do you even know the real world, Kes?” It shouldn’t be a surprise, it’s obvious that Lucas knows his name, but it still leaves something unsettled inside of him. “This life that you live, it’s a utopia. You act like people really have choices all the time when most of the time it’s not as black in white as you might think.”

Kes really looks at Lucas, trying to find some type of sign of anxiety or angriness or anything like it, but he’s stil talking slow and with a soft voice, talking like he would if the subject was how the weather is horrible outside.

“Look around you. This castle that you live in, I can’t even imagine how much it cost and how much it costs to keep it in order, with all these employes, throwing this absurds parties like it’s normal. You think anyone else in the outisde world has a way to compete with all the power all this money gives your family?”

Kes pushes himself up against the bathtub, putting both feet against the white bottom, the weed not helping calm his nerves.

He looks up and Lucas is still looking at him, not at all afected or scared. “When I asked if you talked I didn’t mean for you to start talking to no end, Lucas. You should be a little more careful with what you say.”

Lucas is not wrong, he’s as right as right can be and Kes would never hurt him, but Lucas apparently has a very big mouth full of sharp opinions.

“I’m not afraid of you.” He answers right away and Kes smiles without noticing. He only does when Lucas smiles back.

-

It’s getting late, but nobody seems to be even thinking about leaving. Kes regrets even thinking about a party. Now all he can think about is Lucas. After that conversation in the hidden bathroom, they stayed there for a little longer, not really talking, just looking at each other.

Kes still has some of Jayden’s weed in his pocket, but he might be good for the night, so he’ll save it for later. He’s still feeling light headed and his heart beating faster than normal.

Isa is still with Gijs. Kes saw Jayden going somewhere with a girl he didn’t recognize and Lucas is still there, mainly watching the party, not really interacting with anyone.

When their eyes finally meet, Kes raises his eyebrows, lifting his beer to Lucas’ direction. He watches as Lucas finishes his beer and puts it on one of the desk, moving around so confident, going upstairs like it’s his house. He doesn’t look back and his confidence makes Kes laugh, finishing his beer too.

Nobody is giving him any attention either, so he does as Lucas wants him to and follows him upstairs.

They’re complete alone on the second floor. Lucas is far away, almost at Kes’ bedroom door. The darkness lights up a little when Lucas opens the door and turns the lights on, painting the first meters around him a golden, warm yellow. He’s still not looking back to check if Kes followed him. Kes can see him taking his shirt off, letting it slipping down his arm to the floor and he’s gone, leaving the bedroom door open behind him.

Kes looks at the party happening downstairs and he couldn’t care less about it. If they burn the house down, they burn the house down. Kes has more important things to take care of. He finally starts walking to his bedroom, closing and locking the door behind him.

Happy fucking birthday, Kes.

#skam nl #skam netherlands #lucas van der heijden #kes de beus #lukes

[jcmorgenstern]

3x12 “review” (aka whining)

Okay so 3x12! First the things I liked, so this doesn’t come off as a gigantic whining list of things I hated. (I feel kind of bad I didn’t do a 3x11 review because I actually really liked that one, but I guess I have more motivation to whine than anything else).

readmore for length and sanity.

So things I liked:

Luke and Jace interaction! Though the pacing was absolutely insane and I absolutely refuse to believe that the Clave has the infrastructure in place to take detailed barometric readings in the MIDDLE OF NOWHERE SIBERIA, so detailed that Jace can easily pinpoint exactly where the apartment was. Like I wouldn’t believe they have that kind of detail in rural Iowa, let alone a place that’s colder than balls.

That last point was all whining.The Morgenstern sword!! Y’all have NO idea how long I spent being mad that Valentine didn’t have it in the first two seasons. It now seems a bit odd to introduce it now considering Valentine didn’t in fact ever have it, but whatever. Also Clary being like “fuck Morgenstern weapons” was kind of funny considering her kindjals are waiting at home.

Magnus’ storyline. Though it’s kind of weird and rushed and confused, I’m just glad my man is getting some real focus on him as a person rather than a love interest or idk some overblown “son of Edom” thing.

Cain was, I admit, a really cool and interesting concept, and I already really like Pasha!! I hope he’s continuing to get better after his surgery. Don’t love as much how they’re mainlining Lilith as the Biggest Bad Ever and a Whole Evil B*tch (more on that lovely term of endearment later).

Mirek was really cool, kind of had to laugh at the “demon middle class.” Can’t help but wonder if the “status quo” thing was a deliberate political joke or not. Either way, Jonathan has never met a structure he doesn’t want to overthrow. Does the Clave spark joy? Apparently not.

MELIORN IS BACK!!!!! And wants a threesome, apparently.

Jonathan peevishly being like “I forgive you for trying to kill me, btw” and Clary just rolling her eyes and ignoring him.

Jonathan’s fucking GAAAY. (Or bi. pan. whatever. You do you. All I’m saying is THIS BITCH RAINBOW). I do not care what the intention was, that’s what I’m choosing to get out of it.

Things I didn’t like:

the plot of this episode is pretty much enough material for an entire season. They compressed it so much people are calling it a filler episode. Jace and Luke figure out the secret of the apartment (which is untraceable), go to Siberia, figure out Jonathan is alive, find Clary and rescue her and that’s only about 15 minutes of footage overall. That could be spread out over 15 episodes.

On the Simon side: they find the first fucking vampire, become his new bestie, get the only thing in the world that could rid him of the mark without any sort of price or even really having to ask, they get back into Faerie without any problems, Meliorn takes them right to the Queen despite knowing Simon has a weapon of death on his face, she agrees without argument to unmark him not even knowing if he’ll explode or what, the mark is off in about 14 seconds, the FUCKING DRUG PLOTLINE IS BACK AG A. I N. And then rose petals. That could have been the entire SEASON.

No Maia. (I know she’s in the next ep I just want to complain).

It’s also weird because it seems like Malec is progressing on normal time and the other two story strands are progressing on some extreme kind of fast-forward. It gives you all kinds of whiplash. If there was any kind of thematic overlap or even an attempt to connect the strands thematically it might work to ground the other storylines but it. Does not.

I hate that the apartment is Lilith’s and not Valentine’s, and that apparently it can only go to a few select spots now. NOT. THE. POINT. Point = missed.

And onto the things that bothered me the most: the whole treatment of Jonathan and Clary, and the Sizzy. For which I need an entire section to bitch.

Jonathan and Clary: why god have you abandoned me

* Ok so honestly, I had to go and check to see who wrote 3x11 and 3x12, because  it had to be different people. 3x11 was by Todd and Darren, and 3x12 was by Alex Schemmer. Schemmer has only written one other episode in 3a (3x03), which explains to me why he seems to have missed a fair bit of lore. To me, the huge difference between 3x11 and 12, which basically deal with the same plot line (Clary kidnapped by Jonathan, wary of him, trying to escape) but in hugely different ways and different focus.

In 3x11, the focus is all on Clary. Her initial confusion, her fear, anger, the attempt to escape, the attempt to kill Jonathan. All shot from her point of view. She takes more action than he does—she runs away, she grabs the knife, she stabs him. He is mostly reacting to her, running after her, offering her soup and tea and trying to win her over. Even when he does talk, the scenes where he talks about himself are brief and she shares equal part in the conversation.

This makes sense, as she is the main character.

In 3x12, everything is about Jonathan. From the first shot everything is about him, the camera focusing on him even when Clary is the focus of the scene (i.e., when she’s finding new clothes—and was a shirtless scene necessary? Like we get it, you nearly killed poor Luke in a gym somewhere, thanks for the update). Every time he and Clary talk, it’s just him talking at her. “I forgive you for killing me.” Telling her she’s good at art. Telling her there’s an Institute nearby. Telling her he likes art. She can barely get a word in edgewise from the get-go, and it only gets worse on the hot chocolate “date.”

He says the whole point is to get to know each other better, but he LITERALLY talks about himself the whole time. Clary barely even reacts, just makes eyes at a phone. He doesn’t even seem to notice she’s not listening. Like guys, this is every bad tinder date ever. Then they go to to the antiques store, and even then she’s shuffled off—shoo! Get out of the scene!! Even the French guy interrupts her at every turn and she gets shuffled off like a sack of potatoes *again*.

Like don’t tell me Clary couldn’t kick his ass and then explain things to him when he’s pinned to the ground. It would be faster, safer, and if Jonathan shows up again she can be like “ohh he was threatening us!! Look, I beat him up to keep us safe!” and Jonathan would buy it hook, line, and sinker. Since killing people in broad daylight is ok, clearly the show isn’t worried about the realism of fighting in the streets.

And then she’s shuffled off AGAIN, and although the show clearly understands that being kidnapped and controlled by your dangerously unhappy brother who seriously has the creepy hots for you is a pretty freakin SCARY situation, it still shows all this from Jonathan’s point of view, teasing the “romance” of it all and giving us hehe teehee little slips of it (like the shirtless scene). And then when she finally is able to break free and actually do something, he yells “BITCH” at her and runs off, and she falls into Jace’s arms, completely forgetting to act like a real human being.

The reason why 3x11 works so much more for me is that Clary is at least an equal partner, and is given space to react and actually do things; in 3x12 they seem to take any excuse to bundle her off, keep her out of frame, mute her reactions. Jonathan and his feelings take center stage and suddenly Clary is a side character in her own story. 3x11 is more compelling because Jonathan is legitimately trying to win her over, trying to connect with her, personally. It’s obvious he cares about her opinions as a person and her as a person—you couldn’t replace her with a cardboard cutout and the scene would read the same. They actually interact. In 3x12 he’s just ranting at her about himself while she sits there. On no narrative level is there any sort of connection or interaction.

Like imagine the situation differently. They’re in art store, because lbr the real museums prolly wouldn’t let them shoot there, and Clary is talking to Jonathan about her favorite prints and artists. He’s listening, maybe a little too intently, maybe talks about a piece he likes and what it means to him. She looks unnerved. As they talk, the camera follows her gaze, and we realize she is trying to find someone’s phone to take it. She’s pretending, of course, but there is something charming about Paris. Jonathan keeps offering to buy her souvenirs, very awkwardly, trying to find something to please her. She picks something to make him happy. He returns from the register just before she can make a grab for someone’s phone and bolt for the door. He suggests they go to the cafe across the square. We cut to where they’re sitting down, she’s tearing into a croissant. Jonathan is wearing a “I <3 PARIS” cap, which is a bit jarring and distracting. Clary tells him it looks silly and he takes it off. He mentions in a forcedly offhand way that this is where he met Sebastian Verlac, and seeing her expression, quickly adds that he knows what he did is wrong. She says something along the lines of “do you, tho” and he launches into his monologue. She tells him that she liked Sebastian Verlac, even though she never met the real him. He looks happy at first, then seems to understand what she means, and his expression darkens. He tells her that that’s exactly what Valentine said she would say—that she likes Sebastian, not him. She looks disturbed at the mention of Valentine, and he takes the opportunity to tell her the whole thing about not wanting to hurt anyone and the whole thing being about killing Valentine.

And yada yada yada you get the idea.

Honestly the whole rescue felt very contrived—how convenient Clary has been posthumously pardoned one day before her rescue! And then Jonathan calling her a bitch—haha no thanks. The entitlement is uhh Not Great.

Anyway tldr @ Alex schemmer Clary is not a sofa pls give her some human emotion pls and thanks

Sizzy: why god have you abandoned me, the sequel

Honestly writing that entire wall of text wiped me out but ill try

The drug arc is the bane of my existence

Im so tired

I thought we’d be done in season 2 yet here we are at the end. Drug arc: 1. Actual character development: 0.

Why is this the ONLY plot line the show can remember or keep running for more than 2 episodes. WHY

Why does she even like Simon. They never interact. They don’t even know each other. Everything is just an excuse to get them together. it’s forced and leaden.

Playing her and Raph off as badwrong and her and Simon as rose petal romantic is weird af dude. Izzy has just been the tail end of male characters’ storylines for so long and I’m tired.

If they’d played it off as a sacrifice on her part I might be less mad, like paint her as a hero but it just felt like this was expected of her. It was romantic because there was nothing else to do and OF COURSE she couldn’t refuse!!! Please be realistic, she’s a woman. Think of herself even a little? Impossible!

Never mind she could have easily used her medical training to open a larger artery, pour the blood into his mouth, and iratze herself as soon as Simon was cogent enough to be out of danger. He was already woken up enough to drink the blood she poured from her hand. No biting/venom necessary. Lmao.

Stop treating Izzy like shit just to force a romantic storyline seriously lmao

Aaaaanyway lol that was like 20000000 words but those are my thoughts if you made it to the end you deserve a trophy or smth

#sh spoilers #sh salt #im really sorry i just. did not like.

[sweetsweetnathan]

Top five favorite characters.

This is definitely a question that will reveal a lot about me, so I hope that’s what you’re looking for ;P It’s going to get really fucking long, so I’ll store it beneath a cut so it doesn’t destroy anyone’s dash.

I’m doing these in ascending order, so #5 is least most favorite and #1 is most most favorite. I feel it’s important to say than since #5 is a character that is going to make a lot of people roll their eyes (as is #4, frankly).

#5 - Holden Caulfield from the Catcher in the Rye

Waitwaitwait, don’t leave just yet! I have tried to explain why I like this character to people I go to school with, and they barely let me finish a sentence before reminding me that he’s a whiny brat with well-off parents who spends the whole book wallowing in self-imposed misanthropy. 

These are not the reasons why I like him!

Although I do feel it’s worth pointing out that he’s barely more than a child (he’s 16, which is the age of consent where I’m from, but by no means “adulthood” anywhere), lost his younger brother at an even younger age, witnessed a suicide, and he does in fact live in a world that is extremely alienating to people who are opposed on principle to conformity. But even these are not the reasons why I like him! I like him structurally, as a character in a book, way more than I like him as a person. In fact, I’d go as far as to say that the book doesn’t want you to like him. It wants you to pity him.

Allow me to share a passage with you to explain myself better:

Anyway, I kept walking and walking up Fifth Avenue, without any tie on or anything. Then all of a sudden, something very spooky started happening. Every time I came to the end of a block and stepped off the goddam curb, I had this feeling that I'd never get to the other side of the street. I thought I'd just go down, down, down, and nobody'd ever see me again. Boy, did it scare me. You can't imagine. I started sweating like a bastard—my whole shirt and underwear and everything. Then I started doing something else. Every time I'd get to the end of a block I'd make believe I was talking to my brother Allie. I'd say to him, "Allie, don't let me disappear. Allie, don't let me disappear. Allie, don't let me disappear. Please, Allie." And then when I'd reach the other side of the street without disappearing, I'd thank him.

Holden is a kid given to sudden panic and fatalistic thinking. There’s something in his subconscious telling him that his life is fragile, that it can be taken away at any moment. Suddenly everything can change and what you thought was safe and innocent can be threatened and defiled. This is an existential crisis without a readily apparent inciting incident (though it has one, we’ll get to that). The Catcher in the Rye isn’t a story with an especially noticeable structure-- we’re not on a journey to destroy the One Ring, blow up the Death Star, or defeat any villain really. Holden is trying to get home. The obstacles he encounters aren’t necessarily trying to stop him from doing that, but they’re obstacles nonetheless. Why? Not because the universe is conspiring against him, and not because there’s an all-powerful villain threatening him with destruction. The obstacles come completely from Holden himself.

So why is it that the Catcher in the Rye can get away with this? On paper a character piece about someone taking the long way home one shitty night sounds like the description of countless Creative Writing 1 school projects, not literary classics. How does Salinger make it work?

The answer is in the prose itself, which like the obstacles is possessed entirely by the main character. Let’s examine this passage:

My brother Allie had this left-handed fielder's mitt. He was left-handed. The thing that was descriptive about it, though, was that he had poems written all over the fingers and the pocket and everywhere. In green ink. He wrote them on it so that he'd have something to read when he was in the field and nobody was up at bat. He's dead now.

Look at each sentence: “My brother Allie had this left-handed fielder’s mitt. He was left-handed.” It’s obvious after reading it that he’s talking about his dead brother in past-tense. What’s the big deal there? He talks about the whole damn story in past-tense, because he’s telling it long after it happened. How is this significant?

Well, the last line is “He’s dead now.” Not “He died”, but “he is dead”. So the whole book we’re reading past-tense lines. But this one, out of all of them, is present-tense. And because of that sudden shift we regard it differently. Allie’s death isn’t something that happened in the past. His being dead is something that’s happening in the present. It’s the reminder that this is a story Holden is telling, which solidifies the illusion that Holden is real. Holden is not real-- Salinger, the writer, is real, and Holden is made up. But when Holden has the dimensionality of having both memories of the past and feelings of the present, he seems more real than another, living person. It illustrates the beauty of prose writing: Movies can give us spectacle, and visuals which evoke emotional depth that words can’t. Games give us agency and interactivity to act as ourselves or as someone else in a situation that is alien to us. Prose gives us no visuals, and affords us no agency. What it gives us is the opportunity to see the world through someone else’s eyes. And Holden Caulfield will always be one of my favorite characters for exemplifying that.

#4 - Luke Skywalker from Star Wars

After all that, Holden is beat out by Luke? 

Yes, but listen: Holden I like for professional reasons. Luke I like for personal reasons. See, I have some anger problems. The causes are as numerous as they are complex, and not very interesting. The bottom line is that my emotions are pretty untrustworthy. I actually dislike when people say that a space is dedicated to letting people feel their feelings uninhibited. What if my feelings are violent and hateful? What if without inhibition, I become the kind of person I hate? I have seen things that I wish I could unsee, things that I hate. Being told to let go of that hate feels like being told to permit evil to exist in the world. I cannot abide that. There are certain behaviors that I will oppose no matter the situation. Through this I put myself in an awkward situation: Everyone who doesn’t feel this way begins to look complicit in the wrongdoings of the world. Focus too long on what makes you unhappy, and happiness seems like an unnatural luxury. Feed anger too much, and you forget how to feel anything else. This is what’s called the “Dark Side”.

Luke struggles against the Dark Side. How could he not? His family was taken from him by a system that exploits and murders with impunity. He took the fight to his enemy and destroyed their greatest weapon-- but they’re still not defeated. In the Empire Strikes Back, Luke is terribly impatient to seize the powers of the Jedi. He wants to win. He wants the Empire destroyed. Anything in his way is wasting his time.

When we see him again in Return of the Jedi, he is as close to the Dark Side as a person can be. He walks into a gang leader’s palace, strangles his guards, mind controls his adviser, and pulls a gun on said gang leader. When the gang leader takes offense to all this, Luke promises him death if he doesn’t submit to Luke’s demands. Luke is indulging in every wrathful instinct he has. But he knows that what he’s doing isn’t right. He meets Vader and the Emperor expecting to turn Vader away from this same behavior, but the Emperor has concocted a situation where only might can make right. 

If I was given the opportunity to decide between offering patience to the evil people I’ve met, and killing them without consequence, I don’t know if I’d make the choice Luke made. His story is fantastical, but to me it feels very real. It’s a story about finding balance. One has to act to stop bad things from happening. But one must also restrain themselves, or become one of those bad things.

#3 Guts from Berserk

So I just talked about anger problems and the Dark Side and all that, so you’re probably thinking, “Oh, Guts is that, but just like...more.”

And okay, that’s a little true. A find that in Guts a lot too. But similar to Holden, I’d like to take a moment to appreciate the literary structure Guts is constructed with as well. None of his empathetic qualities would mean anything without this structure. If he’s not going somewhere, then he is just the angry, violent stereotype of a manly man that solves all his problems through violence that people stereotype him as.

So let me introduce you to Booker’s Seven Basic Plots:

Going to an art school has resulted in me feeling that it’s necessary to spend some time justifying the existence of a textbook about structure. So I’m going to detour away from Guts in order to do that.

To keep a literal textbook’s worth of storytelling analysis very short, the seven basic plots are not meant to be the only plots that should exist, or even the only plots that do exist. They are an incredibly versatile sets of story frameworks. Allow me to explain by comparing two stories that share one of these seven plots: Crime and Punishment and the Catcher and the Rye.

These two stories are “Rebirth Plots”, and Rebirth Plots are comprised of five elements:

Falling Stage: A young hero or heroine falls under the shadow of the dark power.

Recession Stage: For a while, all may seem to go reasonably well. The threat may even seem to have receded.

Imprisonment Stage: Eventually the threat returns in full force, until the hero/heroine is seen imprisoned in the state of living death.

Nightmare Stage: This continues for a long time, when it seems like the dark power has completely triumphed.

Rebirth Stage: But finally comes the miraculous redemption, either by the hero (if the imprisoned figure is the heroine), or by a young woman or child (if the imprisoned figure is the hero).

Crime and Punishment and the Catcher in the Rye are both Rebirth Plots, but they focus on different aspects, and are thus completely different stories. Most of Crime and Punishment is the Recession Stage, where the main character has gotten away with his crime. Contrast Catcher in the Rye, where the Recession Stage ends basically as soon as he leaves his school, whereupon he spends a short time in the Imprisonment Stage and everything until the last chapter is the Nightmare Stage.

So even though the Seven Basic Plots presents an outline, it's not an outline meant to exclude strange stories that don’t fit it. Quite the contrary, it’s designed to include radically different stories, sometimes within the same categories as more traditionally-told ones.

So with that in mind, what story does Guts find himself in? Well, that’s the exciting thing: Guts is so incredible because he goes on every kind of adventure.

Overcoming the Monster - This is Guts’ story when Casca is captured by the Holy Seein the Conviction Arc. He has to fight against a whole society built around zealous hatred-- zealous hatred that mirrors his own obsessive pursuit of Griffith.

Rags to Riches - The first third of the Golden Age Arc is famously this kind of story, as Guts goes from a nameless mercenary to one of the most famous commanders in Midland, making friends along the way and overcoming his apprehension towards close personal connections.

The Quest - The journey to cure Casca of her trauma during the Fantasia Arc is a very long version of this kind of story. Guts gathers allies, teaches lessons, and watches the world change around him, as he changes as well, allowing his heart to soften again.

Voyage and Return - The Black Swordsman Arc and the beginning of the Conviction Arc sees Guts gallivanting around Midland killing demons, only to return to Goto’s cabin to find Casca has departed due to his own failings.

Comedy - The middle of the Golden Age Arc is this, with Casca and Guts falling for each other as he begins to develop into his own man separate from Griffith.

Tragedy - The end of the Golden Age Arc, which I would feel bad about listing here three times if it wasn’t fourteen fucking volumes long. Here Guts loses every connection he’s made over the years, then finally loses himself as he chooses to pursue vengeance rather than stay with Casca. 

Rebirth - The whole of Berserk is a Rebirth Plot on many levels. To start with it’s Guts’ shift from the antisocial Black Swordsman to a symbol of hope in a world overrun with demons. For the world of Berserk it’s a change from being centered around an Idea of Evil to believing in something Good.

Guts is a fascinating character for how he changes again and again, yet still stays the same. 

And Unlike Luke, Guts does sometimes fail. But despite the fact that he fails, he finds chances for further redemption. This is because despite every awful thing he’s been through, he still goes on fighting. There’s this brilliant moment when Guts is a child, where he’s run away from home after killing his abusive foster father in self defense. Guts is surrounded by wolves, injured, and starving. He tells the wolves to kill him, because he doesn’t want to live anymore. And yet when the wolves attack, he reflexively defends himself. Even as he wants for death, there’s a part of him that denies it. He wants to go on living, no matter how bad things get. There’s a lot of strength to be learned from that.

I hope Miura will live to see the series end. The character has been at war for so long, and he deserves to put down his sword and live in peace.

#2 Conan the Cimmerian

Let’s take a detour from all my personal issues and literary analysis to talk about the wisest character on this list. It might not seem so, but the original Conan stories by Robert E. Howard are some of the most brilliant and insightful works of fiction ever published. 

Holden Caulfield gives us a realistic look at a troubled teenager. By viewing this teenager’s uncensored thoughts on the world, we’re allowed to see the world through his eyes. Doing so teaches us a lot about ourselves, and what we discover isn’t always so attractive. Conan is similar. Conan hails from Cimmeria, a gloomy and unforgiving land. There is no civilization in Cimmeria. Its people are tribal and nomadic. There are many different languages and ways of writing, no currency, and scarcely any agriculture. But Conan’s story does not take place in Cimmeria. Conan’s stories take him all over the world of Hyboria, which itself is essentially a pre-historic earth, where he explores the cultures of all the “civilized” nations. This, more than the violence, adventure, or lurid depictions of women, is what makes Conan worthwhile to me.

Allow me to share with you a passage:

Conan has seen how people behave when there are no rules imposed on them. He knows how cruel they can be, as well as how kind they can be. More than anyone Conan knows the dangers of civilization, how its rules and customs and trappings might convince a person they are good when they’re letting their fellow man starve, or that they’re bad when they’re committing violence against someone whom the rules of society declares above reproach.

Conan brings a perspective to things that is sobering and unique, and looking at things through his eyes helps a person see humankind not as one divided by lines on a map, but as a singular entity which expresses itself in many different forms.

#1 Eren Jaeger from Attack on Titan

Gif source: https://weheartit.com/entry/214956834

Anger, Dark Side, hopefulness, blah, blah, blah. What makes Eren so special? What makes him more special than Guts?

Let me tell you something personal about me: I have a best friend. And contrary to all my expectations growing up, it’s a person who considers me her best friend right back. 

She is the only person I know that I consider my intellectual equal (arrogant statement, totally true). I love her immensely. Indescribably. Just like, a fucking lot. We express this love in a lot of different ways. To begin with, we talk all the time. Almost every day, for hours. We share with each other the things going on in our lives, our thoughts, our opinions, the games we play, the movies and TV we’ve seen, our desires for the world, all of it. She is the first person I ever talked to about some of the stuff I experienced in my childhood. 

In short, she is pretty special.

When she watched Attack on Titan for the first time it was I who showed it to her. We watched up to episode 11 on that first night, and the rest of the month she texted me her reactions to the events of the first and second season. As she watched she got really enamored with Mikasa, as Mikasa is a lot of what she would like to be in life (capable, dedicated, beautiful, six feet tall, etc). But of Eren, she said that he reminded her of me. In fact, she said that she started to just look at Eren as me-on-the-screen, and when Eren would do something reckless or talk back to someone, or give a crazy-sounding speech about what he believed in, my friend told me she’d say “Classic Nathan [

There is a quality among the great heroes of literature, both from the east and the west, that Eren exemplifies in spades. While Eren has a tendency towards action that makes me admire him and a defiant nature that makes me envy him, his most powerful quality is his immense capacity for hope. You can see this represented in every character on this list in some form or another. Holden hopes against all reason that his sister can be saved from the falseness of the world. Luke hopes that a person can turn from the Dark Side. Guts hopes that life is worth living, even if it’s shown itself to be nothing but suffering. Conan’s hopes are the most justified, as he places it in the vastness of the world, and the world can’t help but satisfy him. 

Eren hopes that the titans, insurmountable as they seem, can be defeated. He hopes that the world, tiny as it may seem behind the walls, can be explored. He hopes that people will listen to him when he speaks. He hopes that when he fights for what he believes in, he won’t die. He hopes for so much, and no matter how much is on the line he is ready to fight for those hopes, and to deny anyone who wishes to restrain him.

And my best friend told me he reminds her of me.

I’m not saying she was right. I’m not as strong as Eren. I’ll shut down socially when I’ve judged people to be dumb, evil, or boring. My hope doesn’t carry me over every mountaintop. Not that it does that for Eren; part of what I love about watching his story is that he struggles and falters. Hell, he dies in his first engagement with the titans.

But like Guts he keeps fighting.

Like Luke he struggles against his lesser qualities.

Like Holden he has a viewpoint of the world that leads me to consider myself.

Like Conan he is different from everybody else, but still believes in himself.

And that’s all I want to be.

[doycetopia]

The Real Dark Side of Star Wars: Spoilers

[This is a repost of a post I wrote about two years, which has inexplicably disappeared from the site.]

I need to talk about something pretty shitty, but it requires a little background information, first.

Many of you probably already know this background info, but some of you don’t, so I’m filling it in for them; everyone else, please bear with.

I doubt it will surprise anyone to know I’m a long time Star Wars fan boy.

Am I the biggest Star Wars fan boy who’s ever lived? No, most certainly not.

In fact (and this bit will shock the less-super-nerdy out there), there are groups of folks out in the world who, after examining the extent of my exposure to Star Wars “stuff”, would decide quite seriously that I’m not a real Star Wars fan at all, or at least not a serious one.

The funny thing is, it’s hard to even explain this without getting at least somewhat nerdy, but I’m going to try. (In my head, as I write this, I’m talking to my sister, which is how I approach more posts than anyone would imagine.)

Now, a lot of people – most people – who say they like Star Wars mean they like the movies, because that is literally the only Star Wars thing they know about. I’m going to call these folks “mainstream fans.”

Obviously (because as a species, we really can’t leave this kind of shit alone) there is a lot more Star Wars stuff out there – more stuff than you’d readily believe. Games, of course. Comics – fucking walls of comics – and enough novels to fill a library.

Collectively, all the stuff that isn’t the movies has been (until recently) referred to as the Star Wars “Extended Universe” or “EU”. The quality of the stuff varies, and by “varies” I mean some of it is pretty good, and some of it is pants-on-head fucking idiocy that makes Jar Jar Binks look as cool as Chewbacca, by comparison.

How does stuff like that get the official stamp of approval? Pretty simple: George Lucas really likes making money, and people are willing to pay him a whole shit ton of money to play in his backyard, so he lets them write novels with Force-nullifying space-sloths (yes, seriously) and puts the Official Rubber Stamp on it, because (a) he got money and (b) he knew if he ever came out with a movie that contradicted stuff people had written, his version would invalidate all the drek he’d authorized in the past, so who cares?

In general, I don’t follow the EU stuff, and (with the exception of the first Star Wars roleplaying game that anyone licensed) don’t know much about it.

The quick summary: there is miles and miles of EU stuff, set anywhere from 30 thousand years before to several hundred years after the movies ‘mainstream fans’ know; the whole thing is an virtually unchartable hot mess…

And there are fans out there who know every single inch of it. Or most of it. Certainly more of it than I do. I’ll call them super-fans.

Now: I have no beef with those super-fans. None.

Okay so far? Good.

Now: Enter Disney.

A few years ago, Disney acquired the rights to the Star Wars intellectual property and announced they were going to start doing stuff with it, and that George Lucas wouldn’t have very much if anything to do with it. (Which, after the prequels, was kind of a relief to hear.)

And Disney took a long look at the Extended Universe stuff and, after some thought, said “Yeah that’s… nice and all… but… yeah. None of that shit is official anymore.”

Basically, they boiled down “Official Star Wars” to the movies, the Clone Wars animated series that ran a few years ago, and whatever stuff they make from here on out (like the totally amazing and fun Star Wars Rebels show, a couple new novels, and of course the new movies coming out).

All that EU stuff? It’s not the “Extended Universe” anymore; it’s “Star Wars Legends” which, honestly, I think is a great name – it implies these are stories about the Star Wars universe (which they are, of course) but just that: stories. Unverifiable. Unverified. Unofficial. Enjoy them if you want – please, by all means – but know them for what they are.

Most – and I do mean most – super-fans were fine with this: they get to keep the stuff they’re into, and they get the biggest pop-culture engine in the world cranking out new Star Wars stuff until the heat-death of the universe finally invalidates Disney’s copyrights.

Some of the super-fans are not happy, and have decided to be unapologetically shitty human beings about the whole thing. I will call this small, vocal-like-a-screaming-howler-monkey subset of super-fans the “spoiler fans,” and here’s why:

These people have decided that it’s not enough that they have this stuff they like. Because Disney has said it’s not official stuff anymore, that somehow makes it impossible to love that stuff as much as they once did – their love is somehow capped by its lack of an official stamp, and this cannot be allowed to stand.

What do they want? This is pretty funny, actually: they don’t just want Disney to go back and say “okay, that stuff is still at least as official as it was when George Lucas was taking your money and planning on invalidating anything he felt like, whenever he felt like it” – they (apparently) want Disney to keep making EU stuff, in addition to the stuff Disney is already making.

“Well, that’s nice,” you might say, “maybe they want a pony, too?”

And yeah, it’s kind of funny, until you realize the internet has allowed shitty people to be shitty on a far greater scale.

See, they’re trying to hold Star Wars hostage to get Disney to do what they want.

How? They have vowed that they will spoil each and every spoil-able moment in the new movie as loudly and as broadly as possible (which, today, is pretty loud and pretty broad), if Disney doesn’t cave.

You’ve probably seen those image memes on Facebook or whatever, asking people not to spoil the movie. I have, and thought “yeah, it would suck to be spoiled ahead of time.”

Because that can happen by accident. Well-meaning, happy, enthusiastic fans can get on the internet and broadcast out to their friends, joyfully exclaiming about all the stuff they loved about the movie, and accidentally spoil something for someone who hasn’t seen it yet, because how have you not seen it yet?!?

This isn’t that. This is not an accidental thing. This is not your friend loving the movie so much he spills something.

This is a guy standing outside the movie theater before The Empire Strikes Back, waiting for the line to form, and then telling every single person in line “Darth Vader is Luke’s dad.”

Except the guy has a megaphone the whole world can hear, if they aren’t careful, and he shouts the message at unexpected times.

I’m telling you about this, because it already happened to me, and I don’t want it to happen to you.

I leaned about this little movement of spoiler-fans via a friend’s post on Google+.

The very first comment to that post was one of these guys, and all he posted was a spoiler, and I am pretty sure he spoiled probably the biggest plot twist in the movie for me.

Now, obviously, I haven’t seen the movie yet, so how do I know?

Let me put it this way: if that guy who came up to you in line at Empire Strikes Back had said, perfectly straight-faced “Darth Vader is Luke’s dad,” would you have believed him?

Maybe you think about it a bit, and it syncs up with everything you know about the movies thus far, and it syncs up with what you’ve seen in the trailers, and it just seems like a very Star Wars-y plot twist.

Maybe you don’t believe it, completely and totally, but you believe it enough that you will sit down in the theater and, basically, spend the whole movie waiting for that moment to come. Or not.

Even if it doesn’t, you will not have enjoyed the movie as much as you might have, because you were distracted. And if it does happen just as that guy said? Well.

That’s the kind of thing this guy posted. One line. Ten words, and there goes my 100% unmitigated enjoyment of the new movie.

Now, shut up: this isn’t about me. Yes, you’re very sorry about this happening. Yes. I love you. Thank you, now shut up for a sec.

Listen.

These fuckers are out there. They are doing this on purpose. They’re enjoyment of their pile of stuff has been somehow – idiotically – damaged; Disney made their Masters-level knowledge of a made-up universe less important than it already was, so they have decided to shit on every other person who wants to enjoy the new movie, because (apparently) “Fuck anyone who is enjoying themselves, if I am not.”

I don’t care about me. I’ve watched Empire Strikes Back probably thirty times, if not more, and I know – know I will enjoy it when I watch it again, because I’ll be watching it with my kids, and the shine hasn’t come off for them.

Because of that, I know I will enjoy this new movie when I watch it, because I will be watching it with my kids and even if I don’t feel the same sense of surprise and wonder as I might have, they will, and I will still get to feel that, through them.

And I know they will get to feel that, because I’m going to protect them from these… infantile man-children and their shit-spattering temper-tantrum.

Now: why did I write all this? Because I want to try to protect you, too.

When you see spoiler warnings, heed them. Stop thinking of spoilers as “that one little thing my super-happy friend let out after he saw the movie” and start thinking “halitosis-reeking stranger who wants to dip his filthy index finger in my morning coffee.”

From here until you see the movies, absolutely avoid comment sections on any Star Wars-related post on any kind of social media.

Just… for a few days, expect people you don’t know to be kind of shitty for no good reason.

I realize that’s kind of a downer message, but seriously: I want you to enjoy the movie.

And also, yeah: I want those petty fuckers to lose, because fuck them.

(Comments on this post are disabled, for obvious reasons.)

original post

#crosspost #randomaverage

[swfanficbyjz]

SW AU - Fate of the Master Chapter 19

<- Previous Chapter

The twins disappeared into bunks to go back to sleep since they'd all been up most of the night. Ahsoka primed the engines and once out of the atmosphere, set the nav computer to make the first of three jumps. Once in hyperspace the ship was pretty much on auto pilot and they had time to focus on other things.

"Thank you," Anakin said, from the co-pilot seat.

"You're welcome." She replied simply. She didn't say anything else. She preferred to let him decide whether or not he was ready to talk about something. He'd always been that way. Though back when he was her master, there were a lot of things that just went unsaid. It was a shame how little he'd felt like he could share. She understood much of what he never said aloud. She could feel them. He'd always felt things more deeply than anyone else she had spent time with. At first it had overwhelmed her, because she hadn't been prepared for that kind of intensity; emotions and feelings pouring off him in waves. It was truly amazing that he hid anything from anyone considering how easy it was to read him. But she supposed everyone else had had too many other things to worry about than what he was feeling at any given time. Not her, however. She'd had studies to attend to and trying not to die or get him killed, but her world pretty much had revolved around him. So naturally, his mental state was very important to her.

Because of all the Jedi rules of attachment, they'd been forced to learn to communicate the 'forbidden' stuff through the force. The other masters always frowned at outward displays of affection or concern. It was never really appropriate in the middle of missions or battles to ask each other if they were okay. But a lot of that was also saving face in front of the clones. You can't be a good leader if the people under you think you can't handle it. For those reasons, the true depth of their relationship and bond came out during their meditation sessions. They'd get together in a quiet room to meditate and talk about the day. It had always been one of her favorite things. She had looked forward to it every time.

It was the only opportunity she really had to understand him. Even though he didn't like to talk about himself, he didn't try very hard to restrain himself around her either. And even though he was, in many ways, the total opposite of what she'd been taught to be, she never really minded. He was a warmer person than the rest of the Jedi, and she'd clung to him. Not because she couldn't survive without him but because she didn't want to be anywhere else. He let her be herself, and she let him be himself, and because of that, they were able to have a really deep friendship. Yet another thing for the Jedi to frown on.

But for all their snobbery, they were not so perfect either. Master Kenobi, who touted constantly the importance of not having attachments, was just as attached to people as her and Anakin had been. And for all his expressed displeasure at outward shows of affection, she could feel the unrestrained joy that came from him whenever anyone showed him love. Other Jedi, like Taria had been more affectionate. And no one had criticized her for it. Master Plo had been the father figure to many younglings and even his clone troopers. So they'd always seemed to be particularly hard on Anakin. And in many ways, their fear of him is ultimately what drove him to turn on them. It didn't excuse what he had done, but it did explain it. If they'd been warmer to him like he had been to her, he might not have been so inclined to distrust them when chancellor Palpatine made his final play to win him over. It never ceased to amaze her what a little love could do.

Anakin had his head resting back against the chair. Since they'd taken the suit off him, his skin had become much less pale. He still had ugly scars across his body and head but otherwise he was starting to look like a healthy human again; even those were beginning to heal some. It was less obvious that he had mechanical legs, they worked like real ones and he wore long pants with boots over them. He wore long sleeves on the top, but didn't glove his hands like he used to. Though he'd said the main reason he'd done that was to hold onto the lightsaber better. His tunic went up around his neck to his chin where there were a couple buttons. It had been strange getting used to seeing him without hair, he'd always had pretty long hair since she'd known him. But whatever had caused the bad burns had apparently singed his scalp so bad it wouldn't regrow without help.

"Obi wan," he said.

"What?" She asked.

"Obi wan did this. Not Sidious." He replied.

"Oh..." was all she could say in response. She'd been wondering for awhile now what had gotten him into such an awful physical state, and now she knew. She never would have guessed it. Now she felt foolish for telling him back on Bail's ship that Obi wan had loved him. She wanted so badly to ask how it had come to that, but she didn't dare. It was probably another one of those things that would come out eventually. She was surprised at how calmly he'd said it though, as if losing all your limbs and nearly being burned to death, especially by someone you loved, was perfectly normal.

"Don't hate him for it like I did." He murmured. He sounded so tired.

–-

They came out of hyperspace near Ilum, seven days after leaving Naboo. It had been a long and tiring trip for everyone, but at least they were all still getting along. The akul was the most unhappy, they'd had very few chances to let it out to hunt and stretch its legs. And now they were about to land on an ice planet with a climate very different from Shili. She'd thought about stopping there on the way to let it off, but they needed to keep moving as much as possible.

Just as Ahsoka had planned, the ghost crew appeared about an hour after they did. Ilum was a sacred planet to the Jedi; home of the majority of the kyber crystals. But the empire had been strip mining the planet for years, and with the Jedi order in tatters, no one had the need to fight for it. She'd asked Hera and Kanan to meet them there to keep the empire occupied while they went down to the surface. She had no more need for kyber crystals, but she believed it was time for the three Skywalkers to get theirs. Anakin had two lightsabers out there already, but both had been left on the millennium falcon when she'd rescued them off that imperial ship. So she wasn't sure if he'd find another here. Luke and Leia deserved to have their own.

After leaving Naboo, they'd both expressed interest in more training in the force and so most of the trip had been spent with Anakin and Ahsoka taking turns teaching them. Luke was doing incredibly well. Leia was struggling because she had a hard time letting go and trusting the force. Bail had done a good job of teaching her self confidence and intention, but she struggled with faith in bigger things and other people. Ahsoka often found Luke coaching her later when they'd finished official training for the day. He seemed to be having a better time getting through to her. Or perhaps she simply trusted him more.

Ahsoka usually didn't wonder how others experienced the force, but she had found herself imagining what kind of trials each of them would face in the Jedi temple. She was certain that Leia's would involve both trust, and overcoming her preconceived notions about her father. Luke's would probably be confidence and patience. And Anakin, if tested... would probably be the hardest of all, because he had the most demons to face. His attitude about everything he went through; his downfall, the broken relationships, the guilt and even his kids, had slowly been shifting. She still felt him freeze in response to certain memories, but overall he'd been slowly opening up and recognize that even though they may have been terrible, it wasn't too late to learn from them. She was incredibly proud of his progress, she knew it wasn't easy. He'd told her at one point that it felt like the bandages were being ripped off but there was less and less blood. She had been pleased to hear that.

The ghost went to work distracting the ships orbiting the planet after a quick holoconference. She'd told them to keep them busy long enough to mask their signal and land, then they were to jump out of there and wait until they were ready to leave. The plan had worked surprisingly well, and their ship managed to land on the surface without being detected. The Jedi temple had been the first place the empire had stripped, so there were no longer troops in its vicinity. There was still a chance they could find crystals here because they sometimes manifested by the will of the force. Only those they call to, can find them. So the empire could only take the few that didn't have all the qualities that make them perfect lightsaber crystals.

They all dressed up in warmer clothes and she led the way to the ice covered entrance of the temple. Anakin let her prepare them for their journey and after using the force to move the mirror so the sun would melt the door, she sent them all on their way. They had twelve hours to pass their trials, find their crystals and exit the temple, otherwise they'd be stuck in there for one rotation, which on Ilum was 28 days. Thousands of Jedi had managed this, she knew they would too. Anakin had done it once, she had done it twice.

She knelt outside the entrance and began meditating.

–-

They all entered the caverns, but at the first crossroads they decided to split up.

"What are we looking for?" His sister asked.

"Nothing and everything," Their father replied.

"Seriously?" Leia asked. "That doesn't make any sense!"

"I can't tell you what you'll find, because I don't know. Jedi temples are tricky, they respond to each person's energy. All I can tell you is to trust yourself and you'll know it when you find it." He replied.

Luke saw Leia shake her head, then put up the hood of her coat and stroll confidently down the middle hallway. He exchanged glances with his father and then he took the left path and his father took the right.

He was walking for a long time before he heard his aunt's voice. "Luke? Luke!" It called, just like the hundreds of times before on Tatooine.

"I'm coming Aunt Beru!" He called jogging across the sand to the little hut they called home. But when he got there, the house was empty. "Aunt Beru? Uncle Owen?" He yelled. Where were they? He searched the hut again but didn't find them, so he started scouring the rest of the property. Nothing. Not even a sign of them. Nothing was out of place, they were just gone. But if they weren't here, how had she called to him? He yelled for them again, but got no answer. So he shrugged and went back inside.

He said hello to his father in the workshop as he passed through and then found his mother in the kitchen cooking. He kissed her on the cheek and rolled up his sleeves to help. He listened to her talk about their shopping trip to Anchorhead. She told the best stories. "Where's Leia?" He asked.

"She went to get something out of the barn, she'll be back in a moment." His mother replied. Then she shooed him off to set the table.

"Ani, please!" He heard his mom cry desperately and he spun around. His father was manipulating the force so she couldn't breathe.

"Stop!" He yelled and ran forward. "What are you doing? Stop!" He begged. His father let go but his mom crumpled to the ground. "Why would you do that?" He demanded.

"She doesn't love me!" His father yelled. "She never has! You turned her against me!"

"What?" Luke was confused, but ran to his mother's side. She was still alive, just unconscious.

"You did that yourself!" Came another voice from behind him. It was old Ben! Except... he looked younger. And sad.

"What's going on?" Luke asked, he was terrified. But the specters ignored him.

"I hate you!" He heard his father scream. He was on fire, precariously close to sliding into the river of lava below. He was missing all his limbs except for one robotic arm.

"You were my brother, Anakin. I loved you!" Ben said and then turned his back to walk away. Luke heard his father wail behind him as the flames consumed him. He covered his eyes, he couldn't watch.

When he looked up again, he saw his father struggling to be breathe. He was badly burned, he had to be in terrible pain. He just laid there in the ash, staring at the sky. Luke rushed to his side. "Father?" He asked. His father's face turned slowly in his direction, yellow eyes unfocused, jaw set to overcome the pain.

"Vader." A cloaked figure approached. The stranger stood over him, Luke could tell he was weighing options. This must be the emperor; and he appeared to be deciding whether or not to save his father.

"You must save him! Please!" Luke begged him. The figure didn't answer.

"You've only been my apprentice for a short time, and you've already failed me." The figure said. "I needed you to stand by my side as the Jedi that remained loyal to the Republic in the face of the others who betrayed me."

"Master," Anakin choked out, "please save me. Let me... let me save my wife! And our child!" He coughed, convulsing. He was dying. The cloaked figure paced back and forth. "Please..." he croaked. "I will do whatever you ask." The emperor seemed to come to a decision and summoned some droids to help carry his father away.

Luke watched them go, knees in the ash. The scene around him changed.

"Lost, your father was." Came an old voice behind him.

"Who are you?" Luke asked the little green creature that had appeared.

"A master I once was. Old I now am."

"You were a Jedi?"

"Yes." The creature replied. "What are you?"

"I want to be a Jedi too. Like my father before me."

"Fear I sense in you. Your father had it too. Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering."

"Is that what happened to him?"

"Let go, he could not. Used against him, it was."

"You said he was lost... but maybe he wasn't! Maybe you were the one that gave up on him! You and Ben! Why didn't you help him? Why didn't you help my mother?" Luke demanded.

"Know, we did not." The creature replied.

"You had to know! Jedi know everything! They can feel things, sense them! That's how I knew my sister was in trouble!"

"Clouded, the force was. See things clearly, we could not."

Luke barely stopped himself before he said something mean. He wasn't convinced. How could the force be clouded? How could they not see something right in front of them?

"If a Jedi, you wish to be, patience you must have. Choose which side, you must." The green creature then disappeared.

He reached over and touched his mechanical arm. "I may never understand what happened to you, father. But I will love you anyways." He said aloud in the empty room. "We might never get to be a normal family, like I always hoped, but I won't leave you."

Luke heard a song coming from the tunnel to his right. He felt compelled to follow it.

–-

As Leia explored the icy caverns, she started getting more and more nervous. She'd heard about the Jedi growing up, though Senator Organa had been careful how much he said because of how dangerous it was to be one. She'd always been able to do things others couldn't, but she'd never expected to be one. After a week of training and extra sessions with Luke, it was clear she was. But she'd always been taught to think on her feet. To focus more on quick wit and negotiations than to fight or trust her instincts. Her adoptive father had taught her how to handle a blaster, so she found the lightsaber unwieldy. Ahsoka had said that when they each get their own it would feel like an extension of your own arm.

What she didn't understand was why peacekeepers even needed to carry weapons. Or more than that, why they were destined to have them. A crystal just calls to you? So you can be granted one of the most powerful weapons? But then once you get it, you're not really supposed to use it? And the force, same thing. It's this powerful entity that binds all living things but it too can be used for attack and destruction. She didn't know a lot about Jedi philosophy, but it seemed kind of twisted to her. Especially why so much of being a Jedi seemed to revolve around a weapon. “This weapon is your life,” her father had said to her.

Was it the power of the weapon that corrupted Jedi, like her father? She understood that her father had deeply loved her mother, and that that was the reason he fell to the dark side. But she hadn't had an acceptable explanation as to how the dark side could completely change you from hero to villain. How could it completely erase your personality, your ideals and your morals? In her opinion, none of those could have been that strong if it was so easy to twist you. Part of her wanted to forgive her father for the mistakes he'd made, but she had grown up seeing the damage and destruction he created and caused. Why should she love him after all of that? Why did anyone think he deserved it? She may be his child by blood, but as far as she was concerned, she wasn't going to be anything like him. If she became a Jedi too, would she be tempted by the dark side? Would she fall too? How did she know he wasn't already brainwashing them?

And where did Ahsoka fit into all of this? Luke had told her that their father had been her master. Did that make her evil too? Senator Organa seemed to trust her, but was it safe to? She was definitely in love with her father. That had been easy to discern. She'd also discovered that Ahsoka had left the Jedi order of her own accord, before their fall. It seemed suspicious to her. She just happened to not be around when Vader slaughtered all of them. Perhaps he'd planned it that way. Perhaps he'd spared her as a tool to use later to convince everyone else he was good again.

But he wasn't! Not really. He cut off Luke's arm! And even though her brother claimed it had been an accident, she didn't buy it one bit.

Her head was spinning as she wandered the icy temple. This is stupid! They'd given her no idea what she was supposed to even be looking for; all she was managing to do was get lost.

"Leia!" She snapped to attention at the sound of her brother's voice. "Help me! Leia! Help!"

"Where are you? I'm coming!" She cried out, sliding a little as she burst into a run. Her heart was racing as she frantically followed the voice. It seemed to be moving too. What would she find when she caught up to it? She knew her father couldn't be trusted! She heard malicious laughter echo around the chambers. Luke's cries were getting more and more painful.

After running around in what seemed like circles for a long time she paused to take a breath. "I can't find you!" She wailed. But the place had gone silent. "Luke!" She called out, but there was no response. Was she too late?

"Why do you hate me so much?" Came a raspy voice behind her. She spun around, losing her footing and falling to the ground. She tried not to tremble as the towering figure of Darth Vader stood over her.

"Because you're a monster!" She spat back at him. "And monsters don't deserve love!"

"Not even if that monster is your father?" The voice wheezed in response and stepped towards her. She stumbled backwards into the wall.

"You may be my father by blood, but you will never be by title!" She reached for a rock to throw at him.

He reached up to take off the helmet, underneath was a handsome face. Nothing like what he'd been like before. He had long honey colored curls. He smiled at her, one scar down his right eye. "Do I look like a monster to you?" He asked.

She hesitated. It wasn't possible. It had to be a trick. She looked up into his soft blue eyes. Was this the person he'd once been? It surprised her to realize he was no longer wearing the evil black suit, but rather a long maroon robe with matching leggings and a dark leather sash over each shoulder, a belt around his thin waist, and shoulder and neck guards. He reached a gloved hand down to her to help her up.

"You look just like your mother," he whispered proudly. "She was my whole world. The light in the darkness. I wish you could have known her."

She pressed herself further back. She wasn't going to fall for it. She couldn't look at him and think all was right with the world! Even if he still looked like that. "You killed her!" She accused him, scrambling to her feet and running away before he could respond.

"I didn't! I would never!" She heard him say from behind her. But he didn't seem to be following her. She stopped after a few minutes to catch her breath.

"Leia," she heard a softer female voice and looked up in surprise. It was her mother, it had to be. She was beautiful. She had long curly brown hair, and pretty brown eyes. She was wearing a very elegant dress, that wasn't real appropriate for the temperature.

"You're dead!" She said, her head spinning. "You're not real, you can't be!"

"I'm one with the force," her mother replied, kneeling in front of where she fell. "But I still live in you. I still live in your brother and your father and my friends." Leia started crying as she looked up at her mother. Padmé reached her hand out to wipe the tears from her face. "Do not be afraid, my child." She whispered, her voice was musical. Leia threw her arms around her mother and sobbed. Padmé patted her head and then held her tightly.

"What am I supposed to do?" She cried.

"Give him another chance. There's still good in him." Her mother replied comfortingly.

"But how? He's done terrible things!" Leia wailed.

"Perhaps, but if we withhold our love, we're no better than them." her mother said.

Leia looked up only to find that she was clinging to her father as he looked now. Her instinct was to pull away, but instead, she buried her face in his chest and wept. He held her close.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, hiccuping slightly as she tried to calm herself down. He squeezed her reassuringly on the shoulder but said nothing. Once she managed to control her sobs, she sat back and looked up at him. She could see the man he'd once been as if it shined out from inside. "I don't hate you," she said. "I'm just scared."

He tilted his head to the side just a little, reminding her of the akul, "of me or becoming like me?" He asked quietly.

"I don't know," she said, looking down. "Maybe, both." A glint caught her eye and she glanced up. He was gone, but where'd he'd been sitting was a little crystal. It hummed and she reached for it. In her hand it felt warm. She could feel the energy radiate from it and it felt as though it was meant just for her.

"Only you can decide what you become." She heard him say in the air around her. She stood up feeling calmer. For the first time, she let herself relax and trust her instincts.

–-

Anakin came to a big open room and decided to sit down and meditate. Ahsoka had been insistent that he needed to go in too, but he hardly felt worthy of not only a third crystal, but also of being a Jedi again. He was beginning to understand that many of the things he’d blamed on them were not really their fault. It was things like the holonet news and traveler’s tales that make you believe Jedi are invincible and can do no wrong, until suddenly they can. Or you become one and discover it’s nothing like what you imagined. He had long believed that the Jedi purposely chose not to end conflicts because their ideals would get in the way of victory. As a strategist himself, it was why he’d come to admire people like Grand Moff Tarkin. But now being on the other side of what he helped create, he could see the Republic as the people had once seen it; flawed and greedy and not caring about the individuals of the galaxy or planets with no strategic value. He’d often been furious with the Jedi for refusing to act to stop horrible tragedies or to end slavery, when in reality, they were beholden to the senate. It was the senate that refused to act. And it still refuses to this day. The few good senators could not outweigh the ones that were in it for their own gains. Often leading business to a stand still and prolonging the war.

When he’d found out that Chancellor Palpatine had been manipulating both sides of the war and that he’d had his hand in everything, he began to see how useless democracy really was. If one person, Sith or not, could make both sides do whatever he desired simply by pulling the right strings, the will of the people would never prevail. And as much as he was ashamed to admit it, he’d truly felt it was better that way. Now that he’d looked in the eyes of the rebels, the pirates, Ahsoka, and even his children, he could finally see that a life that was dictated was not worth living. That true peace may never be an actual possibility, but maybe there was meant to be a certain amount of chaos. And that all you could do was find your place in it and try not to make it worse for people.

Padmé had believed wholeheartedly in democracy. She’d sacrificed so much for it. She’d fought for it every day of her life. And he’d admired her resolve, believing that he was fighting for the same thing, when in reality, he’d been fighting for the person that had undermined it all.

“I’m so sorry Padmé,” he whispered to the empty chamber. “I was blinded by my passion, I couldn’t see what was really going on.”

“How long are you going to keep making excuses?” he looked up to see Ahsoka standing there.

“Ahsoka? I thought you were waiting outside.” He replied.

“Where are Luke and Leia? I can’t find any sign of them. I was worried so I came looking for them.” She said, looking around nervously. “I can’t even feel them.”

He stood up quickly and closed his eyes reaching out his senses. He couldn’t feel them either. Panic rose up in his throat. “We split up shortly after coming in the temple. They might have run into trouble. Come on, we need to find them!” he started running down a hallway, Ahsoka on his heels.

“Anakin, wait!” Ahsoka called up from behind. He skidded to a stop, heart racing. “I think I hear something! This way!” she turned and ran down a passage to the left. He backtracked the short distance to follow her. But she was gone.

“Ahsoka?” he yelled. There was no response. He heard someone fighting and he followed the sound. He came into a small room just in time to see her thrown into a protruding icicle, impaling her. “No!” he screamed trying to run to her. He barely made three steps towards her before he went flying backwards himself.

“Anakin…” he heard her cough weakly. “I.. I… love…” and then she fell silent. He was on his feet again reaching for his lightsaber. But even if he’d had it, there was nothing there to fight. Just her limp body stuck where she’d been thrown. Tears streamed down his face and he ran to her side, carefully pulling her off so he could hold her. She was gone.

“Why?!” he screamed at the universe. He slowly became aware of bodies all around him. He was afraid to look. Even with his eyes shut, he could feel them. He knew who they were. His mother, Padmé, Luke, Leia, Obi wan, Qui-Gon, Rex… and everyone else he’s ever loved. He sobbed. “No…” he cried, his own voice fading in despair.

“You did this.” He heard Darth Sidious hiss from behind him. “Their blood is on your hands! All that you’ve fought for has fallen. And now it’s your turn! Fight me!”

Anakin gently set Ahsoka’s body to the side, closing her eyes with his hands. He stood up, looking around at all the death. His heart ached like he had never known. Seeing Padmé’s lifeless body. Obi wan’s… the twins… he wanted to be angry, but he couldn’t. There was nothing left to be angry about. He slowly turned to face Sidious.

“Fight me!” his cloaked master yelled again.

“No.” Anakin said.

“Then you will join them in the afterlife.” Sidious ranted.

Anakin knelt down again and closed his eyes in meditation. “I’ve spent my entire life afraid. Afraid to let go, afraid to fail, afraid to disappoint. But I was never afraid to die. I was afraid to live. Afraid to live without all the people that mattered to me. I see now that people you love will die. People you love will suffer. People you love will leave. And life goes on. There are still things worth fighting for, even if they’re not there anymore. And fight for those things, I will.” Sidious raised his lightsaber as Anakin looked up at him defiantly. He didn’t even flinch as the weapon passed through him.

–-

Ahsoka stood outside the temple with Luke, watching as the door continued to slowly freeze close. Time was running out but Luke was the only one that had returned. She had to practically restrain him so that he wouldn’t run back inside after his sister and Anakin.

“You have to have patience.” She said for at least the hundredth time.

“But what if they need help?” he whined. “I don’t like just standing around doing nothing.” She shook her head. He was just like his father; always on the move. She’d been like that once too. But years of being on the run had taught her how to slow down and not jump into everything she came across. It had been hard to adjust, but necessary. Now when she had to fight, she could do it calmly and deliberately.

“The only thing dangerous in there is your own fears.” She said trying to calm him down. “This is something they have to complete. It’s admirable to want to help, but it’s their trial. Have faith in them.” She’d been helping younglings complete the trials for years. But even she had to admit this was the hardest one to wait for. She hadn’t been surprised Luke had returned first. He was the one most open and eager to learn and the most driven to exemplify what it meant to be a Jedi. Leia had so many doubts. Understandable really. Even though Senator Organa had been a friend of the Jedi order, he probably didn’t know enough about how it all worked or what the younglings were actually taught to give her any kind of real answers as to what they did and what they believed. And to be fair, neither she nor Anakin had really taught either of them much about Jedi philosophy. Just different forms of lightsaber techniques and how to use the force. They were hoping to leave the how to be a Jedi stuff to Obi wan. Especially if they did help bring the order back to life.

When the door was about a foot off the ground, Leia slid out underneath it. Luke finally breathed a sigh of relief. As they compared notes about their adventures, Ahsoka watched the entrance anxiously. She was worried about Anakin. He had so many demons. So much pain. No trial would be easy on him. Would he give in to his anger? Would he lose sight of reality as the visions overwhelmed him? Would he be strong enough in who he was capable of being?

The three of them held their breath in silence as the last few inches of the door closed with no sign of him. She could feel Luke and Leia’s sadness. Whatever had happened to them in there had changed their attitude about their father. But did it even matter now?

She felt a tickle of awareness and force shielded them just as the ice over the entrance shattered. Anakin walked out tall and confident. She released after the shards fell around them and looked up at him. He smiled at each of them. He was radiating love. She was impressed. She returned the smile. With his long arms he swept them all into a group hug. The twins had tensed in surprise but then relaxed into him and hugged him back. Ahsoka snuck a kiss on his cheek over their heads, hoping they hadn’t seen.

“Whatever the future holds,” he said at last. “We’re a family, in every sense of the word. Come what may.” He let them go. “Now show me your crystals.” They each held out a gloved hand with their crystals, he extended his as well.

“Today,” Ahsoka said, “you have completed the gathering. You have each learned a valuable lesson that will help you find your way. Remember it and let it guide you as you decide your paths. Whatever they be, may the light guide you and the force be with you.”

Next Chapter ->

[renegade-skywalker]

Needless to say, I’ve seen the original SW trilogy (quite literally) countless times. I used to watch them on repeat, day after day, mostly when I was maybe between the ages of 7-9 because my then-baby brother would watch the VHS tapes over and over and over and over so even if I wasn’t actively watching them they were sure as hell the running soundtrack to the most formative years of my life (and this is 100% of the reason why I can repeat, almost verbatim, all of the lines spoken in alien languages across those three movies, but that’s beside the point). ANYWAY, I always found it interesting, if not a little troubling, how the whole Han/Leia thing even develops. A lot of it is left to the imagination, but this time I really paid attention to what Han says and does during the entire time they’re on Hoth, and came to some very interesting conclusions.

Lemme just say that I absolutely love how obvious it is that Han has feelings for her, and not just from observing them or anything, either - Han pretty much comes out and says it. Every jab, every quip, every damn thing that comes out of Han’s mouth pretty much affirms the fact that the whole reason he’s still on Hoth, let alone with the Rebellion (which Leia asks him indignantly about more than several times) is because of her. Han has made it clear that he doesn’t really care about anything other than money, and though his loyalties may have changed and he might care a bit more about other things (maybe about a certain princess and a farmboy, but not necessarily a revolution just yet, but still) there’s nothing he can do about the bounty on his head other than pay it off. And in order to do that, he has to deliver that bounty, he needs to leave. But he can’t. It’s not that he is physically unable to. And it’s not like he doesn’t want to either, he really does. His life depends on it. But no, he’s afraid to. He won’t leave unless he gets an affirmation from Leia that she cares about him, which she denies him at every turn.

Like the buffoon that he is, Han projects his own fears onto Leia. “Come on, you want me to stay because of the way you feel about me,” is Han’s way of saying that he cares about her, but he can’t come out and just say it so he wants Leia to affirm her feelings for him. Which, of course, she won’t do. But Han is anything but subtle. The mention of a “goodbye kiss” or the way he frames their conversation argument to Luke by claiming that “[Leia] expressed her true feelings” for him, as if being in Luke’s presence will somehow convince her to come clean about the way she really does feel (not), makes it more than apparent that Han’s feelings are of the romantic variety but he has absolutely no clue of how to go about it.

Han is very childish about the whole thing, but what I think is so endearing about him is the fact that he’s the one making himself vulnerable. He’s not acting cool about it, literally at all, and if anything he’s kind of coming off as desperate. I think this comes from a very self-centered place, though, where Han thinks of himself as this super cool, tough-guy kind of dude (but we all know he’s a total doofus, let’s be real) and he’s allowing himself to care about Leia, and Luke, a lot. Like, a helluva lot.

Let’s talk about Luke first. Luke is receptive to Han’s camaraderie. The kid’s a fast friend, and it’s clear that Han coming back in the nick of time at the end of A New Hope is enough for Luke to solidify their friendship despite the smuggler’s shortcomings. Hell, Han risks his life for the guy when he doesn’t return to Echo Base. I love how unapologetically heroic Han is here, and to the point of aggression, too, when the other rebel officers tell him that he’ll die out there but he ignores their warnings with a “Then I’ll see you in Hell!” He’s putting his life on the line, again, for Luke. And he does the same for Leia. When the rebel base is falling down around them, Han sticks around until the literal last minute to make sure that Leia gets out of there alive. Despite Han’s cool exterior, he cares a lot and while he may not need anything else from Luke other than his friendship, it’s clear he craves some sort of validation from Leia. Leia is constantly putting him in situations where she knows he’ll be useful, where he’s needed, where he can exercise his better qualities. But why? Why does she care?

I think what bothers Han so much is the fact that she keeps giving him things to do yet continues to ask him why he’s sticking around. At first, she has a point. Is he staying around because he’s dallying? Too afraid to deliver the bounty on his head? Is he in deeper trouble than he lets on? Is he just hanging around for the satisfaction of getting in her pants? Maybe. But by ESB, a good amount of time has passed that this would be absurd. If the latter were responsible for Han’s actions, he would have moved on by now or taken up in some cantina where he might be successful. Hell, he might even try hitting on any of the other rebels, granted they aren’t royalty. I think the reason Han gets so heated is because “Well, isn’t it obvious?”  

Well, yes, but Leia can’t admit to how she feels, let alone why. Han sort of answers this question himself though. When he and Leia are repairing the Falcon while docked on that asteroid, he tests his boundaries and massages her hand to which she snaps “Stop that, my hands are dirty.” Han replies, “My hands are dirty too, what are you afraid of?”

“Afraid?!” 

Leia is afraid. She is very afraid. Leia lost her entire family, her planet, her political station, everything. All she has left is the Rebellion, so she throws herself into the effort 110%. She doesn’t have time, let alone the emotional energy, to care about anyone other than admitting or appreciating that they’re a good person or contributing to the effort. There is a good chance that the Rebellion may still fail, despite their victory upon destroying the Death Star, but Leia can’t allow herself to care about anything else. She’s been through enough.

In the comics, especially the titular Princess Leia volume, it’s made apparent that Leia comes off as this cold, unfeeling ice princess. She puts up walls to protect herself. She doesn’t show emotion, she doesn’t allow herself to be vulnerable. But that doesn’t mean she doesn’t care, because she cares a helluva lot, if not more than enough or too much about everything and everyone. I think by ESB it’s obvious that Leia cares about the Rebellion, and Luke is perceptive enough to know that she cares about him, too - plus, they did share a moment while escaping the Death Star. Leia comforts Luke when she’s the one that needs comforting, and despite the kiss Leia gives him to make Han jealous, it’s clear that Luke is kind of over that initial awe of her he felt upon when he first saw the message she left with R2, and he just kind of lets her do her own thing. But Han is different, Han is needy and he’s gotten to the point where he’s not afraid to show it. It is very, very painfully obvious that he cares about Leia, that he loves her, which is why Leia’s comment just before he’s frozen in carbonite is so important, too.

Sure, by this point, they’ve kissed - that should be enough, right? Not really. Leia is still guarded, and they’re immediately thrust between a rock and a hard place. There are tender moments between them, but there isn’t much time for anything else. So when Leia tells Han “I love you,” and he simply says “I know,” it’s more of an affirmation for Leia, even though Han has gone through all this trouble to get her to say those three damn words. From the minute Empire starts, we all know Han is desperately in love with Leia, which could only mean that she (and everyone else in the goddamn Rebellion) knows it, too. It’s more about her admitting it, and not just to Han, but to herself. I think the reason Han is so adamant about Leia’s admission is the fact that he knows she cares about him, but she continues to act as if she doesn’t.  But who can blame her, really? After losing everything, why allow yourself to lose something else, too? Once she lets him in, she allows for the possibility of losing him to become a more solid reality. 

But it takes her a loss, Han being frozen in carbonite, for her to say anything, to at all consider making herself vulnerable. She gets him back, and it’s their shared affection for Han (Leia, Luke, Chewbacca and Lando) that inspire their half-baked rescue mission at the beginning of Jedi. And, well, it takes about thirty years, the loss of their son and a dissolved marriage to happen but hey, she wasn’t exactly wrong to be afraid, right?

WOW I have a lot of Star Wars feelings…

#star wars #leia organa #han solo #princess leia #sw meta #my meta #jfc brittany #otp feels #reposting this for reasons so hey whatever #han x leia

[twopointthreeninetoone]

(I’ll warn you up front: This shit is long. Because I wrote it while I was watching it, all those many years ago. Also, although I grew up on the movies and love them to death, 1) this is still pretty irreverent, so if you’re a mega-Star Wars fan and want to read nothing but praise for the movies, uh, don’t read this; and 2) I don’t know the official names for a lot of the characters and ships and weapons and so on. So don’t send my nasty anon messages about how I spelled sarlaac wrong. Because I honestly don’t give a fuck how many a’s are in that bloody word. But yeah. We’ll start at the end. That’s a very good place to start.

Revenge Return of the Jedi  (1983)

So, it’s been three years since The Empire Strikes Back.  We imagine that Luke & Co. were knocking around the galaxy—Luke finishing his Jedi training, Leia undoubtedly trying to figure out a way to get her boyfriend back, and oh yeah, there’s that whole rebellion thing going on as well.  Or maybe this takes places shortly after The Empire Strikes Back, with Luke & Co. stopping long enough for a cuppa before heading off to Jabba the Hut’s pad to rescue poor Han.  In any case, here we are, and we’re at Jabba the Hut’s place, and some weird shit is about to go down (read: metal bikini).

It’s apparently a three-pronged attack—initially R2D2 and C3PO lead the first wave of attack, pouncing upon Jabba’s compound with the grace and ferocity of black jaguars.  Or, they go there and are instantly given to Jabba by Luke as a sign of friendship.  It should be noted that Luke (or Mark Hamill) looks wrecked by now…and he’s wearing black.  The Fuck-Up Luke of the Past is no more, my friends.  We now have a calmer, more Stable Jedi Luke, who wears black and talks in a monotone voice and drops his friends at the slightest chance of getting to be in with the cool Jabba the Hut.  It’s just not cool, Luke.

After this scene, George Lucas injected a musical number for the special edition DVD.  Because we needed it.  We really did.  It didn’t stop the story at all.  It wasn’t weird.  And I didn’t fast forward through it.  Nope.  Because it was necessary, damn it.  A green alien dancer also gets eaten by a monster.  It should be noted that Lucas put in a few more shots of the dancer, twenty-one years after the fact.  What’s even more amazing is the fact that he doesn’t use CGI—oh no, not him.  He uses the same actress from the original movie, and what’s more amazing is that she looks the same.  If I hadn’t known all this, I would have thought it was old footage.  I just have to hope and pray that I look like her when I’m forty or fifty.

Second phase of the attack: Chewbacca and a strange alien bounty hunter guy stop by and the bounty hunter sells Chewbacca to Jabba.  You notice a pattern starting here.  Jabba thinks this is all pretty cool.  What he would do with Chewbacca, I really don’t know; although one imagines those Wookiee-skin rugs on the walls don’t bode well for him.  Either that, or…metal bikini.  Oh, and all this time you can see poor Han in his carbonite slab, a very interesting (if mean-spirited) wall decoration for Jabba’s lair.  I can imagine Jabba showing his partygoers around.  “…And this is Han Solo, a bounty hunter who crossed me way back when, so I had him encased in carbonite.  Would you like some punch?”  The Strange Alien Bounty Hunter gets to stick around, I guess.  They don’t much care what he does now.  It’s a bit like the Kennedy compound in that respect. 

That night the Strange Alien Bounty Hunter sneaks through Jabba’s dance room.  It sneaks around sneakily, and satisfactorily knocks over a lamp, runs into some wind chimes, steps on a cat, triggers an alarm, trips on another cat, steps on a rake, breaks a window, starts a fire, gets the dog barking, sets fire to a cat, and sneezes.  It’s still able to reach Han Solo and free him from the carbonite (in one of those cool eighties graphics like the kind you see in Ghostbusters and Labyrinth).  When he hits the ground, it sounds like a freighter was dropped off the Empire State Building.  That’s probably what woke Jabba up, but we’ll never know.  In any case, hey, Han is blind.  Can’t see a thing, and his hair is slicked back in that eighties manner.  And he’s really cold, poor guy.  So he can’t see the Strange Alien Bounty Hunter take him into its arms and cuddle him.  This was the first Star Wars movie I saw, and I distinctly remember thinking that was really, really weird.  As the Strange Alien Bounty Hunter soothes him, Han asks, “Who are you?”  The Strange Alien Bounty Hunter takes off its helmet to reveal that it is actually—Martin Landau!  Actually, it’s Leia.  “Someone who loves you,” she tells him.  “Calista?” he asks.  It’s not.  It’s Leia.  They kiss.  It’s sweet.  There’s laughing.  It’s Jabba the Hut and his entire Crazy dance party.  They were waiting in the shadows the whole time.  Jabba’s Crazy Dance Party is actually a lot like those high-profile cocaine parties from the eighties.  I think George Lucas was trying to say something.

Han tries to bargain with Jabba—and sounds like a used-car dealer in the process—but it’s no use.  He’s chucked into prison while Jabba takes Leia and…well…metal bikini.  It’s interesting to note that the metal bikini has become the fuel to the fire of countless fanboys’ fantasies.  I guess it’s a boy thing.  It doesn’t look comfortable at all, Carrie Fisher looks mortified, and the whole idea of being a sex slave to a huge slug shows that George Lucas was one sick motherfucker.  He really is.  Freudians will analyze this trilogy and officially announce that George Lucas probably should have been locked up long ago (preferably before he made the Star Wars prequels).

In the last wave of the attack, everybody stupidly decides to go banco on Luke Skywalker.  Because if the past two movies have taught us anything, it’s that Luke Skywalker gets things done, damn it.  He comes in, says a lot of things in a sage-like manner, and is ultimately thrown into the cage of that big monster that ate the Alien Dancing Girl.  This scene is really sad, because a hog-like guard is thrown in as well, and as he tries desperately to crawl up the walls of the cave, the big monster picks him up and eats him as he squeals like the hog creature that he is.  George Lucas, you are a sick bastard.  In any case, Luke gets out of it with his Jedi Skillz, and as a reward for his obvious prowess, Jabba sends him, Han, and Chewie into the Living Pit Thing (a pit with a thing that eats other things). 

Before this, Han and Luke have a funny exchange:

Luke: You’re not missing much.  I used to live here, you know.

Han: You’re going to die here, you know.  Convenient.

Han says shit like this the entire time.  I love him.  So a lot of things happen at the Living Pit Thing.  Because that’s the kind of happening place it is.  Luke has a Master Plan and gets them all out of trouble, but not before Lando Calrissian (who was there as well) almost gets eaten by the monster.  When I saw this for the first time, I was very worried about Lando, despite the fact that I had no idea who he was.  My thoughts were more or less, “Won’t someone please help that poor black man!  He’s the only black man in the galaxy!”  And it was true.  During the whole big fracas, Leia (still a sex slave in a metal bikini) strangles Jabba with her chains.  Typical sex slave/pimp-related murder.  George, I said it once and I’ll say it again—you are one sick son of a bitch.

So after everyone is saved, Luke goes to finish his training with Yoda, and I guess the others just fuck around the galaxy a little more.  Yoda dies.  Why does one of the most beloved characters in the trilogy die?  I can only guess it’s because Lucas is a sick man, hates all that is good in the world, and didn’t want to pay Frank Oz any more than he had to.  The thing is, Yoda looks kind of funny before he dies.  His eyes are kind of crossed, and his ears are bent, and damn it if he’s making any sense to me.  Kind of like Ronald Reagan, I guess.  Yep, I went there. 

Obi-Wan Kenobe doesn’t know when he’s licked, and his spirit won’t go away.  Luke doesn’t let the fact that Obi’s dead stop him from bothering him with questions.  Yoda does mention that “there is another” right before he dies.  Another?  Wasn’t the Darth-Vader-Is-Luke’s-Father thing big enough?  And, hey, it turns out to be Leia!  What kind of galaxy is this, where everyone turns out to be related to one another?  Is this galaxy located in the Deep South part of the universe?  Luke is shocked, shocked to learn not only that Leia is his sister, but also that: 1) he kissed—and probably had romantic feelings for—his sister, and 2) he saw his sister in a metal bikini.  George, you sick fuck…

Hey, guess what!  Remember when we thought that the Death Star had exploded to teeny tiny bits and would never ever be a threat, ever again?  Well we were wrong!  Because it’s back!  And they have to blow it up real good again!  Han, Luke, & Co. resolve to destroy it, and while they’re at it, they should probably just destroy the Empire while they’re at it.  Because, you know, it’s getting to be a nuisance.  They go to the forest moon of Endor, where the power station of the Death Star’s force field is located, while everyone else (including Lando, who gets to fly in the Millenium Falcon) waits in space so they can blow up the Death Star II and all the other Imperial fleets.  Han’s a greater person than I am; I won’t let anyone drive my PT Cruiser to the grocery store.  Just goes to show you how much he’s matured (and how immature and insecure I am). 

Carrie Fisher has a cigarette-laden voice.  Just wanted to point that out.  And Harrison Ford is still hot (even if he does just seem to be here for laughs).

Cool Endor hover-bike chase scene!  The price of admission is worth it.  I’d recreate this scene whenever I was biking through the forest when I was younger.  And the part where Leia wrecks her hover-bike and is thrown to the ground?  That scene was recreated a lot.  I never found myself approached by Ewoks though.  More like rabid raccoons.  In any case, Luke succeeds in losing his sister and wrecking his own bike.  My own sister was like him in that respect. 

Another funny line—just after Luke & Co. realize that Leia is missing, R2D2 beeps a bit and C3PO says to him, “And you said it was pretty here.”

Ewoks.  Ewoks are funny little things.  I’m thinking that Lucas put them in the movie just to appease the li’l kiddies (the metal bikini probably placed a lot of odd, uncomfortable questions in their fragile little minds).  Twenty years later, a good deal of these li’l kiddies will loathe those little teddy bear creatures with a passion.  I don’t care about them one way or another—they’re all right and they move the story along.  I remember knowing of them, and liking them, as a little kid—about six years before I’d even seen the movie.  Insane.  The Ewoks are somehow able to capture Han & Co.  How they’re able to do this, I have no idea.  They might be smarter than you think.  And, they have spears.  Funnily enough, they accept C3PO as their god.  No kidding.  Methinks they would have accepted the McDonald’s Golden Arch as their god if the situation had presented itself.  They take them all back to their tree-top living arrangement, with C3PO enthroned, and everyone else (even poor R2D2) tied up to be roasted over flames, slowly.  These li’l guys are the cutest.  And hey, there’s Leia!  She’s up there in the Tree Top Compound as well!  She looks like a hippie folk singer!  Luke is a fucking tool, to the point where I actually kind of miss the whiny Luke of the Past.  They’re saved when Luke uses his Skillz to make everything all right.  Why he didn’t fucking do this in the first place, I have no idea.  Luke and Leia manage to have a heart-to-heart, wherein Luke tells her that she’s his sister and, uh, Darth Vader is their dad.  Leia is shocked, shocked not only by this, but also by the realization that: 1) she kissed (and probably had romantic feelings for) her brother, 2) her father tried to kill her numerous times, 3) her father destroyed her entire home planet, 4) her father froze her boyfriend in carbonite, and 5) her brother saw her in a metal bikini.  Tough times.  Han’s confused by the fact that everyone looks really shocked, but no one will tell him anything.  Welcome to my world, buddy.  He thinks Luke and Leia are in love.  Dude, you don’t want to know what you’ve gotten yourself into.

Luke surrenders himself to Darth Vader (that sounded dirty) thinking that Darth would show some compassion for the first time in, oh, six years.  He’s wrong.  His punk ass gets owned by Darth, who takes him to the Emperor.  Luke doesn’t want to give up the hope that his dad might actually be a nice guy, and will let him by, just this once.  Kid, I’ve had the same problem with just about a million teachers.  It won’t work.  Your ass is toast.  Although I will admit, I was never given the chance to fight-to-the-death with any of my teachers.  Unfortunately.

More stuff happens.  For the rest of the movie, Han & Co. try to get into that power station and turn off the force field of the Death Star II.  Ewoks are involved.  It is both cute and sad, as little Ewok soldiers lay down their lives for a cause that I’m fairly sure none of them have ever heard about until now, or can never ever really comprehend, no less.  Imagine going into the woods outside your house, gathering up all the squirrels in the forest, and explaining to them that we’re at war right now, and would really like their help in fighting, because you see we have all these intergalactic congresses and councils and things went to hell and an Empire sprang up, etc.  They’ll be sure to help you out.

Luke meets the Emperor.  It doesn’t go well.  Darth Vader refers to Luke as “my son” a bit too much in front of the boss.  Luke, Darth, and the Emperor spend the rest of the movie in a deadly game of cat-and-mouse, as Luke realizes that if he doesn’t fight Vader, then his friends will die and the rebellion will be crushed, but if he gives into his anger, then the Dark Side will win.  It’s a bit of a pickle.  And, Lando and the rest of the Rebels pick a dogfight against the Empire’s big-ass ships.  I mention this because some of John Williams’ best music in the trilogy comes from these scenes.  Han & Co. continue to fight on Endor—first getting caught (“You rebel scum”, a Storm Trooper says when he catches them, which led me to believe for a very long time that all rebels were cool, until I learned about all that Civil War stuff.  Some rebels really aren’t cool.)   In the end, they’re saved by the Ewoks.  See, aren’t you surprised that even though they seem small and powerless, they actually play a huge part in aiding the heroes of the movie?  Doesn’t this make you feel a bit better about being short and weak?  Those li’l guys are dangerous though.  Never forget that.  They viciously take out an entire battalion of Storm Troopers and their Evil Chicken-Like Tank Things.  They could tear you apart, given the chance, and still seem adorable as your bloodied entrails are dangling from their fangs.  R2D2 gets shot and explodes (poor thing).  An Ewok dies on-screen.  It is Sad.  Hundreds of rebel fighters are killed when the Death Star II blows up their ships.  It’s not as Sad.  The only other black guy in the galaxy (an X-wing fighter pilot) dies.  So does an Asian guy.  It’s Weird.

At one point in the light saber duel, Darth Vader picks apart Luke’s mind and discovers that Leia is his daughter.  He actually doesn’t seem too shocked at this, probably because: 1) he’s evil.  I just wanted to mention this part (where Darth threatens to get Leia and Luke gets angry and fights him full-force) because the music in it is really cool.  It’s probably my favorite part of the movie.  Ironically enough, just when Han & Co. get things straight on Endor and turn off the force field, and Lando & Co. fly into the Death Star II and try to blow it up, the Emperor decides that Luke isn’t going to give in and proceeds to slowly torture and kill him, as Darth watches.  Luke pleads for his father to help him, once again showing that he really hasn’t learned anything.  You need to fight your own battles, son.  You can’t go running off to Daddy whenever you need help.  Vader shows that he really hasn’t learned anything about being a father by picking up the Emperor and tossing him down a very deep cavern, thus killing himself in the process.  Before he dies he asks for Luke to take his mask off, so that he can look on his son “with my own eyes”.  This is surprisingly sad, not least of all because this is the end of James Earl Jones’ cool Evil Darth Vader voice.  He takes off the helmet to reveal—Humpty Dumpty!  Yes, his dad has a face that looks like an egg.  Darth Vader dies.  Luke gets out of the Death Star II before Lando & Co. blows it up.  Back on Endor, Han & Co. celebrate the destruction of the Death Star II (the explosion is pretty).  He tells Leia that, when Luke comes back, “I won’t get in your way.”  He’s so cute when he’s emotionally destroyed.  Leia laughs at him and tells him that it’s not like that, that Luke’s not heavy, he’s her brother.  Funny part: you can see that fact slowly register on Han’s face, and he grins and kisses her. 

So there are several CGI-produced shots of various planets celebrating the end of the Empire, and then we go back to Endor, where everyone involved is partying with the Ewoks.  The original sickeningly-sweet Ewok song of the original movie is gone on the DVD, replaced by a much-nicer instrumental.  Luke decides to delay his partying so he can burn his dead dad on pyre (I hate parties too, Luke).  Then he joins his friends and everybody hugs and dances and it’s cute.  Luke looks out into the distance and sees—dear God—the spirits of Obi-Wan Kenobe, Yoda, and his Dad!  The schizophrenia has finally set in!  In the DVD version, we see not the original actor who played Egg-Faced-Dad Anakin Skywalker, but Hayden Christensen, who plays Anakin in the prequels.  This is terrible.  He’s considerably bigger than Obi-Wan, and he looks evil and displaced.  In any case, Luke waves and runs off to join his friends.  The last shot of the movie is of them all—Luke, Leia, Chewbacca, R2D2 and C3PO, Lando, and the Real Hero Han—sitting together and laughing and stuff.  The Empire has been crushed, the Dark Side has been defeated, and one thing is for certain: everyone is going to need a lot of therapy.

[Photo is from ScreenFish]

#Star Wars #Return of the Jedi #Billy Dee Williams #Carrie Fisher #Richard Marquand

[the-domestication-of-the-dog]

The 9th Annual L.A.O.K Awards

I’m no artist, but I did love art class growing up, and let’s just say I’ve won a few coloring contests in my day (God did I live for coloring contests). Let’s also say that in high school I did a watercolor of one of my stepmom’s nature photographs, and let’s say that it ended up in the yearbook. That watercolor was the crowning achievement of my many classes with Ms. Warren, our high school art teacher. Let me paint a picture of Ms. Warren for you: short spiky blonde hair, this pattern Gap button down every day, long denim skirt, and the unfaltering attitude of someone who was born to be an artist but instead ended up teaching ungrateful teenagers who called things “gay” around you even though you were clearly a lesbian.

Months after completing that watercolor, I began work on acrylic painting I’ll admit was uninspired, but I still gave it my best. The composition featured a bird on a branch in narrow focus, so that everything in the background was blurry, and I had planned on giving it to my mom as a Mother’s Day present. The problem was that I had no idea how to paint something out of focus, and instead of doing any research or asking my teacher how to do that, I just dove right in and painted from memory and tried to make the lines really soft. Here is that painting, which still hangs in my mother’s bedroom to my everlasting shame.

If you look closely, you might recognize that I cut my losses on this one. That’s because it was at this point in my progress when I fully realized I was in over my head and decided to ask Ms. Warren for some tips. She came over to my desk, looked at the painting for a good 10 seconds, and finally uttered two sentences I’ll never forget: “Garrett, sometimes in art you hit, and sometimes you miss. Your watercolor was a hit.” And she was off to the next student.

That said, sometimes a year in movies is a hit, and sometimes it’s a miss. 2017 was a hit. Now on to the next desk:  

Best Film Eighth Grade The Favourite First Man Mary Queen of Scots Sicario: Day of the Soldado

First off, anyone who didn’t like Mary Queen of Scots can meet me in a laundry cottage halfway between England and Scotland in negative 460 years for another asskicking. What is there not to like about this movie? According to Ben Friday, extreme historical inaccuracy. Okay, if anyone comes up with any non-nerd reasons, please let me know. The second film in my top five that you’re going “Guh, what?” to: Sicario: Day of the Soldado, was actually very good, and it turns out everyone is wrong for thinking it’s not. Wow, definitive proof here (https://letterboxd.com/g_baby9000/film/sicario-day-of-the-soldado/). I also loved First Man’s slow burn. La La Land was a misstep for me from Damien Chazelle, but now I’m right back on the Chazelle train. Bravo for making an unconventional, understated historical biopic, which drives through its seeming monotony with an ever building tension that keeps it compelling from start to finish. Then there’s The Favourite, which continues Yorgos Lanthimos’s reign over this annual list. I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall when the dictum came down to the Fox marketing department that they were going to go wide with this movie. 

And the Layokie goes to… Eighth Grade

In the lead up to Eighth Grade I thought two things: 1) I hope it’s not that good because Bo Burnham’s age and career make me feel inadequate, and 2) It probably isn’t that good because everyone’s talking about how good it is. In LA, if you don’t see a movie until after its release date you are a total loser, and I went even a few weeks after that, so it was already sufficiently hyped. I honestly didn’t expect much from it, and it totally blew me away with it’s humor and heartwarmingness in a way that no other film matched in 2018. I’ll talk more about this great film below.

Next Five The Ballad of Buster Scruggs Cold War First Reformed Roma Shoplifters

Also Great Avengers: Infinity War Beautiful Boy Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot. Outlaw King The Rider A Star is Born Vice (Why does everyone hate Vice? My thoughts on Vice.)

Best Original Screenplay The Ballad of Buster Scruggs - Joel Coen & Ethan Coen (1/6 adapted) Shoplifters - Hirokazu Koreeda Eighth Grade - Bo Burnham The Favourite - Deborah Davis and Tony McNamara First Reformed - Paul Schrader

And the Layokie goes to… Eighth Grade

Not to retread the obvious, but I think about Eighth Grade and its screenplay in much the same way as Avatar. Predictability and the use of stock plotting does not equate to bad writing, and even if you know exactly what’s going to happen (Kayla must end up with Gabe) it can be done in such a satisfying way that the story still sings (which is the reason why the same story lines continue to be retread). From early on, we can guess pretty much what Kayla’s arc will be, but the fact that it plays out in just the right way, so that you can’t really imagine it had the potential to be anything else, is what makes it such a high mark in screenwriting. Getting to this point in a screenplay is very difficult, because it’s usually only after figuring out the 50 paths not to go down that you realize the obviously correct one. When it finally clicks which Scene B should follow Scene A, the screenwriter too realizes that it couldn’t have been any other way, it just takes a lot of work to get there. I put Eighth Grade on for my second viewing while building an IKEA dresser a week or two ago, and it filled me with such glee. I was doubled over with laughter more than once and had to watch some scenes five times before I could move on.

Best Adapted Screenplay Annihilation - Alex Garland Beautiful Boy - Luke Davies and Felix van Groeningen Leave No Trace - Debra Granik & Anne Rosellini Mary Queen of Scots - Beau Willimon Sicario: Day of the Soldado - Taylor Sheridan

And the Layokie goes to… Mary Queen of Scots

Like I said above, I don’t really know anything about the historicity of this movie. Apparently the rabble-rousing preacher that everyone was supposed to hate actually was cool and founded my own church’s denomination? Anyway, I loved the way this was paced, only parsing out the information you absolutely needed and trusting you to catch up through its many jumps in time, expertly illustrated via cutbacks to Queen Elizabeth. The characters were complex (especially Elizabeth) and the dialogue was snappy. There’s nothing better than seeing someone in an authority position take someone’s shit just long enough before thoroughly dressing them down at the exact appropriate time, and Mary gets many such chances to shine thusly.

Best Director Damien Chazelle - First Man Alfonso Cuarón - Roma Yorgos Lanthimos - The Favourite Pawel Pawlikowski - Cold War Josie Rourke - Mary Queen of Scots

And the Layokie goes to… Alfonso Cuarón

Was tempted after another viewing to switch this to Damien Chazelle, but I had already written the following paragraph, and I’m too lazy to redo it. From the opening shot of Roma, two things are clear: you’re in the hands of a great director, and it’s a damn good thing you’re in a theater because it’s gonna be a long, slow ride. If you watched this on Netflix from start to finish without looking at your phone, I salute you (and I’ll say the same for The Ballad of Buster Scruggs). If you haven’t seen it on the big screen and live in LA, it’s currently playing at the Landmark and Vista, so check it out. Also how insane is it that Cuaron will likely win the Oscar in this category this year, making Mexican directors winners in this category 5 out of the last 6 years? Specifically, Cuaron, Alejandro González Iñárritu, and Guillermo del Toro, who were already known as the Three Amigos long before going on this stretch?

Honorable Mention Ari Aster - Hereditary Alex Garland - Annihilation Paul Schrader - First Reformed Stefano Sollima - Sicario: Day of the Soldado

Best Actress Emily Blunt - Mary Poppins Returns Lady Gaga - A Star is Born Joanna Kulig - Cold War Thomasin McKenzie - Leave No Trace Soarise Ronan - Mary Queen of Scots

And the Layokie goes to… Soarise Ronan

I’ve talked about this before, but it seems so many years I struggle to come up with a good list of best actresses (while supporting actress overflows with abundance). I had wondered if I was just a misogynist, but it became clear to me over time that there just weren’t nearly as many films with females in starring roles, let along female protagonists. However, not only did I have trouble paring down my favorites to five this year, there were many more female-driven films I could have drawn from. I really felt like this was a year for women in film, and it was great. The idea that women/minority leads can’t drive box office success seems finally to be a thing of the past, and it’s about damn time. This all probably comes across as liberal posturing, but if you know me well you’ll understand it’s really born from my own selfishness. First, I don’t want special treatment over anyone because I highly value fairness, and the reason highly value fairness is mainly because I don’t want anyone else to get special treatment over me. Second, I don’t care if a story is about women, black people, Asian people, aliens, some fish, or a fuckin’ toaster, a good story is a good story, and I don’t want to miss out one because some marketing executive wants to save his ass. Not once have I ever been not able to get into a film because the protagonist was a different age/race/gender than me. Even though some of them aren’t on this list, Annihilation, Ocean’s 8, Thoroughbreds, Suspiria, Roma, The Favourite, Widows, and Mary Queen of Scots not only had female leads, but fully female-centric casts, and all were either da bomb, fairly da bomb, or da bomb-ish.

Honorable Mention Yalitza Aparicio - Roma Claire Foy - Unsane Claire Foy - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Best Supporting Actress Olivia Colman - The Favourite Tyne Daly - The Ballad of Buster Scruggs Cynthia Erivo - Bad Times at the El Royale Nicole Kidman - Boy Erased Regina King - If Beale Street Could Talk

And the Layokie goes to… Tyne Daly

Pretty thrilled TBoBS is on Netflix, because I recently went back just to watch my favorite two segments: “The Ballad of Buster Scruggs” and “The Mortal Remains.” Still not really sure what “The Mortal Remains” is all about ‘cause I’m not that smart about that kind of stuff, but damn did all five of them chew up the scenery, and none more so than Tyne Daly.

Honorable Mention Zoe Kazan - The Ballad of Buster Scruggs Marina de Tavira - Roma Rachel Weisz - The Favourite

Best Actor Ethan Hawke - First Reformed Nicolas Cage - Mandy Ryan Gosling - First Man Viggo Mortenson - Green Book Christian Bale - Vice

And the Layokie goes to… Christian Bale

I didn’t hate Vice, but it seems like everyone else did. I also didn’t love The Big Short, but it also seems like everyone else did, somehow causing the people who loved The Big Short to hate the Vice. But I don’t think you can deny Christian Bale on this one, or at least I don’t think you can triumph Gary Oldman in The Final Hour or whatever it was called, but deny Christian Bale in Vice. (Scroll down to see that I didn’t triumph Gary Oldman last year, even though he might have deserved it.)

Honorable Mention Mahershala Ali - Green Book Bradley Cooper - A Star is Born Joaquin Phoenix - Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot

Best Supporting Actor Robert Pattinson - Damsel Linus Roache - Mandy Timothée Chalamet - Beautiful Boy Harry Melling - The Ballad of Buster Scruggs John Malkovich - Bird Box

And the Layokie goes to… Timothée Chalamet

It’s about this time that I get tired of trying to come up with something to write for everyone of these, so I’ll take my comments of the air. Timothée Chalamet was great!

Honorable Mention Jake Ryan - Eighth Grade

Best Documentary The Dawn Wall Minding the Gap RBG Three Identical Strangers Won’t You Be My Neighbor?

Syeeeke. Did I say I was done coming up with things to write? ‘Cause I got lots to say about this. First let’s get it out of the way. Free Solo is a mediocre documentary about some excellent subject matter. Jimmy Chin made another one of my favorite documentaries, Meru, that definitely did not get the acclaim it deserved, so if he finds that acclaim with Free Solo, then super. And if it wins the Oscar, I won’t be sad about it. What I will be sad about, is that another documentary, also about climbing El Capitan, The Dawn Wall, got totally overshadowed be Free Solo. I watched The Dawn Wall first, and I think that may have something to do with shaping how I felt about Free Solo, but The Dawn Wall had a better, more interesting, more likable protagonist, with a more interesting story to tell about himself and his climbing attempt and way better climbing material! Now, there’s no denying that climbing the full height of El Capitan without a rope is riveting, awe-inspiring, and completely insane, and the 5-10 minutes of Free Solo that actually cover that feat are impossible to top, but if for the other 90 minutes (both films are exactly 1:40) you’d like to watch a doc about climbing El Capitan, it has to be The Dawn Wall. If you’d like those 90 minutes to instead be about a whiny guy who lives in van, then by all means, champion Free Solo. I don’t want to say too much more about why I think it’s better, because I want people to see it and experience it. Hopefully it starts streaming soon. (And if you did see and like Free Solo, please check out Meru, which is currently streaming on Netflix.) The other docs were also great, and what a shame that Won’t You Be My Neighbor? didn’t get nominated for an Oscar, which made me cry evertim.

And the Layokie goes to… Duh, The Dawn Wall -- (See how the wall below makes Alex Honnold’s Free Rider route look like the freaking Aggro Crag from Nickelodeon’s GUTS?)

Best Foreign Film I only saw: Border Capernaum Cold War Roma Shoplifters

And the Layokie goes to… Shoplifters

Now, as always, on to the fun stuff:

Refuse to Watch Any more Clint Eastwood Movies

The 15:17 to Paris was truly a straw-that-broke-the-camel’s-back-breakingly bad movie. Literally worse acting and writing than some student films I’ve seen. And I’m not talking about the Student Academy Awards, I’m talking about the ones I watched from my own peers in my own undergrad film classes. And I’m not talking about some USC or UCLA film classes, I’m talking about University of Oklahoma film classes, where they actively did not give us film equipment to use, because we were a studies program and not a production program, even though no one there wanted to do anything but be writer/directors, and they seemed to resent us all for that fact so we had an edit bay in like an old closet or something and it was on one of the original iMacs with the hockey puck mouse and everything. The last tolerable Clint Eastwood move was Mystic River don’t @ me.

Great in Everything Award Joaquin Phoenix - You Were Never Really Here, Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot, The Sisters Brothers, (and when do we get to see Mary Magdalene??) Cynthia Erivo - Bad Times at the El Royale, Widows

Best Lesbian Rachel Weisz

Deserves Discussion Damsel

Hmm, a New Wave Anit-Western starring Robert Pattinson with folk dancing and real-life weirdo non-actors, an obvious grand slam slam dunk, right? Wrong. Boy do I wish I had known the Zellner Brothers were also the ones behind Kumiko the Treasure Hunter before going into this. I could have at least prepared myself for all the meandering. I don’t really mind meandering if it serves a story/theme, say like in another seminal film in the genre, Meek’s Cutoff, but you can miss me wit dat meandering for meandering’s sake. The script for Damsel is a great example of an antithesis for what made Eighth Grade so great. The meandering here is not only in the physical sense, but also in the story sense, where no scene absolutely had to happen, and nothing in particular means anything. You would think that a character strapping dynamite to themselves and walking a few miles would fill a theater with Hitchcockian dread and similarly provide a Hitchcockian catharsis when that character eventually blows up. Instead, it’s just one more in a long line of things happening that never add up to what we would call a “story.” Like in Kumiko the Treasure Hunter, the interesting parts that never make up a whole are in themselves still interesting, and I’ll forever be grateful for that film’s gift of the discovery of the Yamasuki Singers. In the same way, I’ll forever be grateful to Damsel’s opening credits sequence, the chance for another stellar character performance from R Patt, the incredible mise-en-scène, and for giving Mia Wasikowska another opportunity to put a mediocre film on her back and carry it to the finish line (what if some day she starred in a good movie??). Perhaps my harshest criticism of Damsel is also one of my proudest film-watching moments. The film’s true lead isn’t even featured on the poster; it’s a character named Parson Henry, portrayed by David Zellner. About 3/4 of the way in, I thought to myself, this actor is so absolutely lacking of anything you could call charisma, I bet it’s the director and he cast himself in the lead role, and you know what? It was. *sunglasses emoji*

Best Song All of the Stars

Best Score Tie: First Man and Isle of Dogs

Many LOLs Avengers: Infinity War Eighth Grade The Favourite Mandy

Most Surreal Movie-Watching Moment When me and Becca and Joe and Natalie went to see Rampage kind of as a joke when we had our Moviepasses so it was like whatev, and the theater was PACKED even though it was a week or two after it came out, and at one point The Rock is going in for a pound with the big white gorilla that he trained, and the gorilla fakes the pound, then flips off The Rock and starts gorilla-laughing at its gorilla antics, and the audience went. fucking. NUTS. Like it was the purest moment of comedy that ever existed. It was a Sullivan’s Travels-level eye-opener for me. Give the dumb galoots what they want, and what they want, is to see a gorilla give The Rock the finger.

Most Non-Fun Fun Movie Ready Player One

Please Stop Giving Melissa McCarthy’s husband bit parts in Melissa McCarthy movies (didn’t hate The Happytime Murders btw)

The Something Award Sorry to Bother You

The Nothing Award Crazy Rich Asians

Best Scenes Annihilation - Watching the camcorder footage Aquaman - Escaping the trench creatures Bad Times at the El Royale - Any time Darlene sings The Ballad of Buster Scruggs - All of “The Mortal Remains,” which was basically a single-scene segment Eighth Grade - Chicken nugget dinner The Favourite - The dance (putting my fingertips to my mouth then and then giving it a chef’s kiss: “MWAH”) First Man - the m-er f-ing moon landing (damn that was good, had me on the edge of my seat in both viewings) Free Solo - Despite what I said above, for a stand-alone scene, you cannot beat the final climb Incredibles 2 - Jack Jack/racoon fight The Girl in the Spider’s Web - the motorcycle escape Mandy - So many, but it has to be the Cheddar Goblin Mission Impossible: Fallout - The bathroom fight The Old Man & the Gun - When John and Forrest meet Outlaw King - When they finally(!) had sex A Quiet Place - The very beginning when the whole theater went silent Roma - Fermin’s naked martial arts, Fermin’s denial (so sad!), and the fire A Star is Born - v basic of me, but you cannot deny the first “Shallow” performance The Strangers: Prey at Night - The pool scene Upgrade - The first upgraded fight Won’t You Be My Neighbor? - A lot of them, but it has to be “It’s You I Like” at the end

Best Visuals Annihilation Cold War Mary Poppins Returns The Ritual

Worst Movie of the Year

The 15:17 to Paris (turnoff)

A Wrinkle in Time (walkout)

The Nun

Fireworks

The Meg

Winchester

Rampage

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom

Hold the Dark

Fahrenheit 451

Sadly Missed/Haven't’ Watched Yet At Eternity’s Gate Blaze Burning Destroyer The Kindergarten Teacher Lean on Pete Madeline’s Madeline Mid90s Never Look Away Private Life Support the Girls We the Animals The Wife

Absent on Purpose BlacKkKlansman Black Panther Blindspotting Bohemian Rhapsody

#layokies #movies #oscars

[ryukoishida]

PARS 2017 | Day 6: Spring Festival | In which Alfreed and Layla become friends at a figure skating competition.

Title: Our Own Rhythmnals   Day/Prompt: Day 6 – Spring Festival Author: ryukoishida Summary: Alfreed and Layla met and became friends at Coupe du Printemps after Layla comforted the heartbroken skater, who was at a very bad place in her life at the time. Three years later, they reunite in the same competition as senior skaters, but Layla is distancing herself, and Alfreed wants to know why. [Figure Skating AU] Rating: T Warning: N/A A/N: Title from Luke Lalonde’s “Grand”. Alfreed’s SP music is Eendo’s “Eshgh e Aasemaani”.  Layla’s SP music is Ólafur Arnalds’ “33:26”. Links to music are embedded into the text of the fic for your convenience. Holy… okay, so this is my first time writing F/F and I hope I did them justice. If you have no idea who Layla is, there’s a bit of information about her here and here. Also, I took the theme a bit liberally; the name of the competition is Spring Cup, so… spring skating festival it is!

L’inverno Series: i. Fire and Ice | AO3 | Arslan/Elam ii. Untitled snippet | Arslan/Elam iii. Our Own Rhythmnals | AO3 | Alfreed/Layla

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“Alfreed Zottī, with a score of…”

Alfreed doesn’t need to hear the announcement to know that she has one of the lowest scores among the twenty-four junior female skaters present at the Coupe du Printemps.

She squeezes her eyes close, two hands crushing the fabric of her jacket that she hasn’t even bothered to put on after she gets off the ice; her knees still throbbing from the falls as she tries not to let frustrated tears fall. Colours run together and blur into a mirage of shapeless, meaningless images.

A few audience members applaud after the score has been announced, but with the arena only about one-thirds full — not surprising since junior events are never at the center of attention —the half-hearted applause sounds even worst, echoing pathetically and then fading until there’s not a trace of it left as if it was all in her imagination.

She pulls herself up from the bench, and accompanied by her coach, who hasn’t really said anything yet other than a few attempted words of comfort, the red-haired skater stalks down the aisle where staff, other skaters, and coaches are still idling about, and she doesn’t stop until she reaches the safe privacy of the changing room and locks herself inside a washroom stall.

Alfreed knocks her forehead against the metallic door, the cool sensation at least a nice relief for her heated skin after that disaster of a short program, and at the thought of that, her mind of course decides to focus on nothing but the toppled double axel that started the chain of calamity that followed: the triple Loop she stepped out prematurely, the under-rotated jump combo, and the less-than-perfect step sequence when she had lost all momentum and spun out of control.

A teardrop escapes and rolls down her cheek, and before she knows it, she’s sobbing uncontrollably, chest heaving like she can’t catch her breath and fists striking uselessly against the door as tears and snot run down her face in a mess.

She hates herself for being so weak — not just in terms of her physical elements in figure skating, because she’s always believed that she can improve through incessant practice and training, but her emotional state as well, that she had been so easily swayed by a single mistake that it’d led her down into an unending spiral of self-doubt, resulting in such a devastating and disappointing score in an ISU skating competition, even if it was one of the smaller-scale ones.

If only she can be as strong as her brother, she muses, a sense of self-deprecation settles over her like a heavy blanket that’s impossible to shake away. Despite the recent death of their father, Merlane continues to train ceaselessly back at their home rink — perhaps even more so than before, as if he has something to prove.

Alfreed wipes her tear-streaked face furiously — make-up and costume be damned, she can always wash up her face and have the clothes dry-cleaned later — and that’s when she hears the door to the changing room swings open with a squeak, followed by scattered footsteps and snippets of conversations, most likely other skaters who are looking for a refuge for some gossip.

She claps a hand over her mouth and tries to stay as quiet as possible.

“Who do you think will take gold this time?” someone with a nasally arrogant voice asks and adds, “That Kassem girl was really good, but I’ve never even heard of her until this season. Where did she pop out from?”

“I heard she’s just switched coaches; she’s apparently training under Ilterish Turan now.”

Another girl gasps, “No way! The devil incarnate — that Ilterish Turan?”

“Call him what you want, but most of the skaters trained under him ended up sweeping the medals at all the big competitions.”

“Speaking of, how old is she anyway? She looks like she could be in the senior division.”

“I think she’s just freakishly tall for her age,” the first girl replies with an amused snort, and everyone else laughs.

And that is the major reason why Alfreed always finds herself unable to befriend anyone around her own age range in the figure skating field. She isn’t the friendliest person to hang around with in the first place — with her unrefined, loud-mouthed nature that others never expect from a figure skater and a raw, straight-forward kind of honesty that always rubs people the wrong way — but she despises those who talk shit behind people’s backs even more.

Whoever they’re referring to — Alfreed racks her brain trying to remember a skater named Kassem but fails to come up with anything — she wishes she can stomp out of the washroom stall at that very moment and defend the stranger, even if said stranger isn’t around to witness it. That’s not the point, after all, and nobody deserves to be the target of someone’s joke like this, especially when it’s obviously so ill-intended and tasteless.

Her hand is already resting on the lock, ready to kick open the door and reveal her presence, but then someone else is talking again.

‘God, how long are they planning to stay here?’ Alfreed rolls her eyes, but freezes when she hears her own name.

“And from all the things I’ve heard about Alfreed Zottī, I would’ve thought she’d be a more impressive skater, but wow, was her SP a disaster or what? Those jumps and that posture were absolutely awful! How did she even manage to remain at the top twenty?”

“My coach told me that her father just passed away, so maybe we shouldn’t be too hard on her,” another girl mentions in a softer voice, but the first speaker only sniffs indignantly.

“And her father was her coach, if I remember correctly. That would explain why her performances have been so inconsistent lately.”

“All the more reason she shouldn’t slack off, then,” the first girl only says, her tone final, signifying the end of the discussion.

It’s at this point that Alfreed finds herself shuddering in fury, fingers curling into fists and nails digging into the tender skin of her palms as her eyes flare up in a dangerous crimson: it’s fine that they’re talking about all the flaws in her skating, and it’s true that she’d been letting her emotions get the better of her for the past few weeks since her father — a single-parent who brought her and her brother up and trained them since they were young, a harsh and unreasonable man at times, certainly, but everything he said and did was for the benefit of his children — has died from an unfortunate accident. Yet to discredit all the time and effort she’s poured into training in such an offhanded manner when this girl doesn’t even know her is crossing the line, and Alfreed is about to give these clueless girls a piece of her mind.

“Who did you say is slacking off?” a new voice — light and sweet like the first trace of spring — joins in the conversation, and for a few seconds, everyone in the changing room remains uncomfortably quiet, the air stiff and dense and no one dares to make the first move.

“W-what’s it to you?” one of the girls says, a little too loud, like an entrapped prey trying to make itself bigger and more menacing than it truly is.

“Nothing,” the newcomer pauses, and Alfreed presses her ear against the door as if it’d help her hear better, “But maybe you should consider being nicer human beings and stop talking crap behind people’s backs? The way you girls are behaving — it’s rather childish, don’t you think?”

“Just because you’re in first place after the SP doesn’t make you the boss of us, you freak,” one of them, presumably the leader of the trio, snaps.

The newcomer ignores the insult and responds with the kind of nonchalance that Alfreed can only dream to achieve, “Oh? I think the medal speaks otherwise.”  

“There’s still the free skate tomorrow,” the girl reminds her, snide sneering obvious in her taunt, “I wouldn’t be so certain about that gold medal if I were you, Kassem. Come on, girls, let’s get out of here.”

The rushed footsteps fade, and the door swings back to place with the familiar squeak. Alfreed feels herself releasing a breath she hasn’t realized she’s been holding.

The hesitant rapping against the door of her stall comes unexpected, and causes Alfreed to jump back a little, a hand on her chest, her heart still beating a little too fast from the conversation she’s been accidentally eavesdropping.  

“Hey, you okay in there? You’re not stuck in the toilet, are you? Should I get some help?”

It’s the girl who’s kicked the gossipers out of the changing room — ‘Kassem, wasn’t it?’ Alfreed recalls — her heroine, to be honest, though she’ll never admit such an embarrassing thing to a stranger she’s barely met.

“No! I-I’m fine, thanks.”

Without making it too obvious, she tries to wipe off as much of the dried tear marks and straighten up her costume as best as she can, and with a twist of the lock, she pulls the door open and steps out of the cramped stall, murmuring with a hint of blush on her cheeks that she’s hoping the make-up will at least partly cover, “Sorry. I didn’t mean to, but I heard the whole thing… Thanks again for, well…”

She’s aware that she’s rambling a mile a minute, and the more nervous she feels, the worst her running mouth gets. It’s a bad habit Alfreed still hasn’t been able to get rid of.

“You’re Alfreed Zottī, aren’t you?” the sweet voice rings clear and silvery, and it’s filled with pleasant surprise that makes the other skater blink in confusion.

Alfreed finally has the sense to look up, and she internally scolds herself for not remembering the girl standing before her, a bright grin lighting up the soft green of her eyes and short, dark curls braided on one side of her head while stray locks frame her cheeks: Layla Kassem, a young skater with the strength and elegance of a lioness, skills that most skaters her age can only dream of, and a burning passion for the sport that simmers and explodes in her programs and in the way she moves on the ice.

She was in the group before Alfreed’s, but she must have been too busy worrying about her own performance and warm-up to pay attention to the other skaters at the time.

Later that evening, when she’s re-watching that day’s event on the laptop she’s brought along with her, Alfreed will realize that Layla — the thirteen-year-old girl with the bright, fervent eyes and the enthusiasm and skills to match — is one of the few junior female skaters who was crazy enough to attempt the triple Axel, and somehow managed to land it, even if she had to put a hand on the ice to stop herself from completely falling out of the jump.

“How did you know?” Alfreed asks, eyes widening comically.

“Your beautiful red hair is pretty unforgettable,” Layla replies as she glances admiringly at Alfreed with a small but genuine smile, which only makes the other girl blush even harder than before.

“Oh, you mean I didn’t leave enough of an impression when I flunked that double Axel?” Alfreed chuckles, rubbing the back of her neck, abashed at the attention she’s getting from the other skater.

“Come on, we all had our bad days. Your musical interpretation and transitions were nearly flawless, and I’m not just saying that to make you feel better, I promise,” Layla says.

“You really think so?” Alfreed looks up to meet Layla’s steady gaze with hesitant, cerise irises, teeth worrying at her lower lip.

“Don’t judge too harshly of yourself,” she gives the red-headed skater a sympathetic smile — nothing demeaning, just a sincere gesture to express her concern and an invitation to talk more should Alfreed wishes to do so. The dark-haired skater offers her hand with a tilt of her head, “Layla Kassem. Want to be friends?”

“Absolutely!” she clasps Layla’s hand in hers in an enthusiastic handshake, “I’m Alfreed Zottī, but uh… I guess you already knew that.” Her cheeks are tinted pink again, and Alfreed suspects that this is going to become something of a recurrent theme, but Layla merely laughs, the sound gentle and earnest, and they let go of each other’s hand, fingertips tingling with warmth that seeps deeper than skin and into their bones.

“Want to get out of here and grab a coffee?” Layla asks as she turns around and heads to her locker.

Alfreed follows suit.

“Hot cocoa?” Alfreed wrinkles her nose in disgust at the unpleasant bitter drink and suggests instead.

“Sure! Anything to get away from my coach just for a little while,” Layla whispers conspiringly under her breath.

“The rumors are true then? You’re training under the devil incarnate?”

“Is that the nickname Coach Ilterish goes by around here?” Layla can’t help but laugh, though she definitely wouldn’t have dared if the man were actually present. “Sure, he’s tough and strict with his students, and his ballet classes are brutal; plus, I think he’s secretly a robot or something because I’ve never seen that man cracked a smile, ever.”

Layla pauses for a moment as she puts her sweater on and continues after contemplating her next words, “but he’d taught a lot of top skaters for the past decade and I think I can learn a lot more with him guiding me.”

“That’s amazing — you’re amazing, Layla,” Alfreed has already changed out of her costume and into a set of sweatpants and windbreaker with matching orange and white accents; the clothes are half a size too big on her slight frame, so the sleeves are covering most of her hands, revealing only the tips of her fingers. She pokes her head around the corner of a wall of lockers to check and see if Layla is done yet, and finds that the other girl is mostly dressed except for her shoes.

Similar to herself, Layla’s feet are covered in welts and bruises, and healing wounds protected by bandages. The dark-haired skater quickly pulls on her socks and slips on a pair of sneakers, head ducked to hide the faint blush on her cheeks after Alfreed has complimented her out of the blue.

“H-how do you mean?”

“You must be around the same age as me, right?” She plops down beside the other girl and drops her sports bag by her feet. “Fifteen? Sixteen?”

Layla zips her windbreaker all the way up in a weak attempt to hide the heat on her face. “I’m thirteen, actually.” She curls in on herself as if she wants to make herself appear smaller, and Alfreed has to wonder why, though she does find the gesture rather endearing.

“What? Seriously? Wow, you’re two years younger than me and you’ve already got your future all planned out,” Alfreed sighs in awe as she stretches her arms upward and leans back against her hands braced against the bench.

“I mean… I just know that I’ll always want figure skating to be a big part of my life,” Layla replies sheepishly. “Don’t you?”

“That’d be ideal, yeah, but when you get to a certain age, you just realize that there are some things that, no matter how much you want it, no matter how much time and effort you spend trying to attain it, it’s simply… impossible,” Alfreed turns and looks over at her new friend, cerise eyes bright but it’s in the way she shrugs her shoulders a bit helplessly and the crooked grin on her lips that doesn’t quite touch the entirety of her face that make Layla want to shuffle closer to offer some sort of consolation, a hug, maybe.

She isn’t sure how to go about this — isn’t sure if the gesture is perhaps too forward of her — so she remains unmoving.

“Look at you, talking like a grandma already,” Layla playfully punches the other girl’s arm instead, before her tone turns somber once more, “it won’t always be like this — what happened on the ice today.”

“I know,” Alfreed smiles faintly at her friend’s words, her head lowered as she stares at her hands. The gratitude is unspoken, but Layla understands as soon as the red-haired skater nudges her shoulder gently against hers, and the serious topic is dropped for the moment.

The day after the Coupe du Printemps, under the lush, green foliage of the woods that surround the Patinoire de Kockelscheuer, Alfreed and Layla stand side-by-side as they look at the venue one last time before they have to board the bus and leave. In the end, Alfreed managed to climb back up to ninth place after completing a near-perfect rendition of her free skate, and Layla proudly took silver, losing only a mere 0.5 points to the gold medalist.

“This April’s Worlds’ will be my last competition as a junior skater,” Alfreed tells her as she leans heavily against the trunk of an alder tree. The thick layers of leaves provide some cover from the rain for them, but Alfreed pulls her hood tighter around her head as the breeze begins to pick up. It’s rare to see the usually boisterous girl conveying such a grim expression, but as soon as the thought of her senior debut enters her thoughts, it’s difficult for her mind to think of anything else.

“Are you excited about your senior debut next season?” Layla asks, her back touching the same tree, their arms almost touching, and even though it’s already March, the climate of southern Luxembourg is still bitingly cold, especially when the chilling wind brings with it occasional precipitation that’s more like viscous mist than actual rainfall.  

“Not going to lie, but I’m actually really nervous about this whole thing. The ladies’ singles field is pretty deep and there are so many talented skaters from all over the world. I feel overwhelmed just thinking about it,” her voice softens at the next statement, “I don’t know if I’m ready for this.”

“You’ll wait for me, right?” Layla pushes herself off from the trunk with a determined grunt and stands before the other skater. She’s almost a head taller than Alfreed, so when she’s standing this close to her, with one hand braced against the tree a few inches away from Alfreed’s ear, her towering stature seems even more alarming and noticeable.

“W-what?” Alfreed is slightly taken aback by their sudden proximity, but she’s tilting her head to meet Layla’s gaze, albeit a bit bashfully.

“I’ll be keeping in touch, obviously,” and Alfreed really likes how confident and matter-of-fact Layla sounds when she announces this, “but we won’t be competing against each other in the same discipline anymore, so until I debut in the senior division, you have to promise to keep skating your best, and in turn, I’ll promise to train hard over the next two years so that when we’re finally competing in the same field, I’ll be able to stand on the podium with you.”

The pale green of her eyes is blazing, and Layla is focusing on nothing else but the girl standing before her. Her goal has been clear from the moment she’s decided to abandon everything, sacrifice and cut off the frivolous ties that threaten to hold her back, to pursue figure skating as her career: she will go down in history to become one of the most notable female skaters of her era and bring pride to her family and country. Now that she’s befriended Alfreed — an older, more experienced skater who shares some of those insecurities that she has never brought up or admitted to anyone else — Layla wishes nothing more than to have Alfreed be part of this journey, this transformation, her life.

Caught up in her own thoughts, Layla hasn’t even noticed that Alfreed, standing on her tiptoe, is cradling her flushed, wind-chaffed face between her palms, and she says with a teasing grin, “You don’t sound like a thirteen-year-old at all when you talk like that, you know?”

A small, displeased pout begins to form on the younger skater’s chapped lips, but Alfreed interrupts with a pat on Layla’s head as she ruffles her hair, “Hey, I meant that as a compliment. Now stop frowning before you start getting premature wrinkles and sprouting grey hairs.”

Layla’s cheeks are still uncomfortably warm after Alfreed retrieves her hands, and it definitely doesn’t help that a second later, the red-headed skater has taken her hand into hers without a forethought and starts dragging her towards the bus station across from the arena.

“C’mon, we should head back before our coaches decide to ditch us here.”

In the unknowing mist of spring among the green woods in Luxembourg, they make a promise to meet again on the world stage as equals after two years; however, during that period of time, their exchanges over texts and Skype become fewer and farther in between, mostly with Alfreed being the one to initiate conversations, and even then, she’ll only receive the occasional dissatisfying short replies. This awkward, one-sided game of hide-and-seek continues until about a month right before Layla’s supposedly senior debut at the Finlandia Trophy that season, and that’s about the time when Alfreed completely loses track of her friend.

There have been no messages, no calls — no attempt at any kind of contact at all — and Alfreed is worried, her heart becoming heavier as days of silence turn into weeks, except she has no time to worry about a girl who may not be her friend anymore, but she remembers their promise still, intending to keep it in her heart until the end.

-

Nothing much about the Patinoire de Kockelscheuer has changed over the three years since she last skated in the venue, except the crowd in the stands seem more enthusiastic, and she even spots a few supportive banners bearing her name.

“Alfreed, are you listening to me?” her coach is saying, his head ducked down to scan the content of his clipboard, “remember to watch your posture during the triple axel.”

She hums to show that she’s listening, and then asks out of nowhere with a straight face, “So, have you reconsidered my marriage proposal?”

It all started out as a joke when someone back in her home rink discovered Alfreed’s childhood crush had been none other than the current favourite star choreographer for many prodigious skaters, Narsus Shahidi. Since the older skaters wouldn’t stop teasing her about it even after she’d clarified that that childish infatuation had long been forgotten ever since she grew out of that phase, Alfreed has learned to just swim with the tide with a smile instead of fighting against it.

These days, only Narsus himself is still embarrassed about the entire fanfare, and Alfreed enjoys making the older man fluster every once in a while.

Alfreed tucks a stray lock of her red hair behind the curve of her ear, batting her eyelashes in an overly-exaggerated keenness that, if the man hasn’t already known her for a long time, he’d have assumed she’s making a horrid attempt at flirting with him.

“Excuse me?” he cocks a well-shaped eyebrow at his student’s question, though his concentration is still fully focused on the clipboard in his hand, the other one scrawling down notes that Alfreed is unable to make out because she’s standing on the other side of the rink board. Also, because his handwriting — even if she’s not viewing it upside-down — is terrible.

“Remember what I said about marrying you when I win five golds this season?” she continues with a wide grin, unperturbed by the dark glower her coach sends her.

“No,” he snaps.

“’No’ as in you don’t remember, or ‘no’ as in you don’t think I can win gold here?” Alfreed remains in good humor, her lips, shimmering with pink gloss that matches the sea-blue gauze and silver trimming of her costume, tucked in a self-assured smirk.

“’No’ as in I refuse to answer this obviously loaded question.”

“You’ll give the poor man an aneurism, Alfreed,” a tall woman with an elegant posture even when she’s just standing, ink-black hair that cascades down her back, and exquisite jade-green eyes that can either convey heartbreak or downright murder appears beside the blond-haired coach who’s still fuming over Alfreed’s teasing.

“Farangis!” Alfreed chirps excitedly, “What are you doing here? Didn’t you say you were going to stay behind and train for Worlds’?”

“I thought it’d be fun to come cheer you on,” Farangis replies with a soft smile.

“Aghriras is stalking you again, isn’t he?” Narsus turns to her with a knowing glance. “Have you considered getting a restraining order? I heard those things are rather effective against stubborn and shameless men who just don’t know when to give up.”

“That seems a bit extreme, don’t you think?” Farangis sounds remarkably calm, as if having her old pair skating partner following her on every social media platform she’s on and obsessively trying to get back in touch with her despite Farangis’ outright refusal to have any more connection to the man who gave up on their partnership after a few consecutive disappointing results is nothing to be afraid of. It amazes Alfreed how the skater, who’s only three years older than her, can deal with all this with such a mature and composed demeanor.

In most people’s opinion — fellow professional figure skaters and audiences alike — Farangis Avesta is better off skating in the singles discipline anyway; her techniques have always been at the top in the pair skating field and her performances and public persona are popular with the judges and fans. To be rid of the weight of a troublesome partner is a blessing, and Farangis bursts into the ladies’ singles scene burning brighter and more dazzling than ever before.

“You’re too nice,” Alfreed pipes up as she balances her chin on her palm.  

“And you should be out there doing your warm-up before time runs out,” Narsus scolds.

“Alright already,” Alfreed makes a face and skates away to join the other skaters in her flight.

“How’s she doing?” Farangis asks as she watches the red-haired skater speeds past the other young women in the rink, eyes focusing straight ahead and nothing else.

“Everything should be fine if she can concentrate and not let any unnecessary things distract her from her goal,” Narsus answers, a finger tapping against his bottom lip as he finally drops the clipboard down on one of the available chairs nearby.

“I saw her — the girl that Alfreed mentioned before,” Farangis comments, “she’s in the flight after hers, and it looks like Ilterish is keeping quite a tight leash on his prized skater.”

“Yeah? I wish you wouldn’t bring it up to her because Layla Kassem is trouble and is considered to be one of the aforementioned unnecessary things that Alfreed doesn’t need to bother herself with right now,” Narsus replies coolly.

“She probably already knows,” Farangis speaks again after someone announces the end of the warm-up segment, and they move aside to allow the stunningly-dressed skaters go by, a few who recognize Farangis are waving at her and the woman nods her greeting with a pleasant, polite smile. “She must have seen the entries list, at least. And her skating feels different during the last few days, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, too.”

Narsus remains silent but his pursed lips and the unease in those usually confident, violet eyes tell Farangis all she needs to know.

“Wish Alfreed good luck for me,” Farangis turns around, “I’ll be watching from the audience stands.”  

-

Like so many times before, like the moment before that disastrous short program that had led to the most unlikely encounter three years prior, Alfreed is once again standing in the center of the rink where the Coupe du Printemps takes place, her body poised gracefully in her starting position as all eyes dwell on her.

Her mind is blank except for the one name that refuses to be wiped off, and that’s all right because she is the one person Alfreed wants to skate for.

She’s known since the entries list was published on the event’s official website about a month ago; she’s known that Layla will be here, and she will see her at some point over the course of the competition, surely. But somehow, over the past two days during the sanctioned practice times or even at the drawing for the starting order last evening, she couldn’t find a chance to approach her or even wander close enough to garner her attention.

Ilterish is always with her, it appears, as if he’s her personal bodyguard; Alfreed has to admit he’s doing a damn fine job at keeping everyone else at bay from bothering his protégé.

If she can’t talk to her friend, then the only way Alfreed can get through to her is to skate her heart out, lay it bare for all to witness.

Will Layla be watching?  

She doesn’t have time to ponder about that for too long because the staccato notes of the folksy accordion to her short program music have started playing; she unfolds from her frozen pose, the semi-transparent gauze of her sleeves flowing in the air like blue wings spreading out in the wind, and she transforms into a lover lamenting for a kind of heavenly love she’ll never find.

The female singer’s smoky vocals melt seamlessly into the jazzy tang of the melody, and Alfreed lets the harmony of the song and the movements of her body fuse together as one. After the triple flip, which she lands solidly to the applause and cheering from the audience, the music — suffused with playful guitar chords and trombone slides — picks up the pace, and she prepares for the spread-eagle entry, leading to an impressive double axel-triple toe loop jump combination with incredible height and speed.

The colours blur into ribbons and the music drowns out everything else; Alfreed can feel her blood singing, her body soaring in a delirious rush of desperate passion as she seeks the answer she longs for, chases after the shadow of her friend who, like a spirit, continues to slip and escape through her fingers every time she gets too near.  

Slightly out of breath, she topples precariously doing the triple axel in the second half of the program, so deductions are unavoidable in that account, and Alfreed can already imagine Narsus’ unimpressed ‘what were you thinking?’ scowl. She vaguely wonders if Layla has perfected the jump that she’d dared to try three years ago.

The melody is becoming light and sparse once more, and she concludes with a beautiful layback spin that shows off the elegant arch of her back as her skirt flares out in waves from the momentum, skating to a stop in her final pose when the tinkling notes float and dissipate into the roaring ovation from the crowds.

Everything aches: muscles, feet, bones, the raw, clawed out emptiness in her heart, and she’ll have to do it again tomorrow at the free skate event. She pushes the stray locks of her hair back and away from sticking onto her sweaty cheeks as she joins Narsus at the kiss and cry area and awaits her score.

“I would yell at you for that terrible posture during the triple axel…” Narsus murmurs as he smiles brilliantly for the camera pointing at him.

“I know you would,” Alfreed interrupts without a hitch, her eyes trained on the scoreboard.

“But I’m not going to,” he concludes, a little smug.

“Oh? This is new,” Alfreed looks over at him, and then she immediately narrows her eyes with suspicion, “Wait, am I in a different kind of trouble?”

Narsus’ answer is halted by the announcement of Alfreed’s score: her season’s best SP score yet, which lands her in the first place with six more skaters to go.

“You knew she’s here — your… friend,” Narsus only hesitates a little at the end of his statement.

Alfreed has only told him in the briefest manner about her friendship with Layla when they first met, but what she’d said to him three years ago — right after World Championships had ended, and Alfreed had come running to him asking for the choreographer, who has been a decorated figure skater himself at the height of his achievement but has never expressed any desire to take in students, to become her coach — it was enough to convince Narsus.

The resolve in her eyes and the determined set of her mouth when she announced that she wanted to become better so that she could skate as her best friend’s equal, sharing the joy and victory together on the world stage, revealed to Narsus the potential of a young, fervent skater who so desperately wanted to improve her artistry and techniques for the sake of friendship.

He’ll never admit this, but at the time, Narsus thought Alfreed really reminded him of his younger self: awfully reckless and full of the kind of ideals and tenacity to the sport and art of figure skating. It’s a part of him that gradually fizzles out as he grows older and becomes too docile, too complacent.

Alfreed nods without a word as they walk around the side of the ice rink, out through the passageway, and into the hallway beneath the audience stands. She plops down on one of the benches by the wall and begins to unlace her skates with quick, practiced fingers.

“What will you do?” Narsus sits down beside her and gingerly places a pair of sneakers by her skates, which she promptly slips on along with her team jacket.

She pulls herself to her feet and zips her jacket all the way up, the movement echoing a hint of ferocious flare.

“Alfreed?” Narsus picks up his students’ skates and stands up tentatively.

“I’m going to talk to Layla,” she simply says, her tone low and brittle. “I need to know what happened.”

“How? Ilterish follows her like a guard dog.”  

They make for the section of the stands reserved for competitors and staff.

“He can’t possibly follow her everywhere she goes,” she snorts insolently, climbing up the stairs two at a time. Layla is the first to start in her group and she wants to find a good seat.

Glancing over at the red-haired skater and realizing that there’s nothing he can do to dissuade her from doing whatever she’s planning in her head, Narsus can only sigh in defeat.

Her left leg jiggles up and down impatiently as her thumb scrolls on her phone while they’re waiting for the ice to be resurfaced for the last six skaters; she can’t understand a word she’s seeing on the screen, but it doesn’t matter because she isn’t even sure what she’s reading in the first place.

When the six skaters finally step out onto the ice for their warm-up, Alfreed leans her entire torso over the railing and narrows her eyes in search of the familiar figure of her friend. The dark hair and towering frame is easy to spot amongst the slighter-built skaters: donned in an asymmetrical dress with one long sleeve covering her right arm and showing bare, olive-toned skin of her left, the fabric a subdued gradient of black from her neckline to bright red along the edge of her skirt with delicate silver jewels sewn into an intricate pattern, and short hair combed back with a single purple pansy flower hairpin, Layla Kassem stands out with her presence.

It’s difficult to tell from this distance, but Alfreed is sure that Layla has grown quite a lot taller over the years they haven’t seen each other; her limbs develop elegant, powerful lines of lean muscles, and she exudes cool confidence as she perfectly does a triple axel with the ease and grace of a veteran skater.

At last, the announcer is introducing the first skater, and Layla glides one lap on the ice before she locks into her starting position at the left end of the rink.

Alfreed’s attention is solely focused on the lone figure on the ice — the excitement of finally seeing Layla perform live for the first time in three years overwhelms the dawning fear of having to confront her after the event. For now, she just wants to watch her friend skate.

And skate she did: beautifully, perfectly, not a chink in her armour strengthened by the impeccable execution of all the required technical elements.

The program begins with the isolated, winding melody of a violin, the swift contrast from absolute low to rough high notes bringing Layla to stretch out into a graceful layback Ina Bauer, back arched and gliding sideways, that leads into a double axel-double toe-double loop combination.

One element after another, Layla executes each to the praise of the audience, yet it makes no difference for her.

Despite the melancholic nature of the song that seems to paint a character walking alone in the dark — restless and with nowhere to go, no place to belong — nothing on Layla’s facial expressions convey that sentiment. Her eyes, glazed green and too fierce for the piece she’s performing, only depicts hungry, roaring flames; to the skater, there is only one purpose to this program, and that is to flawlessly complete the list of challenging technical elements that will garner her the most amount of points.

With her fingers curled around the railing and her knuckles turning white, Alfreed feels a sense of unease toiling inside her chest. Even though Layla is skating without any mistakes and every movement, every tilt of her head, spread of her arms, is calculated and exact — the Kerrigan spiral that transitions into a triple loop, the various spins — her performance can only be described as cold, distant, and unfeeling.

It’s nothing like the kind of skating Alfreed remembered from when they first met.

As the song progresses, the violin melody becomes more urgent, the notes slashing through the air like caged snarls, the rhythm chaotic and vicious — violent, almost — and her step sequence and final combination spin completely mirror that.

To nobody’s surprise, Layla receives a very high score, a good eight points ahead of the person currently in second place. The other five skaters who perform after Layla don’t even come close to her standards in terms of technical skills, but Alfreed hasn’t remained in her seat long enough to find out until much later because as soon as she observes Layla leaving the kiss and cry area with her coach, she shoots off for the direction of the changing room downstairs.

With her arms crossed in front of her chest and one leg resting before the other while leaning against the stark white wall of the female changing room, Alfreed ignores the confused stares that some of the passerby staff have sent her way and replies to the brief greetings from her fellow competitors when they choose to acknowledge her on their way in or out of the room.

It’s nearly deserted when Alfreed finally spots a tall figure with a head of dark, messy curls. She waits until the last person in the room leaves, and then steadily makes her way to where Layla is sitting on a bench facing the row of lockers. She sits down beside her, with a few inches of space between them; Alfreed can’t find the strength in her to reduce that distance yet, not until she gets the answers she’s wanted for the past year.

“What the hell was that out there?” Alfreed decides to break the silence with the first question that comes to her mind. She could’ve phrased it better, but she thinks they’re beyond polite words and courteous pretense now.

“What do you mean?” Her voice is just as sweet as Alfreed remembers it, yet something is amiss in that tone — that touch of blooming spring that reminds Alfreed of revival, a new beginning, a hopeful future.  

“That style of skating — that was not you at all!” She tries to control the contempt and disappointment in her voice, but it’s leaking into her words like sticky tar, a dark, disgusting coat that clings to every word that comes out of her mouth.

“And how would you know what skating style best defines me?” Layla wraps her jacket tighter around herself as she looks away.

“Maybe if you haven’t suddenly disappeared off of the face of the earth and replied to my messages once in a while, I would’ve known the answer to that and we wouldn’t even be having this ridiculous conversation right now,” Alfreed’s voice simmers between exasperation and helplessness, and it’s tearing her apart.

“Maybe there are circumstances that you don’t understand,” Layla mutters.

“Damn it,” she kicks the door of the closest locker and its slam echoes like a clap of thunder in the room, and then she whirls around to face the other girl, “then make me understand, Layla.”

“I can’t!” She sounds resolute, and she sharply turns to the red-haired skater with an agonized expression, lips pursed and eyes despondent. “I need to do everything I can to achieve my goals, and that includes… this.”

“This?” Alfreed repeats, uncomprehending.

“You,” she tries to put her sentiment into words, but with the way Alfreed is staring at her, confused and pained, it’s becoming difficult to think clearly.

“Me?” Alfreed is feeling foolish for repeating again, but there are issues that need to be clarified, and this one is currently on the top of the list.

“I had to leave you behind,” she says quietly, her fingers fiddling agitatedly in her lap.  

“By ignoring me without a single, logical explanation? The Layla I thought I knew would have at least tried to talk it out first.”

“Coach Ilterish was right…” she murmurs. Everything becomes so much more complicated when Alfreed Zottī is involved, Layla has thought. Coach Ilterish was able to foresee it and was probably just being logical back then, suggesting that the earlier she cut ties with unnecessary baggage that might ruin her future, the faster and smoother her path to the top of the figure skating world would be.

“Ilterish…?” Alfreed spits out the name in distaste, “Since when did you start caring about what he said?”

“Since I started winning at competitions,” Layla’s reply has no wavering hesitation, just absolute belief, “since I started truly understanding his philosophy.”  

“Oh yeah, the philosophy of treating your friends like shit in order to win,” Alfreed sneers, and even as the words slide out of her mouth, viscous and full of venom, some part of her hopes that it will infuriate Layla enough to make her stay just a bit longer.

“You can think whatever you want of me, but I’m done with this conversation,” Layla pulls herself up from the bench and begins to turn away.

“Whatever happened to keeping in touch, huh?” Alfreed has wrapped her fingers tightly around the taller girl’s bicep in a flash to stop her from moving further, and she’s pleading now, wide-eyed and crestfallen. “Whatever happened to waiting for you so we can compete in the same field? Whatever happened to standing on the podium together?”

“We aren’t kids anymore, Alfreed,” she makes no movement to retrieve her arm from the other girl’s grasp, her stance fixed as an ice sculpture, her voice just as stiff and cold, “when all of us compete in the same discipline, there can only be one person standing at the top of the podium, and I will be the one with the gold medal around my neck.”

The trace of warmth in her pale green eyes is lost to the winter frost, and Alfreed feels her friend slipping away from the tip of her fingers again as her arm drops to her side listlessly.

‘Whatever happened to us?’ Alfreed wants to ask Layla, but she’s alone in the room now, and there’s nowhere else for her to go but back to the world constructed of ice.

-

A/N: Err I did mention this piece will not have a happy ending, didn’t I? [sweats nervously]

Some notes about this AU here.

#arslan senki #the heroic legend of arslan #pars2017 #alfreed/layla #alfreed #layla #bowie's crappy writing

[i-read-good-books]

Expomise Extra!

You all really seemed to want Victor to get his hands on Luke and murder him, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to give you some craic.

Summary:

Luke turns around slowly, still protecting his front with his gym bag, “Please, please, I just want to skate -”

“Oh, for Merlin’s sake,” the murderer sighs, and the lights flick on by themselves. Luke blinks, startled.

The murderer… looks like a fourteen year old little Luke clone.

Link to ao3: here

Extra under the cut:

Okay, so Luke considers himself a pretty chill guy. He doesn’t really get mad very often, he helps his friends out whenever he can, and he’s got a high tolerance for weird shit, a fact that has historically turned out for the worse as he’s forced to proofread his friend George’s Draco x Harry fanfiction because no one else will do it.

But there’s limits to his chillness, alright? Everyone has limits. And when Luke walks into his bedroom after a long afternoon at gymnastics, his joints aching, to find someone sitting on his bed in the darkness, he screams like some teenage girl in a horror movie, jumping three meters back and holding up his gym bag to protect himself.

“Oh my god!” he whimpers, quivering. The ‘someone’ in question isn’t that visible, indistinguishable in the dark room, only the faint edges of a person’s figure. “Please don’t kill me. I’m really young and I could have a future so like. Maybe kill some politician instead?”

Oh god, he’s home alone. His parents are away and his stupid brother will be out all night, so there’s literally no one to save him from this. He’s going to die murdered in his own bedroom.

Frantic, he turns back and moves to open the door, whining, only to find it locked. His eyes widen. Luke just came in a few seconds ago, what the fuck -?

“Luke Matthews,” his murderer says, a male voice. It’s unbelievably steady, given he’s probably a serial killer. Luke wonders if he’s got a super creepy monologue already planned. This is the worst night of his life. “We finally meet.”

Luke turns around slowly, still protecting his front with his gym bag, “Please, please, I just want to skate -”

“Oh, for Merlin’s sake,” the murderer sighs, and the lights flick on by themselves. Luke blinks, startled.

The murderer… looks like a fourteen year old little Luke clone.

His voice trembles, “Are you my son? From the future?” He suddenly realizes, “Oh god, did we already kill the planet? Are you here to save us?”

Little Luke shoots him the most disdainful glare that Luke’s ever received from someone his age, crossing his arms over his chest and whipping his long hair back. It’s a bit unfair that he’s prettier than Luke, but well. Life is unfair. “You are clearly not very bright, I don’t see what Yuuri even sees in you.”

Wait.

Wait.

...Yuuri?

As in, japanese Yuuri Katsuki, the sweetest kid on Earth? Yuuri Katsuki, who once baked him cookies that were skate-shaped for his birthday? Yuuri Katsuki, who jumps over milestones in figure skating like they’re nothing? That Yuuri?

He frowns, too disorientated, “I’m lost.”

The Luke clone flicks his tongue in disapproval, “I’m Yuuri’s friend. I’m not giving you my name. Men like you can’t be trusted.”

Luke blinks. Men like me?

“Um,” he bites his lower lip, clutching his gym bag close. “Can I just ask why you’re in my room, Yuuri’s friend? I’m not really getting this.”

The teenager hesitates, his gaze falling to his feet. All of a sudden, he looks unsure, his cheeks slightly flushed, and coughs slightly. “You, er, you made Yuuri sad.” His voice sharpens. “And you didn’t even apologize for it!”

Luke’s slightly worried that Yuuri might be in the mafia.

He’s about to maybe call the police so as to get this overprotective child to his parents, when it hits him, realization slamming into him. This can’t be Phichit, Yuuri has always talked about him being glued to his phone and existing in a permanent state of joy and snarkiness. Can’t be Leo, either, Yuuri said the kid was sweeter than candy floss.

Ergo, this must be…

“You’re Yuri!” he declares triumphantly, oddly proud of himself. “Very angry but very sweet, blond and cute.”

Yuri stares at him with the most deadpan expression he’s ever seen, “Are you kidding me? I’m Yuri? Yuri Plisetsky? Luke, if Yuratcha knew that you made Yuuri upset your skin would be hanging on his wall.”

Luke gulps, “Good to know.”

But if it isn’t Yuri, then there’s only one more friend Yuuri talked about while they were training together.

“I love the bracelet, dude,” Luke comments, bumping their shoulders together. “Super cool. Where did you get it?”

“Oh, I didn’t buy it,” Yuuri admits, looking at him from between his eyelashes. His cheeks must be red from the cold, poor thing. “My friend Victor made it for me.”

His voice goes a little breathless and light when he says it, pausing especifically on Victor’s name, and Luke smirks. “Good friend, huh?”

“He really is!” Yuuri gushes, his glide turning into a messy waddle on the ice as he swivels around to talk to him, vying for his attention. “Victor’s great, really. Did you know he was the one who got me into figure skating?”

“Well, he’s done a good job for all skating fans out there,” Luke tells him, smiling.

Yuuri squeaks, “I wouldn’t go that far… but Victor is really sweet. He’s always really considerate, and feels super bad whenever he messes up. I actually can’t wait to see him,” he confesses, fidgeting. “I hope he isn’t too busy practicing that he won’t want to come.”

His head snaps up to look at Luke, “N-not that I would blame him! I mean, I’m not as important as his career, obviously, he has to focus on that.”

Luke tries not to grin too broadly. Oh man, kids crushing is the cutest thing ever. “I don’t think that will be a problem, Yuuri, okay?” He ruffles his hair, trying to imagine what Victor is like.

“Holy shit,” Luke breathes, and then slaps a hand over his mouth, because there’s a kid listening. “You’re Victor.”

Victor gives him a look that says he would have a more intelligent conversation with a dead slug, rolling his eyes. “Smart.”

“But,” Luke flounders, confused. His gym bag drops to the floor, forgotten. “Yuuri always said you were so sweet.”

That makes Victor’s head snap up, the colour in his cheeks brightening. “... Yuuri said that?”

Oh.

Oh.

So that’s what this is about.

“Oh yeah,” Luke carries on, smirking. He can’t believe he actually felt threatened by this kid a few minutes ago, despite the fact that he actually broke into his house. He’s gonna have to take a look at his locks. “Yuuri just loves talking about you.”

Victor’s blush deepens, and he stares at his feet, the corners of his lips twisting upwards. “H-he does?” The boy bites his nails, pulling at his hair slightly. “It’s just - it’s really hard to see what he thinks, sometimes, he’s so nice to everyone.”

Obviously this kid has never seen Yuuri after Celestino screams at him for ten minutes, glowering and hissing at anyone who comes close, or ranting about why he just hates this one guy at school. Luke and the other people at the rink have become acquainted with Yuuri muttering under his breath and cursing his sister daily, which was, for some time, Luke’s only source of info on Mari.

Luke smiles, kind of liking this kid. He can see why Yuuri’s so gone on him, even if the little fluff is terribly oblivious. But really, how can someone just not realize a person this obvious has a crush on them? Some people just don’t get it.

“Well, I can safely tell you he talks about you the most,” he says, moving to sit on his bed and patting the space next to him with a smile. As if on autopilot, Victor shuffles until he sits down, swinging his legs. It’s a lie, of course, Yuuri talks about Phichit the most, but what Victor doesn’t know won’t hurt him. “And that you have nothing to worry about.”

“You think so?” Victor munches on his lower lip, eyes wide and worried. He puts a lock of hair behind his ear, letting out a stressed sigh. “He just - it’s really hard to be around him, sometimes. I don’t know if - if I’m being too obvious or I’m being too subtle, and he just sends me this letter talking about some guy -”

Ouch. That’s gotta hurt. Luke can kind of see why Victor would feel torn, although he wonders why he’s speaking to Luke, instead of the actual guy Yuuri is apparently crushing on. Kids these days are weird, he guesses.

He puts his arm around Victor, checking to see if the kid’s comfortable with that, and pushes him closer when he seems to lean in closer, mumbling. “It’ll all be fine, okay? I’m pretty sure that other guy isn’t as devoted as you to go stalk your crush’s random acquaintance at his ice rink.”

Victor stares at him, for a few seconds, as if he’s incredibly dense, and says, “Yeah, I’m starting to get that.”

Snorting, Luke ruffles his hair a little. He’s got a thing for ruffling kids’ hair, it’s the cutest thing in the world to see them trying to keep him from messing it up. Victor whines, hands moving up to fix it, and sighs a little, sounding tired. He bumps their shoulders together. “Just tell him how you feel, alright? I’m willing to bet that would end up being a good idea.”

Victor whimpers, burying his face in Luke’s shoulder, muttering, voice muffled, “No, that’s scary.” He looks up at him, blue eyes wide and frightened. “What if he doesn’t want to be friends anymore?”

Luke pats his head reassuringly, “C’mon, this is Yuuri we’re talking about. He might be pretty intense at times, but he’s a sucker for affection. Even if he doesn’t reciprocate,” which he totally fucking does, Luke adds internally, “nothing bad will happen.”

“I guess,” Victor says, not sounding too convinced.

“Okay,” Luke stands up, putting out his hand for Victor to grab it, “Let’s go get some hot chocolate and phone your parents.”

Victor eyes his hand suspiciously. “What if there’s only the hot chocolate?”

“No hot chocolate without responsibility, I’m afraid,” Luke admits.

The teenager sighs as if this the most tiring conversation he’s ever had, but grabs his hand, smiling slightly.

…

The next morning, Luke wakes up to 4 notifications that he’s been unfollowed on Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram and unfriended on Facebook by Phichit Chulanont. Apparently, he’s also been tagged in some dark reddit post in which a Russian kid is flipping him off. Minami Kenjirou, whoever that is, is on a rant on Twitter on how much he hates him.

“Huh,” Luke mutters, not quite understanding what he did wrong. They probably just got the wrong account looking for someone with the same name or something. He’s got other things to do. Heartbeat speeding up, he grabs for his phone and dials.

“Hello, Mari here?”

“Yeah,” Luke swallows hard. “This is Luke. You know, from the ice rink? I was wondering…”

fin

#expomise #expomise extra #victuuri #yoi #yuri on ice #jealous!victor #fanfiction

[lucaumbriel]

The Last Jedi spoilers (and a huge wall of text) under the cut

The opening was way too similar to Empire Strikes Back, the Rebellion, sorry, the “Resistance” has just destroyed the First Order’s big bad weapon, but despite this the bad guys are stronger than ever (no, seriously, they apparently have defacto rule of the Galaxy or something now, because apparently the destruction of one system means the entire Republic is gone somehow) and the good guys are on the run.

Rey is seeking training from Luke, which is also a plot point lifted directly from ESB, but is done in a completely different way so it’s not something I hold against the movie. The training itself, however, is lack luster and feels more like something you’d see stretched out across an entire episodic season crammed into as little screen time as possible between everything else that’s going on. And I really didn’t like how they started going the route of “well, the Jedi need to die, but that doesn’t mean there are not going to be any more force users”, like they were going to have Luke get Rey to gut the tradition and legacy and keep everything else to sort of found a brand new order without any of the “you should fear the dark side because it’s the dark side and don’t ask questions about it because you shouldn’t be asking about that” and the removal of emotions and attachments and so on, and then go right back to “actually, nah, Rey’s gonna tell Luke that the Jedi are cool and that’s gonna change his mind and he’s even gonna acknowledge her as a jedi cause the jedi are cool and we wouldn’t want to stray from that or anything even though Kylo explicitly said he’s not gonna be a sith”. Like, there were so so many other arguments Luke could have used to show how the Jedi are not the undisputed good guys (just look at the people who try to say how “the jedi are the actual bad guys” cause they steal babies and enforce a specific lifestyle and doctrine and anyone who doesn’t agree with everything gets thrown out, instead of just “the Jedi were egotistical, they all died cause Palpy fooled them”, which is the single weakest argument for “the jedi weren’t actually that good” I think I’ve ever seen and that entire scene just feels pathetic and annoying).

Which brings me to the next bit and my major criticism with the movie: they try to do to much. It feels like two or three movies, or most of a Netflix mini-series crammed into two and a half hours. It doesn’t let you really digest anything that’s happening and everything from the subplots to the main plot feels rushed and there are a lot of little things (like the fight between Luke and Kylo) that feel really tacked on despite them actually being pretty important overall to the story. Like, they could have stopped the film at several points (most notably after everyone got in the base), but it’s like they kept coming back with “and one more thing” (the bad guys have a canon that can blast through it, which actually would have made an interesting cliff hanger, if this were the Netflix mini-series it feels like), and then “one more thing!”, and then “one more thing!”

The conflict between Poe and the Admiral feels unnecessary. Yes, Poe was wrong to go behind her back, and more wrong to try and mutiny because the Admiral did actually have a fully fleshed out and usable plan that would have worked perfectly if Poe hadn’t sent Finn and Rose off to infiltrate the flagship and allow the code breaker to betray them for money, but his actions were still justified because instead of explaining the plan to him or anyone else, she intentionally kept him the dark and obfuscated what she had planned for no reason what so ever, seriously, there was no reason she couldn’t say “we’re going to load people in the shuttles, yes, I know they’re shielded and unarmed and will never outrun the destroyers, that’s why I’m going to stay behind and pilot the cruiser, we’re gambling on them not looking for smaller ships, so this should provide a decent distraction, the shuttles will be going to a fortress world were they’ll have enough power to contact our allies”, but no, she never says that, instead she just tells him “trust me” and “hope” and when he finds out about the shuttles she blows him off. Yeah, Poe is a hot head and all, but she’s a shitty leader if she can’t be asses to explain a simple plan to someone who you have no indication of being a defector or spy or anything else. The entire time it feels like either she’s the traitor like Poe thinks, or she’s trying to trick a traitor by using Poe or some shit but there’s no actual payoff to the entire subplot except “Poe was wrong and should have blindly trusted his leader who’s first conversation with him involved her verbally bitch slapping him and acting like he’s been nothing but a detriment to the entire Resistance.”

Over all, the film feels like an action movie, with a lot of space battles, amazingly choreographed fight scenes, lots of big loud energetic moments like them crashing through the casino, it doesn’t feel like a Star Wars movie so much as an abridged season of Clone Wars or Rebels.

Oh, and how can I forget Rey. She continues to be a Mary Sue, never suffering any real complications or failings, even in this film, her absolute biggest fuck up, getting herself captured thinking she can turn Kylo to the light side and together defeat Snoke, results only in Kylo killing his only superior and acquiring supreme control over the First Order, and then she escapes with no real consequences otherwise. And if you say “well putting the immature, hot headed, egotistical, man-child in charge of the First Order instead of the highly powerful, nearly all seeing, calm, collected, and very powerful mastermind who put the First Order together in the first place” a bad outcome from this and something that has in any way actually strengthened the Order, especially since we already see the conflict between Kylo and Hux growing worse and worse with every scene they’re in, then I don’t really know what to tell you except maybe watch the movie again and actually pay attention.

The fight scene between Kylo and Luke was awesome, though, again, very action movie and, like I said above, adds to the list of “they tried to do too much in one movie”. I like that if you pay attention, you can see that it was pretty obvious he was never actually there. Not only “how did he get into a base there’s supposedly only one way out of” but “how did he even get there in the first place?” the only ship we see is the sunken X-Wing that’s probably been there for way too long for it to still be usable, and then not only is he not even scratched by the ATs, he doesn’t even have any dust on him period, he’s using a lightsaber that we just saw sundered, and he’s adamantly refusing to even block Kylo’s attacks. The dice thing, however, was stupid and makes no fucking sense at fucking all. I was waiting for him to say the line, but he never did, you’re supposed to become more powerful that he could ever imagine, damn it.

Luke’s ascension also feels kinda tacked on and forced, epic as it was. Makes me think they were planning to kill each of the main three at the end of their particular movie. We’ll see how that holds up...considering.

Kylo’s continued indecision was good, as was the twist with him killing Snoke and then taking command instead of turning. I also liked the fact that he used his apparent execution of Rey to cover his actual execution of Snoke, which reminded me of the “you will kill Luke Skywalker” thing with Mara Jade in the comics, though I am a little disappointed that after everything from the first film, this is all we get with Snoke unless he revives himself somehow. Which would be stupid, honestly.

The fight scene with the honor guards was awesome, though Rey continues to prove that someone who grew up fighting rats on a farm with a staff is a match for much better trained fighters. I was fine with the scene, up until she and Kylo were both being choked out and she’s the only one who figures out how to escape and then gets to save Kylo. With everything else on top, it just adds to my dislike of her writing as I’ve discussed above. How Kylo finished off the last guard was awesome, though, and everyone in the theater cheered cause it was awesome.

All of this, and any other things I might have forgotten, I still loved this movie and it was great. Great fight scenes. Great space combat. The casino scene with all the aliens was great. Luke was great. Leia was great. That scene between Luke and R2, especially once he played the message, was great. Rey, Finn, Poe, and Rose maybe not great but they were ok. The scenes that reminded me of other movies, comics, TV series were all great (except maybe the elevator scene that paralleled Return’s Luke/Vader scene, that just felt kinda weird). The pieces were all great, it’s the bits between them that are more...eh, and while some of them are necessary, others, like I’ve said, feel tacked on or fall into “and one more thing” near the end.

Overall, I would rate this as one of the better Star Wars movies. It’s better than Empire (the filler of Star Wars), and definitely better than most of Clone “I hate sand”/forced romance Wars. If it had been a mini-series instead of a whole movie or some of its points had been cut from here and put in some EU materials or another movie somewhere, I think it would have come out better because they would have had more time to flesh things out and work with more of the points they raised up instead of it feeling rushed and crammed together. Empire, for its faults, still handles its two plots better than Last Jedi handled it’s three or four.

#tldr: i liked it but it had its problems

[okimargarvez]

METEOROLOGY- Cloud

Original title: Meteorology.

Prompt: climatic metaphors, phases of love.

Warning: none.

Genre: drama, romantic, comedy, angst, family, friendship.

Characters: Luke Alvez, Penelope Garcia, BAU team, Phil (Luke’s partner), Phil’s wife, Roxy, Derek Morgan.

Pairing: Garvez, Phil x Lucille.

Note: Multichapter.

Legend: 💏😘😈👓🔦🐶❗👨‍👩‍👧‍👦💍🎈. 

Song mentioned: Via con me, Paolo Conte. Note: I'm so happy because in this chapter there is a confrontation between Phil and Luke. Coincidence? I remember writing it three weeks ago, so again I had imagined right.  Obviously my Phil is different from the CBS's, I had few elements to create it, just name, profession, and the fact that he was hurt. Let me know if you want this evening to post the first part of "Unconditionally- mater & pater". :)

Peace & Love Garvez always

Meteorology- Masterlist

MY OTHER GARVEZ STORIES

CLOUD

You don’t feel them, you don’t realize it, and yet they are turning enough slowly not to attract attention, but quite quickly because, staring at them, reveal their movement. Often, we have never observed them with be careful, although we can do it at all times, but we forget it, and sometimes, looking at them suddenly we discover a new, unexpected, point of view, and after a while we were concentrating on something else we find that sometimes everything is changed, something happened in that time spent without looking at the sky. Is our life being so. Silently, something happens to us every hour, everyone day and transforms us, like a cloud, in good and evil. (Luca Mercalli)

 You just got in time to take refuge in the building when the downpour starts. Look out the window like the brushstrokes change the face of the city, already gray in itself, rather which is indeed enriched with colors of so many umbrellas and raincoats. Everyone seems forced to slow down the rhythm, mothers try to prevent children from putting their feet in the puddles.

You didn't bring anything in the rain. You are not very careful about the weather, lately. You're not very careful about anything, actually. However, it is useless concern to it, at the time you put your foot out of here, maybe there'll be nothing like this.

You get back into your bunker to prepare the useful documents for the meeting that will take place in one hour. JJ warned you that there will also be a Task Force agent, the best bureau hunter, so Rossi describes him, the only person to know him personally.

But you don't think it should be something that matters to you. The idea of capture those escapees no longer stimulate yourself, even if there is Mr. Scratch among them, which is a serious threat to all of you. Long time ago you would have imagined the appearance of a new guy, you comment it with the others, between laughter and some alcoholic sip. Like you and JJ did the first time you saw Hotch's brother. But today you do not have the slightest interest in replicating such a scene; JJ is married, and you are no longer yourself.

You look the desk and system the various objects, changing the place continually, always dissatisfied with the result, like wives in television shows that make walk back and forth, carrying a heavy couch, her husband and his best friend. You probably should worry because it's one of the symptoms of obsessive maniacs, or it isn't a good sign anyway.

You spill a vial mistakenly that you find isn't closed properly. You save everything except your dress and your hands. -Damn!- you exclaim, aware that you'll be forced out of the safe area to go into the world beyond that door. You head to the bathroom trying to avoid further damage. You stay still for a moment, reflecting on how to open it without even touching up the handle when you hear footsteps behind you. You turn and moving to let him pass, but he stops in turn.

-Lady, you need some help?- you jump when you see him. The outer shell adapts perfectly to the warm voice, with slightly Latin features. He is tall, brown, a bit bearded so as to give him a wild, frisky air. Muscled. And above all drenched; apparently, he hasn't even brought an umbrella with him.

While waiting for your answer, he has a genuine smile printed in his face. - Ehm... yes.- you exclaim, suddenly embarrassed and all because he is a handsome man. What a superficial world! And you're completely part of it. Should we all be blind to be certain that the other person is interested in us not only for the physical aspect?

He is, however, unaware of the thoughts that pass through your mind, so he just keeps the door open so that you can pass, entering after you. Here, your roads will be split, and he will become the further beautiful, unknow type. But no. He stops on the threshold of the corridor leading to male toilets and he looks at you a bit. -I've seen you somewhere, but I can't remember where.- you never figured this. You couldn't forget him if you met him previously, those like him remain indelible, like a tattoo. Not even the rain takes them away.

About rain ... -What has happened to you? - you didn't keep a laugh without great skill, real and not built; a rarity, at this time. His hair is completely soaked and even his clothes are a mess. He looks like a wet chick. You note that he holds a parcel in his hand, probably, you hope for him, his change of clothes.

He enlarges his arms without blushing. -It's a shower unscheduled.- he smiles again. There aren't more excuses to stay and continue this "conversation" if this can be defined. -And you? A close encounter with a sepia? - man seems doesn't feel the same as you. You see that you like its nice tone, which brings some sunshine on your gloomy mood, and this is worrying you.

You no longer want to be happy after Morgan. Mourning is too fresh. - Something like this ... - just give him another look. -Well ... good day.- he also stops for a few seconds to staring you.

-Good day too.-.

 As you dry your hands, understand it: she's the blonde who was going to fall in front of you on the subway. You remain dismayed. You don't believe in coincidences. But not even in fate.

She hit you. You don't know precisely the specific reasons. She isn't one of those women by the cover. But her mild smile has been able to dissolve some layers of ice covering your heart. And that gaudy dress, full of colors ... and her hands so clear, dirty in ink. But above all her voice, how many nuances and sweetness, makes you think ... to your mother.

You get out of the bathroom trying to convince you that doesn't help think about it. See her twice was already strange, there won’t be a third. Even if a chance, even on a thousand, there is. After all, if she's here, she'll work for the Bureau too. In what role? Considering the ink, which assumes the use of a pen, the most obvious deduction would be she is a secretary. But something doesn't convince you.

You reach David Rossi's office and you knock at the door. He welcomes you with enthusiasm. From the earliest steps to the Academy he took you under his protector wing. It has become, banally, a kind of second father for you, since the physiological one has gone too long ago. -Luke! Come in!- he makes to you a sign of sitting down. - As I mentioned yesterday, we need your help. Twelve among the worst serial killers who have ever walked on this earth are escaped. Among them there are Peter Lewis, Tommy Yates, and Daniel Cullen- you immediately extend your ears to hear the last name. -I called you for that. - he gives you an emblematic look. He knows a lot about that event, but not everything. The only other person to know most of the story was Phil. - Well, are you in? - you don’t have to think about it; you nod, and give your hand to the older man.

-Sure. When do we start? - the other man smiles, the usual pride betrays from every pore.

-Whenever you want to- he replies, and you thank him for not mentioning anything about your emotional state. It's a profiler, he can easy saw these things, you can't fool it. He there was also at the funeral.

-For me even now. Just give me the time to warn the big boss. - you reciprocate his gaze.

-Sure. Do you prefer to study documents in the old-fashioned way or have you become one of those with the head always to staring to your cell phone and tablet? - Rossi's joke also get you a laugh, he has always been a degree away from technophobia.

-They're fine with paper, if it's not a problem.- he bends to press a button.

-Garcia, would you please give to agent Alvez a copy of the complete dossier on the evasion? You will find him at Morgan's desk- an extended silence.

Then, that voice: -As you wish, boss.- Rossi shakes his head, then he stands up and you do the same. You go back to the open space and here he shows you one of the desk, the only empty one.

-Set up you here too.- you nod and settle the bag. -Are you sure you don't want to join a full-time job? We have a vacancy and you'd be a great resource for the team ... - he starts to charge, but you shake your head. Before you time to replicate, a blonde appears in front of you. -Oh, right in time. Garcia, this is the agent of the task force, Luke Alvez. He'll give us a hand in the case of escapes. The folder that the woman clutches in her hands falls to the floor as soon as your eyes are chained to each other.

Right you! her eyes seem to tell you. You lower to help her, your hands touching hers, but she retraces hers like she was scared. Rossi looks confused at the scene. Now he looks at you, now at the woman. -You two have met before, by a chance? - a moment of silence.

Then you both break out, shouting each one their own opinion.

-Yes- you, quiet.

-No! she says, much more agitated than you. Before anyone can add something else, the blonde gets away with what seems like an obvious excuse -I had to go back to my office. I have a lot to do.- you shifted your attention to Rossi.

-Don't do that face! She's a weird woman, but she's also the best computer technician in the Bureau and a wonderful person. If you often cross in these parts, you will become accustomed to Penelope mood.- so you learn her full name, which sounds fit for her. Then also the man leaves, and you remain alone. You look at the folder on the desk and then, without knowing why, your gaze is drawn to a huge window: it does not rain anymore, but the sky is covered by a lot of clouds. _______________________________________________ @talesoffairies @itsdawnashlie @c00lhandsluke @saisnarry @janiedreams88 @kiki-krakatoa  @arses21434 @gcchic@martinab26 @rkt3357 @orangesickle @entireoranges @jamirn@kathy5654 @lovesgoodluna@thisonekid @thenibblets @ambrosiaswhispers @perfectly-penelope @teyamarra @courtneyxoxo1@jahreau @gracieeelizabeth27 @thinitta @silviajajaja @maba84

Tell me if you want to be tagged here or if you want to be removed ^_^

#garvez #luke alvez #penelope garcia #meteorology

[doycetopia]

The Real Dark Side of Star Wars: Spoilers

[This is a repost of a post I wrote about two years, which has inexplicably disappeared from the site.]

I need to talk about something pretty shitty, but it requires a little background information, first.

Many of you probably already know this background info, but some of you don’t, so I’m filling it in for them; everyone else, please bear with.

I doubt it will surprise anyone to know I’m a long time Star Wars fan boy.

Am I the biggest Star Wars fan boy who’s ever lived? No, most certainly not.

In fact (and this bit will shock the less-super-nerdy out there), there are groups of folks out in the world who, after examining the extent of my exposure to Star Wars “stuff”, would decide quite seriously that I’m not a real Star Wars fan at all, or at least not a serious one.

The funny thing is, it’s hard to even explain this without getting at least somewhat nerdy, but I’m going to try. (In my head, as I write this, I’m talking to my sister, which is how I approach more posts than anyone would imagine.)

Now, a lot of people – most people – who say they like Star Wars mean they like the movies, because that is literally the only Star Wars thing they know about. I’m going to call these folks “mainstream fans.”

Obviously (because as a species, we really can’t leave this kind of shit alone) there is a lot more Star Wars stuff out there – more stuff than you’d readily believe. Games, of course. Comics – fucking walls of comics – and enough novels to fill a library.

Collectively, all the stuff that isn’t the movies has been (until recently) referred to as the Star Wars “Extended Universe” or “EU”. The quality of the stuff varies, and by “varies” I mean some of it is pretty good, and some of it is pants-on-head fucking idiocy that makes Jar Jar Binks look as cool as Chewbacca, by comparison.

How does stuff like that get the official stamp of approval? Pretty simple: George Lucas really likes making money, and people are willing to pay him a whole shit ton of money to play in his backyard, so he lets them write novels with Force-nullifying space-sloths (yes, seriously) and puts the Official Rubber Stamp on it, because (a) he got money and (b) he knew if he ever came out with a movie that contradicted stuff people had written, his version would invalidate all the drek he’d authorized in the past, so who cares?

In general, I don’t follow the EU stuff, and (with the exception of the first Star Wars roleplaying game that anyone licensed) don’t know much about it.

The quick summary: there is miles and miles of EU stuff, set anywhere from 30 thousand years before to several hundred years after the movies ‘mainstream fans’ know; the whole thing is an virtually unchartable hot mess…

And there are fans out there who know every single inch of it. Or most of it. Certainly more of it than I do. I’ll call them super-fans.

Now: I have no beef with those super-fans. None.

Okay so far? Good.

Now: Enter Disney.

A few years ago, Disney acquired the rights to the Star Wars intellectual property and announced they were going to start doing stuff with it, and that George Lucas wouldn’t have very much if anything to do with it. (Which, after the prequels, was kind of a relief to hear.)

And Disney took a long look at the Extended Universe stuff and, after some thought, said “Yeah that’s… nice and all… but… yeah. None of that shit is official anymore.”

Basically, they boiled down “Official Star Wars” to the movies, the Clone Wars animated series that ran a few years ago, and whatever stuff they make from here on out (like the totally amazing and fun Star Wars Rebels show, a couple new novels, and of course the new movies coming out).

All that EU stuff? It’s not the “Extended Universe” anymore; it’s “Star Wars Legends” which, honestly, I think is a great name – it implies these are stories about the Star Wars universe (which they are, of course) but just that: stories. Unverifiable. Unverified. Unofficial. Enjoy them if you want – please, by all means – but know them for what they are.

Most – and I do mean most – super-fans were fine with this: they get to keep the stuff they’re into, and they get the biggest pop-culture engine in the world cranking out new Star Wars stuff until the heat-death of the universe finally invalidates Disney’s copyrights.

Some of the super-fans are not happy, and have decided to be unapologetically shitty human beings about the whole thing. I will call this small, vocal-like-a-screaming-howler-monkey subset of super-fans the “spoiler fans,” and here’s why:

These people have decided that it’s not enough that they have this stuff they like. Because Disney has said it’s not official stuff anymore, that somehow makes it impossible to love that stuff as much as they once did – their love is somehow capped by its lack of an official stamp, and this cannot be allowed to stand.

What do they want? This is pretty funny, actually: they don’t just want Disney to go back and say “okay, that stuff is still at least as official as it was when George Lucas was taking your money and planning on invalidating anything he felt like, whenever he felt like it” – they (apparently) want Disney to keep making EU stuff, in addition to the stuff Disney is already making.

“Well, that’s nice,” you might say, “maybe they want a pony, too?”

And yeah, it’s kind of funny, until you realize the internet has allowed shitty people to be shitty on a far greater scale.

See, they’re trying to hold Star Wars hostage to get Disney to do what they want.

How? They have vowed that they will spoil each and every spoil-able moment in the new movie as loudly and as broadly as possible (which, today, is pretty loud and pretty broad), if Disney doesn’t cave.

You’ve probably seen those image memes on Facebook or whatever, asking people not to spoil the movie. I have, and thought “yeah, it would suck to be spoiled ahead of time.”

Because that can happen by accident. Well-meaning, happy, enthusiastic fans can get on the internet and broadcast out to their friends, joyfully exclaiming about all the stuff they loved about the movie, and accidentally spoil something for someone who hasn’t seen it yet, because how have you not seen it yet?!?

This isn’t that. This is not an accidental thing. This is not your friend loving the movie so much he spills something.

This is a guy standing outside the movie theater before The Empire Strikes Back, waiting for the line to form, and then telling every single person in line “Darth Vader is Luke’s dad.”

Except the guy has a megaphone the whole world can hear, if they aren’t careful, and he shouts the message at unexpected times.

I’m telling you about this, because it already happened to me, and I don’t want it to happen to you.

I leaned about this little movement of spoiler-fans via a friend’s post on Google+.

The very first comment to that post was one of these guys, and all he posted was a spoiler, and I am pretty sure he spoiled probably the biggest plot twist in the movie for me.

Now, obviously, I haven’t seen the movie yet, so how do I know?

Let me put it this way: if that guy who came up to you in line at Empire Strikes Back had said, perfectly straight-faced “Darth Vader is Luke’s dad,” would you have believed him?

Maybe you think about it a bit, and it syncs up with everything you know about the movies thus far, and it syncs up with what you’ve seen in the trailers, and it just seems like a very Star Wars-y plot twist.

Maybe you don’t believe it, completely and totally, but you believe it enough that you will sit down in the theater and, basically, spend the whole movie waiting for that moment to come. Or not.

Even if it doesn’t, you will not have enjoyed the movie as much as you might have, because you were distracted. And if it does happen just as that guy said? Well.

That’s the kind of thing this guy posted. One line. Ten words, and there goes my 100% unmitigated enjoyment of the new movie.

Now, shut up: this isn’t about me. Yes, you’re very sorry about this happening. Yes. I love you. Thank you, now shut up for a sec.

Listen.

These fuckers are out there. They are doing this on purpose. They’re enjoyment of their pile of stuff has been somehow – idiotically – damaged; Disney made their Masters-level knowledge of a made-up universe less important than it already was, so they have decided to shit on every other person who wants to enjoy the new movie, because (apparently) “Fuck anyone who is enjoying themselves, if I am not.”

I don’t care about me. I’ve watched Empire Strikes Back probably thirty times, if not more, and I know – know I will enjoy it when I watch it again, because I’ll be watching it with my kids, and the shine hasn’t come off for them.

Because of that, I know I will enjoy this new movie when I watch it, because I will be watching it with my kids and even if I don’t feel the same sense of surprise and wonder as I might have, they will, and I will still get to feel that, through them.

And I know they will get to feel that, because I’m going to protect them from these… infantile man-children and their shit-spattering temper-tantrum.

Now: why did I write all this? Because I want to try to protect you, too.

When you see spoiler warnings, heed them. Stop thinking of spoilers as “that one little thing my super-happy friend let out after he saw the movie” and start thinking “halitosis-reeking stranger who wants to dip his filthy index finger in my morning coffee.”

From here until you see the movies, absolutely avoid comment sections on any Star Wars-related post on any kind of social media.

Just… for a few days, expect people you don’t know to be kind of shitty for no good reason.

I realize that’s kind of a downer message, but seriously: I want you to enjoy the movie.

And also, yeah: I want those petty fuckers to lose, because fuck them.

(Comments on this post are disabled, for obvious reasons.)

original post

#crosspost #randomaverage

[doycetopia]

The Real Dark Side of Star Wars: Spoilers

[This is a repost of a post I wrote about two years, which has inexplicably disappeared from the site.]

I need to talk about something pretty shitty, but it requires a little background information, first.

Many of you probably already know this background info, but some of you don’t, so I’m filling it in for them; everyone else, please bear with.

I doubt it will surprise anyone to know I’m a long time Star Wars fan boy.

Am I the biggest Star Wars fan boy who’s ever lived? No, most certainly not.

In fact (and this bit will shock the less-super-nerdy out there), there are groups of folks out in the world who, after examining the extent of my exposure to Star Wars “stuff”, would decide quite seriously that I’m not a real Star Wars fan at all, or at least not a serious one.

The funny thing is, it’s hard to even explain this without getting at least somewhat nerdy, but I’m going to try. (In my head, as I write this, I’m talking to my sister, which is how I approach more posts than anyone would imagine.)

Now, a lot of people – most people – who say they like Star Wars mean they like the movies, because that is literally the only Star Wars thing they know about. I’m going to call these folks “mainstream fans.”

Obviously (because as a species, we really can’t leave this kind of shit alone) there is a lot more Star Wars stuff out there – more stuff than you’d readily believe. Games, of course. Comics – fucking walls of comics – and enough novels to fill a library.

Collectively, all the stuff that isn’t the movies has been (until recently) referred to as the Star Wars “Extended Universe” or “EU”. The quality of the stuff varies, and by “varies” I mean some of it is pretty good, and some of it is pants-on-head fucking idiocy that makes Jar Jar Binks look as cool as Chewbacca, by comparison.

How does stuff like that get the official stamp of approval? Pretty simple: George Lucas really likes making money, and people are willing to pay him a whole shit ton of money to play in his backyard, so he lets them write novels with Force-nullifying space-sloths (yes, seriously) and puts the Official Rubber Stamp on it, because (a) he got money and (b) he knew if he ever came out with a movie that contradicted stuff people had written, his version would invalidate all the drek he’d authorized in the past, so who cares?

In general, I don’t follow the EU stuff, and (with the exception of the first Star Wars roleplaying game that anyone licensed) don’t know much about it.

The quick summary: there is miles and miles of EU stuff, set anywhere from 30 thousand years before to several hundred years after the movies ‘mainstream fans’ know; the whole thing is an virtually unchartable hot mess…

And there are fans out there who know every single inch of it. Or most of it. Certainly more of it than I do. I’ll call them super-fans.

Now: I have no beef with those super-fans. None.

Okay so far? Good.

Now: Enter Disney.

A few years ago, Disney acquired the rights to the Star Wars intellectual property and announced they were going to start doing stuff with it, and that George Lucas wouldn’t have very much if anything to do with it. (Which, after the prequels, was kind of a relief to hear.)

And Disney took a long look at the Extended Universe stuff and, after some thought, said “Yeah that’s… nice and all… but… yeah. None of that shit is official anymore.”

Basically, they boiled down “Official Star Wars” to the movies, the Clone Wars animated series that ran a few years ago, and whatever stuff they make from here on out (like the totally amazing and fun Star Wars Rebels show, a couple new novels, and of course the new movies coming out).

All that EU stuff? It’s not the “Extended Universe” anymore; it’s “Star Wars Legends” which, honestly, I think is a great name – it implies these are stories about the Star Wars universe (which they are, of course) but just that: stories. Unverifiable. Unverified. Unofficial. Enjoy them if you want – please, by all means – but know them for what they are.

Most – and I do mean most – super-fans were fine with this: they get to keep the stuff they’re into, and they get the biggest pop-culture engine in the world cranking out new Star Wars stuff until the heat-death of the universe finally invalidates Disney’s copyrights.

Some of the super-fans are not happy, and have decided to be unapologetically shitty human beings about the whole thing. I will call this small, vocal-like-a-screaming-howler-monkey subset of super-fans the “spoiler fans,” and here’s why:

These people have decided that it’s not enough that they have this stuff they like. Because Disney has said it’s not official stuff anymore, that somehow makes it impossible to love that stuff as much as they once did – their love is somehow capped by its lack of an official stamp, and this cannot be allowed to stand.

What do they want? This is pretty funny, actually: they don’t just want Disney to go back and say “okay, that stuff is still at least as official as it was when George Lucas was taking your money and planning on invalidating anything he felt like, whenever he felt like it” – they (apparently) want Disney to keep making EU stuff, in addition to the stuff Disney is already making.

“Well, that’s nice,” you might say, “maybe they want a pony, too?”

And yeah, it’s kind of funny, until you realize the internet has allowed shitty people to be shitty on a far greater scale.

See, they’re trying to hold Star Wars hostage to get Disney to do what they want.

How? They have vowed that they will spoil each and every spoil-able moment in the new movie as loudly and as broadly as possible (which, today, is pretty loud and pretty broad), if Disney doesn’t cave.

You’ve probably seen those image memes on Facebook or whatever, asking people not to spoil the movie. I have, and thought “yeah, it would suck to be spoiled ahead of time.”

Because that can happen by accident. Well-meaning, happy, enthusiastic fans can get on the internet and broadcast out to their friends, joyfully exclaiming about all the stuff they loved about the movie, and accidentally spoil something for someone who hasn’t seen it yet, because how have you not seen it yet?!?

This isn’t that. This is not an accidental thing. This is not your friend loving the movie so much he spills something.

This is a guy standing outside the movie theater before The Empire Strikes Back, waiting for the line to form, and then telling every single person in line “Darth Vader is Luke’s dad.”

Except the guy has a megaphone the whole world can hear, if they aren’t careful, and he shouts the message at unexpected times.

I’m telling you about this, because it already happened to me, and I don’t want it to happen to you.

I leaned about this little movement of spoiler-fans via a friend’s post on Google+.

The very first comment to that post was one of these guys, and all he posted was a spoiler, and I am pretty sure he spoiled probably the biggest plot twist in the movie for me.

Now, obviously, I haven’t seen the movie yet, so how do I know?

Let me put it this way: if that guy who came up to you in line at Empire Strikes Back had said, perfectly straight-faced “Darth Vader is Luke’s dad,” would you have believed him?

Maybe you think about it a bit, and it syncs up with everything you know about the movies thus far, and it syncs up with what you’ve seen in the trailers, and it just seems like a very Star Wars-y plot twist.

Maybe you don’t believe it, completely and totally, but you believe it enough that you will sit down in the theater and, basically, spend the whole movie waiting for that moment to come. Or not.

Even if it doesn’t, you will not have enjoyed the movie as much as you might have, because you were distracted. And if it does happen just as that guy said? Well.

That’s the kind of thing this guy posted. One line. Ten words, and there goes my 100% unmitigated enjoyment of the new movie.

Now, shut up: this isn’t about me. Yes, you’re very sorry about this happening. Yes. I love you. Thank you, now shut up for a sec.

Listen.

These fuckers are out there. They are doing this on purpose. They’re enjoyment of their pile of stuff has been somehow – idiotically – damaged; Disney made their Masters-level knowledge of a made-up universe less important than it already was, so they have decided to shit on every other person who wants to enjoy the new movie, because (apparently) “Fuck anyone who is enjoying themselves, if I am not.”

I don’t care about me. I’ve watched Empire Strikes Back probably thirty times, if not more, and I know – know I will enjoy it when I watch it again, because I’ll be watching it with my kids, and the shine hasn’t come off for them.

Because of that, I know I will enjoy this new movie when I watch it, because I will be watching it with my kids and even if I don’t feel the same sense of surprise and wonder as I might have, they will, and I will still get to feel that, through them.

And I know they will get to feel that, because I’m going to protect them from these… infantile man-children and their shit-spattering temper-tantrum.

Now: why did I write all this? Because I want to try to protect you, too.

When you see spoiler warnings, heed them. Stop thinking of spoilers as “that one little thing my super-happy friend let out after he saw the movie” and start thinking “halitosis-reeking stranger who wants to dip his filthy index finger in my morning coffee.”

From here until you see the movies, absolutely avoid comment sections on any Star Wars-related post on any kind of social media.

Just… for a few days, expect people you don’t know to be kind of shitty for no good reason.

I realize that’s kind of a downer message, but seriously: I want you to enjoy the movie.

And also, yeah: I want those petty fuckers to lose, because fuck them.

(Comments on this post are disabled, for obvious reasons.)

original post

#crosspost #randomaverage