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tongue-like-a-razor · 7 months

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Brother's Best Friend - Part 9

Jake Seresin x F!Reader

A/N: I just wanted to let y'all know how much your enthusiasm and encouragement means to me. Your support, whether it's in the form of comments, reblogs, or asks, literally inspires me to keep writing and I just wanted to say thank you for your kind words! You guys seriously rock!

Summary: The trials and tribulations of falling for your brother's best friend.

CW: Uhh.. you're gonna love it

WC: ~2500

Part 1 | Masterlist

“What’re you up to tonight?” Jake asks casually, about five minutes after you’ve entered the kitchen.

You glance up from your still steeping tea hesitantly; you haven’t spoken to Jake since the pervious night at the club and you’ve all but resolved never to make eye contact with him again. “Uh,” you begin shakily, the stress of the situation resulting in a minor mental shutdown.

You watch as your brother tries on a third Hawaiian shirt and walks over to the mirror in the front hall to check himself out.

You gulp uneasily, your eyes meeting Jake’s as Bradley leaves the kitchen. “Just studying,” you finish, finally remembering your plans for the evening.

“Studying, huh?” Bradley calls from the foyer. A second later, he reemerges with a smirk on his face. “I know what that means.” He wiggles his eyebrows at you and then shoots Jake a knowing grin.

Jake appears, at the very least, unimpressed with Bradley’s insinuation and, quite possibly, even critical of it. He gives him an irked look and proceeds to flip more aggressively through an old National Geographic magazine, one from the stack currently sitting on the living room coffee table. “You look like a douche in that shirt,” Jake grumbles.

Bradley’s eyebrows converge as he stares at his friend with a mixture of shock and disappointment. “Is that true?” he asks, turning to you for support as if you’re there to mediate.

You shrug. “I don’t think the shirt has anything to do with it,” you say.

Jake snorts out a laugh while Bradley’s mouth falls open in outrage. He looks between you and Jake and shakes his head. “That’s how it’s gonna be?”

“Maybe wear a t-shirt,” you suggest. “Borrow one of Jake’s.”

Jake gives you an amused look. “You think I’m just handing out band tees?”

Bradley narrows his eyes. “I feel like I’m missing something.”

“I just finished a load of laundry and I’ve got a Pantera shirt you can wear,” you continue, already smiling in anticipation of Jake’s reaction.

Jake lifts his eyebrows with a grin. “I thought that wasn’t appropriate dating attire. Too many skulls or some shit?”

Bradley places his hands on his hips and tilts his head suspiciously. “I…” he begins. “I have questions,” he concludes, still glancing between you and Jake. His knotted eyebrows indeed confirm just how perplexed he is. “But I’m already late. So, I guess douche shirt’s gonna have to do.” He grabs his jacket off the back of a kitchen chair and heads back out into the hall.

“Have fun!” Jake calls, leaning into the table so that his voice carries through to the front door.

“You sure you don’t want to come?” Bradley calls back. “We’ll be meeting up with her friends later tonight. They’re female.”

You roll your eyes, removing the tea bag from your mug. You look up to see that Jake’s gaze is trained on you.

“I’m good,” Jake calls back, finally breaking eye contact with you. He reverts his attention to the article before him detailing the mating rituals of various species of primates.

“See you tomorrow, then!” Bradley calls, and then the door shuts behind him.

A predictable, but still awkward, silence follows Bradley's departure. You finish preparing your tea while your heart batters relentlessly against your ribcage, daring you to say something – anything – about the previous night’s affairs. Naturally, you ignore this sensible impulse, starting for the staircase mutely after shooting Jake a quick, rigid smile.

Jake’s eyes follow you as you cross the room. “You got a date with ‘study group’ guy?” he asks pointedly, using air quotes to emphasize study group as though your evening is sure to consist of anything but that.

You pause, holding your mug close to your chest. “It’s not a date,” you say, although, at this point, you kind of wish that it were.

Jake raises his eyebrows like your response has only served to reinforce his skepticism. “Why do you even need to study?” he says with a cringe. “You’re already smart.”

You purse your lips to suppress a grin. “Funny,” you comment, continuing toward the stairs.

“I could help,” Jake offers.

You glance at him over your shoulder in surprise. “What?”

Jake closes the magazine and straightens his back. “I could help you study.”

You stare at him, trying to imagine how that might go down. “What do you know about psychology?” you ask, having already decided that, despite his noblest intentions, Jake’s assistance would be absolutely useless.

Jake scoffs. “I don’t need to know anything about it to help you cram for a test. You got flash cards?”

You give him a flat look. “It’s an oral exam.”

The corner of his mouth twitches. “Say what, now?”

You close your eyes and massage your temple irritably. “It’s worth fifty percent of my grade.”

Jake grimaces. “How good are you at oral?”

You let out an indignant cry, wishing you had something in your hands to throw at him other than a ceramic mug full of scalding liquid. “And this is why I’m studying with ‘study group’ guy,” you retort, stomping up the stairs.

“I’m joking!” Jake laughs, getting to his feet. “Come back!”

But you’re already on the second floor and you shut your bedroom door before he can say anything else.

…

Twenty minutes later, you return with your book bag, your empty mug, and a disparaging look on your face as Jake approaches the bottom of the stairs to greet you with a sheepish grin.

“Come on, Baby B,” he says as you set your bag down and glide by him with an eyeroll, heading for the sink. “It was a joke.” He follows you through the kitchen and leans into the counter as you start to wash your mug.

You bite into the inside of your cheek to keep a straight face. It’s not every day that Jake takes responsibility for his actions, and you’re sort of enjoying the groveling. “I’m not mad, I just think you’re an idiot.”

“See? I told you you’re smart,” Jake says.

You sigh, glancing up at him wearily. “Unfortunately, my extensive knowledge of Jake Seresin isn’t going to help me pass my midterm.”

“Shame,” he responds with a slight grin. “’Cause you’d ace that.”

You chuckle. “You think?”

Jake’s smile falters and he leans his back into the refrigerator. His eyes scan your face like he’s searching for something. You wonder if he’s finally going to address the elephant in the room, but he just exhales moodily and drops his gaze. “Well, have fun,” he mumbles to the floor.

You narrow your eyes and let out a somewhat resentful scoff. It’s just like Jake to lead a girl on, and you should have known that – after all, you’re apparently the leading expert on Jake Seresin. “Oh yes,” you say. “Studying’s a blast.”

Jake lifts his eyes solemnly. “Come on, you’re not that naïve.”

“What are you talking about?” you ask, picking your book bag back up.

Jake’s gaze slips briefly to your bare abdomen, framed by the hem of your crop top and the band of your baggy joggers. “This dude only wants one thing,” he says. “And it’s not to help you prepare for midterms.”

You let out a cackle and head out of the kitchen. “Seresin, please!” you exclaim. “Not every guy in the world is a total pig.”

“How many people are you meeting tonight?” he asks, trailing behind you.

You pause at the door before putting on your shoes. “He couldn’t get a hold of anyone else,” you respond innocently, trying not to cringe at the – now that you think about it – ridiculous excuse ‘study group’ guy has given you.

“Right,” Jake mutters, taking the bag off your shoulder when you bend down to put on your sneakers.

You stand back up and your eyes meet his for a moment. He looks like he’s got more to say but you have a feeling he isn’t going to say it. “I can handle myself,” you reassure him.

Jake watches you with a dubious expression. “As long as you know what you’re walking into,” he says.

You laugh, taking a step back to ease some of the tension that’s got your back muscles seizing up. “And even if he does have an ulterior motive – which I seriously doubt – would it really be so terrible?”

Jake doesn’t seem as amused at this prospect as you. “It would be manipulative,” he responds levelly.

You shrug nonchalantly. “I don’t think it’s a big deal.”

He squints slightly and you feel like he’s judging your answer. “I thought you needed to study.”

“I do!” you respond defensively. “And I’m not going with the intention of engaging in any…” you pause, thinking of a way to put what you’re about to say more delicately. “… other activities,” you finish with a minor wince. “But, if an opportunity happens to present itself –”

Jake raises his eyebrows. “An opportunity,” he echoes in the same disapproving tone.

“What, like you’ve never taken advantage of an opportunity.”

Jake juts out his jaw in a sulking manner, pondering over your allegation without disputing it. He looks a fair bit guilty but that may very well be your personal interpretation. Finally, he reaches for the door and opens it resignedly. “Call me if you need me,” he says.

You sigh, standing in front of the open door. “You don’t have any plans?” you ask, almost cautiously because you probably don’t want to know the answer.

Jake purses his lips and shakes his head.

This gives you pause, but you try not to let the defeated look on his face sway you. You aren’t sure what he stands to gain from this particular transaction, but you doubt his motive for offering to help is entirely altruistic.

Perhaps he’s gunning for a clean slate. Trying to be a friend. Trying to eclipse recent, reprehensible behavior with an act of goodwill. Maybe he’s worried that you’re mad, or that he might lose you.

The fact of the matter is, you could speculate till the cows come home, but you won’t know unless you ask. So, in a move not even you could have predicted, you do just that. “Why would you even want to waste your evening studying?” you probe.

Jake tilts his head to the side and squints his eyes at you in confusion. “Just tryin’ to help,” he responds.

You look down at your feet uncomfortably and shrug, but continue prodding, nonetheless. “I mean, you could be out with my brother.” What you really want to say is that he could be hooking up with a new chick within the hour if he feels like it; it wouldn’t even be a challenge.

“Didn’t wanna crash his date.”

You glance up at him sharply, wondering if that is, indeed, the only reason he chose to stay behind. His eyes slide slowly over your face as though he’s trying to guess what you’re going to say next. You gulp uneasily; being scrutinized by the guy of your dreams is hardly an enjoyable pastime. At the same time, it’s wildly thrilling to have his undivided attention. “No other reason?” you ask with a slight break in your voice, your throat decidedly too dry to pose any further questions.

Jake glances pointedly at the open door he's still holding and then back at you. He doesn’t respond, nor does he inquire why you’ve still not left. Instead, he starts to slowly close the door, his eyes boring into yours so intently you think the weight of his gaze might vaporize you.

You feel a warmth wash over you – no; a heat. It’s a distressingly abrupt sensation, like you’ve been shoved into an oven set to broil. But it’s nothing new. You’ve experienced this kind of nauseating high before and you’re just as unamused with this bodily reaction now as you’ve been in the past.

Jake stands very still, his back to the door he’s just shut, stalling. And despite the very persistent voice in the back of your head telling you he can’t possibly be interested in pursuing anything remotely romantic with his best friend’s little sister, the hesitation on his face is telling quite a different tale. Jake is torn.

You can relate. You’ve been simultaneously longing for and avoiding direct contact with him for ages. “You, uh” – you take a shallow breath and nervously lick your lips. “You think I’ll get more studying done if I stay?” you ask faintly.

Jake watches you carefully, as though he’s giving himself a minute to consider your question. He takes a step toward you, lowering his face to maintain eye contact. And, while his expression remains mostly impassive, you swear that you notice a brief flicker of exhilaration pass over his features right before he says, “I can’t promise that.”

You stare at him, frozen in place as he takes your chin in his hand and lifts it ever so slightly, as if he knows that you’re in no condition to elevate it on your own. Then, just as you’re about to say something completely irrelevant to fill the silence, Jake’s lips pass softly over yours.

And that’s when you come entirely apart. Your book bag crashes to the floor as your arm drops limply at your side. Your legs vibrate feebly, fighting to keep you standing. But you ignore the – indeed concerning – widespread weakness sweeping through your body. Because the only matter worth attending to is Jake’s hand as it slides purposely down to your throat, his thumb curling around as though he means to choke you.

Admittedly, you’d let him.

But his fingers don’t commit to a firm grasp by any means, instead, they glide up and down, intermittently applying a gentle pressure to your neck as his tongue curves boldly into your open mouth.

Jake Seresin is kissing you.

In a way that no one’s ever kissed you before. In a way that rattles you. Because it’s hungry and unreserved. Because it’s dangerously intimate. Because it’s Jake Seresin.

He’s kissing you like he already knows just how you like to be kissed. Or… the way you like to be kissed just happens to be the way he kisses. He’s had plenty of practice, after all.

Whatever the case may be, there’s a fire at the tip of every one of his fingers, and it follows the length of your collarbone in their wake. There’s a spark in the friction of every touch, at every point of contact.

It’s in the sweet burn of your bottom lip when he catches it between his teeth. It’s in the way he nudges your face with the tip of his nose in between kisses. It’s in his eyes when he finally releases your lips and meets your gaze; it’s in the silence.

You swallow, looking up at him anxiously, unsure how it’s even possible that you’re still standing. Jake is watching you with an unsettling blend of affection and alarm. He sighs finally and tugs on your elbow, pulling you in to rest his forehead over yours. “Fuck,” he mutters, closing his eyes and releasing a heavy – and noticeably unsteady – breath. “Your brother’s gonna kill me.”

Read Part 10

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yumeka-sxf · 4 months

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A chronological analysis on Twilight and Yor - Part 24

*This is part of an ongoing post series. If you missed the Introduction/Part 1, click here*

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When Twilight finds out that there's a bomb on the ship, he's at first torn about whether to intervene or not. This is an interesting situation for him because it's not a mission he was assigned to do, and intervening could run the risk of revealing himself to the SSS. But at the same time, not intervening and relying on the SSS being capable enough to take care of it, is risky, too.

If Twilight was the selfish, unfeeling spy he makes himself out to be, he would figure out a way to escape the ship with just himself, Yor, and Anya (of course he'd insist he's only taking them with him "for the mission"). He'd probably use one of the lifeboats like the eavesdropping assassin used, perhaps even contact WISE beforehand so they could pick him up. But we know that he's way too conscientious to let such a catastrophic event take place when he could have used his skills to prevent it. So, like his wife elsewhere on the ship, he makes the unselfish decision to help others even if it's a risk to himself.

Later, Twilight has some final bouts of second-guessing regarding his decision when he picks up Anya at the daycare that night.

Rather than be proud of himself or even relieved that he was able to stop a potential crisis, he instead feels regret that he had to once again abandon his family…but his family is also part of his mission…so by averting the crisis, he saved them? But taking a vacation was also his mission, so does that mean his mission is to…not have a mission? Even I had trouble making sense of his thoughts here, but it's clear that the poor man still has a long way to go before he's not so unnaturally hung up about "missions." Rebecca Silverman on ANN neatly wraps up Twilight's cruise arc character development in an article here, to quote:

"…He wants to make sure the ship doesn't go down, but he also doesn't want to just abandon his child so he can go save it, and that's a distinction that hasn't been as clear in his mind before now. His little meltdown at the end is him fighting against the realization that this family isn't just a “mission” to him anymore; he's now a dad. This is beautifully shown when he catches Anya when she rolls off her bunk; not only is he attuned to her movements, but he cradles her for a moment instead of putting her down immediately. The smile on his face says that he cares, even if he's not comfortable with the idea."

Speaking of the aforementioned scene of Twilight catching Anya when she fell off the bunk bed, the anime adds this new footage of the early morning before the ship arrives at the resort island. Considering Twilight's doubts the night before, we see one of his rare, not-forced smiles, as he interacts with Anya.

Meanwhile, Yor is alone in her room treating her injuries. We know that she didn't sleep at all the night before since she was keeping watch over Olka's group the whole time. She then spent most of the following night in life or death struggles against various assassins, so she looks rightfully exhausted (and I'm sure the pain from her wounds disturbed what little time she was able to sleep).

While they wait for Yor at the island, Anya continues to show how much she has Twilight wrapped around her little finger – all she has to do is suggest that he's not acting like a "normal" dad would, and he immediately bursts into an awkward skip to try and prove to whoever's looking that, yes, he is just a dad having fun on vacation!

However, as soon as he realizes that Yor is there, his face reddens in embarrassment. He doesn't care if nearby strangers think he's acting like a silly, fun-loving dad, but it seems like he doesn't want Yor's view of him as a dignified, composed husband to be tarnished.

His look of concern when he notices that Yor's face is swollen is emphasized more in the anime…what could have been his first thought upon seeing that? However, when she tells him that despite City Hall's failed attempt to win over the couple, they were smiling in the end, he softens. Since the latter part of Yor's words here were not a lie, she was able to express them with genuine satisfaction, and Twilight picked up on her sincere feelings about the matter.

In fact, throughout their entire time on the island, Twilight gazes at Yor with more noticeable softness than he ever has before. From the aforementioned moment when she tells him that the couple were happy, to when she tells him how peaceful she feels watching Anya play with the sheep, and then at the very end of their excursion when he praises her for her hard work while carrying her and Anya back to the ship…Anya may have been right to call him out about missing Yor during the cruise. As I mentioned before, this is likely the longest time he's gone without seeing her since their "marriage," so this may be his subtle way of showing that he missed her.

At this point in the series, it's not hard to tell when Twilight's smile is his fake "Loid Forger" smile versus his real smile – Endo does a good job making the former look "forced," usually accompanied by his eyes being closed in a stiff squint to emphasize the phoniness, while in the latter case, his eyes are much more relaxed and his expression is more animated overall. Nightfall noticed this as well during her visit to the Forger house – how Twilight's real feelings seeped through the phony smile, particularly when his eyes relaxed.

Takuya Eguchi, Twilight's voice actor, also does a good job changing the pitch of his voice slightly when he's speaking as Loid Forger versus speaking his true feelings. If you compare how Twilight converses with Yor in this episode compared to, say, how he converses with Desmond during their encounter at Eden, the difference is very noticeable…even though, according to Twilight, both situations are "for the mission." In his mind, he shouldn't feel anything special for Yor compared to Desmond or anyone else he has to put on an act in front of. And yet, his voice and eyes convey otherwise.

It's been a while since the Forgers went on a family outing, so it was wonderful seeing them enjoy such a variety of activities together. What stood out to me the most as far as analyzing was Yor's difficulty riding the horse.

This may be more of a headcanon, but I feel like animals are uncomfortable around her because they can sense her insane physical strength even when she's not actively showing it. This could be why Kopi didn't put up any fight when she grabbed him, why all she had to do was glare at the German shepherd for him to run away, and why this horse doesn't want her riding him. It could also be why she's Bond's least favorite according to Endo in the fanbook. Also, Yor's fear of bugs makes sense since they're so tiny and quick, which makes them very difficult to take down from an assassinating perspective.

While Anya plays with the sheep at the petting zoo, Yor is finally able to fully relax for the first time in days, since she got the cruise assignment. She doesn't have to do anything in that moment besides watch Anya enjoying herself to the fullest in this lovely, peaceful little town. She tells Loid how peaceful she feels while also thinking to herself that she hopes this peace could last forever. Out of all the activities they did together, the reason this particular scene is so emphasized is because it perfectly portrays the reason Yor decided to keep being Thorn Princess back on the ship – so that children, whether her little brother Yuri, Anya, Gram, or whoever, can live freely and innocently in a peaceful world. And, when she expresses to Loid how peaceful she feels here, he says that he feels the same way.

As I just discussed, Twilight was not in "Loid Forger acting mode" here, so the reason he honestly agrees with her is because he's fighting for the same thing. Like I mentioned in Part 21, Twilight and Yor continue to do their ugly, thankless jobs in order to secure the peace of future generations.

When it's time for them to head back to the ship, Yor's exhaustion finally gets the best of her, forcing Twilight to carry both her and Anya in his arms on the way back. While he's a bit perturbed at first since some onlookers were snickering at him, it didn't take long for him to give into his feelings in that moment – namely, his genuine appreciation of Yor's sacrifice so that Anya could have a wonderful day with both parents. Though it's not a long scene, I think this is one of the most significant scenes for their relationship thus far (along with the post-Fiona date). Why is it so significant? Because there was no reason for Twilight to put on any Loid Forger acting in that moment, since he wasn't conversing with nor being scrutinized by anyone.

So why would he give that soft smile followed by such affectionate, comforting words as "お疲れ様/otsukaresama"? (this can be translated in many ways, but generally it's what you say to thank someone for their hard work). The answer is because it's something he truly felt...he knows all about being overworked and tired, yet Yor still made the effort to spend the day with them to make Anya happy. And, as her father (or "for the mission" in his language), he was grateful for that (now if only he knew the sacrifice she made on the larger scale!)

Many scenes in the cruise arc, as well as the resort island episode in particular, showcase that Twilight has a distinct relationship with both Yor and Anya, despite the fact that, in his mind, both relationships should be "fake." He's extremely casual with Anya, not just in his speech (more apparent in the Japanese version) and he doesn't feel any qualms about scolding her when necessary, being strict with her studies, or criticizing her weird little comments and actions that confuse him. The way he acts with Anya is more similar to how he acts with Franky than anyone else. But he's practically the opposite with Yor – despite her actions also confusing him at times, he never scolds, criticizes, or expresses disapproval of what she does. He also always speaks to her politely and, unlike most other people with whom he puts on his Loid Forger act, she's more often on the receiving end of his genuine smiles instead of his fake ones. It could be that because Anya is a child, he feels like he doesn't have to worry so much about acting in ways that would make her suspicious. Also because she's a child, she's less likely to take offense if he lets some of his negative emotions slip out. On the other hand, he knows from both the "post-Yuri's first visit" and "post-Fiona's first visit" instances that Yor has very sensitive self-esteem, so that could be why he's thoughtful about how he interacts with her, always speaking with courtesy and encouragement. He also knows the struggles she's had to go through in the past and how much she genuinely cares about Anya, which is another reason why she brings out his "softness" more often than anyone else.

In a way, Twilight's relationship with both Yor and Anya bring out a side of him that he may not realize he wants to strive for – with Anya, he can be relaxed and can drop the "nice guy" act in favor of being an exasperated but still caring father. And with Yor, he can become the polite, compassionate husband naturally, because he knows that many of her struggles and values are the same as his…he's realizing more and more about how much she sacrifices for others, and that can't help but resonate in him whenever he interacts with her. Perhaps one day he can become these personas and drop the "Loid Forger" and "Twilight" acts for good.

Continue to Part 25 ->

<- Return to Part 23

#sxf #spy family #spy x family #spyxfamily #loid forger #yor forger #twiyor #sxf meta #sxf analysis #loid x yor #loidyor

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itsclydebitches · 1 year

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We've all rightly been gushing over Trent listening in on the parent-teacher conference and there are a lot of cool interpretations for why he'd eavesdrop: a crush on Ted, a tendency towards gossip (as seen in "International Break"), the fact that you just can't take the journalism out of the boy, Trent is clearly picking up personal tidbits for the book if the group's initial "Don't print that" worries are any indication, etc. So yeah, it's clear why he'd want/be okay with the door staying open.

Meanwhile, I'm slightly feral over Ted letting the door stay open and what that conveys to Trent.

Based on what we've picked up about his personal life and the direction of this season, we have good reason to believe that Trent was a deeply isolated man prior to Ted arriving. His job makes enemies simply by virtue of the profession itself, especially when you "bring the heat" as hard as he did. Roy flipping the press off at the gala in Season 1 and Nate sneaking out at dark this last episode shows us how journalists are treated on the regular: ignored, dismissed, told to "fuck off" as a matter of course. That's often well deserved, as Roy's two personal stories (Trent's article about him + the response to Isaac's attack) attest, but the end result is still a profession that alienates you from anyone other than your peers. When you're a "colossal prick" in your articles, people hate you all the more.

So Trent at least has other journalist buddies, yeah? Well, not that we've seen. I always think back to that chorus of "--The Independent" in the press room when everyone knew what Trent was going to say and how it... wasn't entirely fun ribbing. I think there's a fair bit of mockery there. Even if others disagree, I doubt that was received well by someone who wears their professionalism as an armor, who takes off his glasses as soon as they're complimented, who was, notably, closeted into his 40s. Trent is a man who is deeply aware of how others perceive him (pointing out his "vibe" feels quite calculated now: highlight what you want people to notice rather than waiting for them to find something on their own) and he is likely to read the worst of most interactions. Cue his shocked, "You really mean that, don't you?" when faced with someone like Ted who is not only genuinely nice, but blunt about it in a way that Trent can't misunderstand, or brush off via denial.

What's his home life like? Married to a woman when he's gay and that's putting a serious strain on them both. He tries to come out and isn't believed. The only other family members we know about are a toddler (who, while lovely I'm sure, can't provide Trent with the kind of emotional support an adult needs) and a father who, if we read the series through Lance's headcanons, may not have been very supportive of his son. Who else does Trent know? Uhhh... other subjects who hate him? Owners like Rebecca who want to use him? A random, potential date that he felt so little for he ditched to get a quote?

(EDIT: I can't believe I forgot to mention the strong implications that Ted was bullied in childhood/as a teenager, based on how he reacts to the whole of the club ignoring him -- resigned but unsurprised -- his reaction to Roy telling him to fuck off after he tries to mend that relationship -- disappointedly awkward "I can't believe I even tried that. What was I thinking?" -- and his body language during the locker room scene -- jumping, furtive glances towards Ted, backed up against the shower stall because shit, he's been in this situation before.

So uh, yeah. Trent may not have had a lot of friends growing up either! That was not the response of a social butterfly, but rather someone who is already very used to being ignored/dismissed/cursed out/threatened, not just within his profession, but within the school-like atmosphere of Richmond's family too.)

I'm by no means reinventing the meta wheel here, but Trent has truly undergone a STAGGERING transformation in Season 3 and the result of that is the reframing of his Season 1 and 2 scenes as, frankly, more depressing than they originally seemed. Seeing him now smiling, singing, gossiping, dressing just in t-shirts, casually snacking, making jokes, letting go enough to be a complete, hyperactive "dork" in front of others... it just hammers home how deeply unhappy Trent was before. How closed off. How closeted--in more ways than one.

So what must it mean to someone like Trent for Ted to leave the door open?

It's not just an open invitation towards community--sit near me, listen in, quietly participate, there's literally no barrier between us--but a staggeringly personal one too. I don't care if a 10-ish year old failing science is inconsequential in the grand scheme of things, the fact remains that letting anyone hear a parent-teacher conference with your ex is a hell of a show of trust. That would mean a lot to Trent in general, this acknowledgement that someone trusts the ex-prick journalist with that amount of personal information, but Ted in particular? Oh boy. Ted is the one Trent betrayed with that article! And yeah, Ted forgave him the instant he learned of it, but Trent himself was obviously feeling a lot of guilt, hence him burning his source and orchestrating a firing. Toss in the fact that Ted, despite being a VERY open man on the regular (I still laugh at his "I don't mind" to Rebecca when over-sharing about Michelle) has in fact denied Trent information in the past. No, I won't tell you that was a panic attack. Yes, I will continue the lie that it was food poisoning. Perhaps for Ted it was less about Trent knowing and more about anyone getting at the truth, but at the end of the day it amounts to the same: there was a time when Ted did not fully trust him and Trent justified that fear by writing the very article Ted was looking to avoid, even if Trent approached that situation with as much grace as he could.

So this moment, beyond the humor, just makes my brain go !!!!!! for Trent. Ted Lasso, of all people, has left the door open for Trent Crimm, also of all people, to hear the messy details of his, Henry, and Michelle's life. He is not at all afraid that this information will be spun in a bad light--Local Gaffer's Son Suffers While Father Plays at Coach Across the Pond--despite the fact that Trent is actively writing a book about him. Trent himself is so unguarded in this moment, dressed only in a t-shirt, playing around with his orange, making little quips. The Trent of Season 1 would NEVER. I mean, I think we see small glimpses of the real Trent back then, especially when Ted amuses him enough to coax his guard down for half a second (Trent's reaction to “Make like Dunst and Union and bring it on, baby!" comes to mind. That's a gesture we're seeing a lot now that he's comfortable around the club), but on the whole he was still so, so, so isolated. No one knew the real him: gay, funny, dorky, inquisitive, longing for companionship and using the artificial 'closeness' of journalism to cover that ache up.

Now? Trent is fully a part of the Richmond community and he knows he's a part of it because everyone--Ted, Beard, Roy, Colin, Rebecca--are going out of their way to tell him that, notably in very overt ways. Trent strikes me as someone who wouldn't fully believe it when he's told someone enjoys his company; the kind of wounded, anxiety-prone person who, if casually invited to participate, would assume they're just being polite and he'd actually be an annoyance to them. Trent needs overt, obvious, beat-you-over-the-head-with-it reassurance, which is why Ted is so very good for him because Ted is composed of THE most over-the-top positivity you've ever seen. (Compare that need of Trent's to Michelle thinking that Ted is too much...) When faced with a defensive journalist Ted says explicitly that he liked spending time with Trent. When faced with a still unsure writer who thinks of himself only as an observer--never a part of the team himself--Ted literally begs with monkey noises to hear Trent's opinions. He's blunt to the point of absurdity and someone like Trent who has likely spent the majority of his life hiding/being told that his true self is inadequate needs that level of constant, neon-light reassurance.

So Ted leaves the door open to a personal conversation, refusing to literally bar Trent from his life. The best part? Colin re-opens the door because he understands Trent and he knows his coach; of course Ted wants him included. Colin asks permission to CLOSE the door, not open it, and Trent is seeing this openness again and again over the course of several months, with each episode bringing him further out of his shell as he slowly unlearns that self-doubt. Yes, please stay, please tell us what you think, please offer your advice, please join our Diamond Dogs, please ask us questions (they're no longer perceived as a threat), please become an integral part of our lives. We trust you and we like you and we want you here.

Everyone's waiting for Trent to catch the door again because, you know, the rule of three, but what if he doesn't need to? What if he's past slipping a hand or a foot through the crack and scraping by on what that gets him? He caught the door before it could close to get closer to Colin. He caught the door before it could close to get closer to Ted. Now they've both kept the door open for him, his presence welcomed from the get-go.

Trent doesn't need to sprint for that opening anymore.

#Ted Lasso #Trent Crimm #Tedependent #ted x trent #mymetas

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brf-rumortrackinganon · 3 months

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How do you know from whose PR articles are coming from? Can’t it be that the publications are just writing them themselves?

Recently, there have been articles about how Kate feels lonely without Meghan. It’s clickbait obviously. The article just talks about how they could’ve been like Diana and Sarah, but then continues to says that Kate has been successful in the rf because of her inner circle. Where do you think this is from?

Also, during the BAFTAs, William asked one of the nominees about her experience filming, saying they must have had fun. It was completely innocent and was said in a politely engaging in a casual conversation kind of way, but the Daily Mail spun it to look like a “gaffe” because the film was about a girl who was raped. I stumbled upon a sussex squaddie’s tiktok talking about it and although the account acknowledges it was a spin, he also says “William must have made some enemies” meaning there must be someone trying to make him look bad. Do you think that’s true? I thought maybe it’s just the dailymail stirring stuff to punish William for keeping himself and Kate away from public eye these days.

Honestly, this is the thing that drives me insane with royal watching. It causes paranoia. And most royal watchers begin to hate on certain royals just because they assume certain narratives are coming from that royal’s pr even though we have no proof.

You sound like you might be new to the analytical side of royal watching. That's okay!

The only reason I mention that is because if you've been a royal-watcher since before Meghan, you would have noticed a very distinct, very obvious shift in how the royals are covered and discussed in the media after Meghan came in (2016/2017). This happened because Meghan had her own PR, strategy, and comms people, Sunshine Sachs and Gina Nelthorpe-Crowne among them, promoting and marketing instead of relying on the BRF or just doing it herself personally as all the other royal girlfriends/married-ins did. And we know Meghan kept her LA team even after moving to London and getting married; it was confirmed in one of the royal books. I think it was Bower's Revenge.

How do you know from whose PR articles are coming from? Can’t it be that the publications are just writing them themselves?

It's in the details. Here are a few.

If the article is talking about apologies or olive branches, it's from the Sussexes. They're the only ones who've demanded apologies and olive branches, ever since the Oprah interview and including in Harry's Spare interviews.

If the article is discussing several members of the royal family but Meghan is listed first, it's her PR. If the article uses titles, it's from the BRF. If the article uses their first names but William and Kate are first, it's just the publication writing.

If the article is about Meghan and it's on a random topic (like that beauty article the other day about her magical hair) or it appears randomly (like when she otherwise hasn't been in the news), it's her PR. Publications aren't going to randomly write about someone unless there's cause, and cause is usually a pay incentive.

Now, People will also take stories from the BRF too, especially and mostly about Kate. Usually any long-form article about Kate that includes "close sources" or "palace insiders" quotes, it's from Kensington Palace/William's PR.

People and US tabloids also regurgitate stories from other media. If you see similar articles with near-identical quotes, that's their own writers, not usually sourced from someone's office.

Everyone also has preferred journalists that they give info to and will seek out for stories. For Meghan, it's Scobie (though she doesn't seem to be talking to her anymore, probably because she's pissed about the Dutch Endgame leaking the names) and Gayle King. For Harry, it's Bryony Gordon. For the BRF, it's usually one of the Richards, sometimes Rebecca English. For Camilla, it's Piers Morgan. (I track some of this in my Timeline series.)

If an article is about Charles and talks about a new idea or a new initiative, it's from his PR. We call them trial balloons - Charles is notorious for using the public reaction to these ideas to decide what to do.

If the piece is overly critical of Kate in comparison to Meghan, it's usually from Meghan's PR. If Meghan's name is listed first, then it's definitely from her PR. If it's bashing the Waleses children or criticizing Kate's parenting, it's from Meghan's side (though she's been very careful lately not to have her name directly connected to those stories).

If the piece is overly critical of the Waleses/Cambridges while simultaneously full of gushing praise for the Sussexes, it's usually Sussex PR.

I don't believe that William/KP briefs against the Sussexes anymore but back when they used to in late 2018/early 2019, you could tell when it was KP speaking versus the publications reporting - e.g., stories about concern for Harry's mental health were William and KP.

There are also key phrases that each principal royal like to use. Like you'll hear "keen" a lot with Kate - that's Kensington Palace speaking. "Olive branch" is Meghan.

There's also a very specific way that the writers refer to insiders/close sources, especially for William/Kensington Palace, but I'm totally blanking on that right now.

There are other ways to tell whose PR has sourced a story. These are just the ones off the top of my head. If anyone else can think of others, please share them!

Kate feeling lonely without Meghan is from Meghan-friendly associates. Meghan might be shit when it comes to public service, but she really knows her shit when it comes to PR and media. She knows that for maximum effect, she needs an affiliation to Kate. That's why she wears outfits similar to Kate's. That's why she styles her hair in big bouncy Chelsea blowouts. That's why she tries to be kid-friendly like Kate. She needs Kate for the attention she can't get on her own. Meghan needs Kate. Kate doesn't need Meghan - she's shown us that over and over again.

Anything that connects Meghan to Diana is also from Meghan. There was a whole PR campaign back in 2017/2018 when she was trying to convince Harry's world that she was royal material about how she was just like Diana. So Meghan (and Harry) also uses Diana for the attention boost.

However, anything that mentions Diana and Sarah together, that's not Meghan. Those are from the reporters themselves. Meghan so obsessively wants to be Diana that Sarah is the last person she wants to be associated with or compared to. Meghan thinks she's better than Sarah.

Kate being successful because of her inner circle is KP. Kate herself rarely speaks through PR - she's content to let William and their comms team speak for her. (Which I suspect is one of the reasons why Meghan immediately disliked her; Kate has no interest in using all this fame she has for her personal benefit where you know it's Meghan's dream to be that famous.)

Nah, it's just the Daily Mail stirring shit up. It goes back to the old adage "if you won't give me the news, you'll be the news." It's not really punishing William so much as using William for clicks, attention, and traffic, which is how digital media makes their money. Everyone does it and everyone understands that to keep their media coverage positive, they need to give the reporters something to write about. It's an unofficial pact that the palace has with the media.

William and Kate do understand this but it's not their priority to do something just for the optics and media coverage. I suspect this approach largely comes from how they were both treated by the media and paparazzi - they both understand that the interest in them is organic due to their positions. It's very 'if you build it they will come' so they don't necessarily worry about media and press coverage the way others in the BRF might.

(I do think they're a little too extreme with how media-averse they are. On the one hand I understand it because maybe they do have legitimate PTSD from how they were treated by the media and they seem to be closer to the Elizabeth/Philip style of monarchy with royal mystique and palace intrigue than the Charles/Diana/Camilla style of royalty and monarchy with transparency and open coverage. But on the other hand, they're public servants living in publicly-funded and publicly-subsidized estates; they need to be pulling their share of the weight and that means needing to be seen by the public on a regular consistent basis doing regular, consistent service. This is a lifetime commitment, not a "in 20 years when I'm King" commitment. Obviously exceptions apply when there are health concerns at hand, like there are now, but they can't alawys lean back on health concerns - not when Charles has cancer and is still seen regularly by the public.)

And that's fine! I don't think it's paranoia though - it's more stan culture to me, where the more consumed you are by your favorites, the more obsessive you become about how they're treated by others and covered in the media. At the end of the day, it's all parasocial relationships. The celebrities we favor, pay attention to, follow - they have no idea we exist and they have no idea how consumed by their life we are. Collectively, sure, they get it but individually? No. They have better things to do and they think we have better things to do.

That's why I think it's healthy to take a few steps back, look at everything more objectively, and ask exactly the kind of questions that you're asking.

As for not having proof about certain narratives, to an extent you're correct - no one is going to explicitly come out and take responsibility for saying certain things or causing certain drama. But they have subtle ways of showing their hand and giving us the proof. You just have to know what to look for and, barring that, just wait for the royal books. The books fall on a spectrum with deeply researched and investigated (like Tom Bower) on one side and biased reporting (like Scobie) on the other. If you read more of the 'biased reporter' books, those authors are falling over themselves to defend their sources and when they do that, they throw everyone else under the bus and end up confirming rumors or spoiling someone's PR game.

#ask #brf #in this essay i will

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minggukieology · 1 year

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Hello, I found this old quote from jimin and I’ve seen it translated elsewhere but I was hoping to get your take on it? It’s from this article

https://n.news.naver.com/mnews/article/415/0000001635?sid=004

지민_ 중학교 3학년 때부터 춤을 춰왔고 부산예고에 수석 입학 할 만큼 소문난 춤꾼이지만 동시에 매력적인 보컬로 방탄소년단만의 색깔을 만드는 데 큰 역할을 했다. 또 ‘짐드백’(지민+샌드백)이란 별명이 생길 정도로 팀 내 서열 꼴찌가 됐는데 어쩌다 이렇게 됐나.

▲ 춤뿐 아니라 보컬에 대한 고민도 많은 편이다. 보컬적인 면에서 아직 너무 부족하다고 생각하기 때문에 스스로 만족할 수 있을 만큼 노력해서 더 좋은 노래를 들려드리고 싶다. 서열 꼴찌인 건 인정한다. 막내 정국이한테 던져지고 나서 이렇게 된 것 같다. ‘정국 맘’이라는 별명이 있는데 이제 ‘정국 장난감’이 된 것 같다.(웃음) 반항할 수 없기도 하지만 그런 장난이 싫지 않기 때문에 어쩔 수 없다.

Hi, thanks a lot for your message.

Since it's quite a bit of text I will give a translation without much of explaining around it for the parts where it just mentions Jimin's history etc and focus more on the parts which I assume were the reason you sent me the message for.

Here I will also try to make it more fun for me (and for those who are maybe interested in going more in depth too) by showing multiple ways of translating certain words or phrases, ranging from 1st option marked as ¹ - 'closest to source' translation (which I typically provide to show what was said in original word as opposed to just transforming it to be more seemless and easier to understand for an English speaker) /2nd option marked as ²- close synonym (kind of middle of the two, optional) / 3rd option marked as ³- 'looser, more flexible' translation (might not be mirroring the source text 100% but brings the essence of the word, phrase closer to the English language and its context). This is just to show translations can vary depending on stylistic choice and preference. Naturally, this doesn't always apply though and there's many further nuances that can be discussed etc.

Note: if you wish to skip the (admittedly long) explanation and my weird number exercise, scroll to the bottom for clean translation.

지민_ 중학교 3학년 때부터 춤을 춰왔고 부산예고에 수석 입학 할 만큼 소문난 춤꾼이지만 동시에 매력적인 보컬로 방탄소년단만의 색깔을 만드는 데 큰 역할을 했다.

또 ‘짐드백’(지민+샌드백)이란 별명이 생길 정도로 팀 내 서열 꼴찌가 됐는데 어쩌다 이렇게 됐나.

"Jimin- You've been dancing since the third grade of middle school and were such a notorious dancer to the point that you got accepted to Busan Arts High School as the top student (*수석 입학), but at the same time, you also played a big role in creating BTS' own specific colors with your ¹attractive / ²appealing vocals.

Though on top of that, you came in ¹last position in the team ranking / ³were last in the team pecking order to such an extent that you ³earned yourself a nickname ¹'jim-deubaek' / ²'jim-dbag' / ³'jim-punchbag' (Jimin + ¹sandbag / ³punching bag), ¹how did it happen / ³how come / ³how did this come about?"

(*note: here of course the tone is playful and the meaning obviously isn't referring to any harmful violence, the question is posed in a way that it implies Jimin is both the top (skills, influence wise) and then finds himself at the bottom when it comes to certain power hierarchy in the group, like when they joke around together (even physically), to the point that not even the youngest regards him as a 'hyung' and rather plays around with him, which Jimin then refers to in the response accordingly)

춤뿐 아니라 보컬에 대한 고민도 많은 편이다. 보컬적인 면에서 아직 너무 부족하다고 생각하기 때문에 스스로 만족할 수 있을 만큼 노력해서 더 좋은 노래를 들려드리고 싶다.

서열 꼴찌인 건 인정한다. 막내 정국이한테 던져지고 나서 이렇게 된 것 같다. ‘정국 맘’이라는 별명이 있는데 이제 ‘정국 장난감’이 된 것 같다.(웃음) 반항할 수 없기도 하지만 그런 장난이 싫지 않기 때문에 어쩔 수 없다.

"Not only dancing, I tend to worry a lot about my vocals too. I think I am still lacking in the vocal aspect, therefore I want to try hard enough to be satisfied with myself and give you better songs.

I admit to being last in ³the pecking order. I think ¹it became/ ³I ended up like this after ¹being ¹thrown / ³tossed around by ¹the maknae Jungkook. I have the nickname ¹'Jungkook's mum' (*the word mum spelled in Korean) but now / from now on I think I am becoming ¹'Jungkook's toy' / ³'Jungkook's plaything'. (Laughter) I cannot ¹defy it / ²resist, but since I don't hate these kind of ¹antics/ ¹play / ²jokes / ²mischief, ¹there's nothing to do / ³I can't help it."

Concluding note: by giving multiple options I tried to show that there are always various ways to go about translations. Here I would say to avoid misunderstanding, it's better to try to convey the meaning of what was said with a bit more flexible translation.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

TLDR, clean translation:

Reporter: "(Jimin) You've been dancing since the third grade of middle school and were such a notorious dancer to the point that you got accepted to Busan Arts High School as the top student, but at the same time, you also played a big role in creating BTS' own specific colors with your attractive vocals. Though on top of that, you were last in the team pecking order to such an extent that you earned yourself a nickname 'jim-punchbag' (Jimin +punching bag), how did this come about?"

JM: "Not only dancing, I tend to worry a lot about my vocals too. I think I am still lacking in the vocal aspect, therefore I want to try hard enough to be satisfied with myself and give you better songs. I admit to being last in the pecking order. I think I ended up like this after being tossed around by the maknae Jungkook. I have the nickname 'Jungkook's mum' but now I think I am becoming 'Jungkook's plaything'. (Laughter) I cannot defy it, but since I don't hate these kind of antics, there's nothing to do about it."

(exerpt from 그 여름, 우리가 사랑한 방탄소년단, published 27.07.2016 by atstar1)

#ask #translations #jikook #민꾸기 #the language nerd in me just jumped out here #sorry for the confusing numbering system

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abiiors · 1 year

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what are your opinions on the article that just came out?

hi darling! thanks for asking <3

okay so i read the article twice because i actually wanted to talk about it in detail. and i still feel a bit all over the place about it (i think no matter how much i edit this, i'm never going to feel like i'm being articulate so i'm going to just let it be)

as far as answering the question goes---who is matty healy?---i do think it does a wonderful, albeit predictable job. fans who have known him and followed him for ages, and watched him go through all his phases---his "eras"---won't be much surprised by what the article reveals about his character. but i do think it does a wonderful job of portraying him as a simple, ordinary man (and i mean that in the best way possible)

his music and stage presence and political views aside, i think as a person he is very much like someone any of us would know irl. he cares too much but doesn't want to show that he does. he is vulnerable one moment and then makes a joke to clear the air. he's curious, sometimes about the wrong things ("he told me that he became a fan [of the podcast] in part because he was attracted to differences in opinion, and also to one of the hosts, whom he described as “really sexy.”"). and yes, he definitely isn't a fan of the fame; he has made that much very clear over the years. (although i do think he indulges in it sometimes as a form of self-flagellation (ha! ironic of me to use a religious term for it))

onto this bit that i literally just made fun of:

no, i think he is objectively wrong here and for that I'm going to reference the caitlin moran times interview where her daughters are quoted saying "he looked bare ill and sad" (sadly don't have access to it anymore, it's behind a paywall). point is - his fans have shown him time and time again that they care, more than just the surface level. more than just shouting "fuck me!!" in his face.

2. i'm not going to rehash the podcast and the porn stuff. i think we've had several discussions on it already but i am quite happy that the article didn't just gloss it over.

3. i really want to mention some bits i found very sweet or even at times, bittersweet -

-----

(he refers to george ^)

-------

(ross has a niece 🥹💕)

-----

4. and onto a lighter note, this bit that i found genuinely fucking hilarious!

5. and finally, regarding the taylor swift rumours. i love the final note of ambiguity. and i respect it very much.

that's that i think, if i think of more (and i most probably will), i'll make more posts <3

#asks #chatty asks #the 1975 #ross macdonald #matty healy #adam hann #george daniel

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inchidentally · 5 months

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U wanna analyse this? The words kinda made me sad: https://www.planetf1.com/news/peter-windsor-oscar-piastri-negative-impact-lando-norris

oh babe that one's easy bc not only did Lando have his best season yet by a long shot, he has many many times publicly credited it to Oscar pushing him and giving him the kind of competition that he's needed. as in he's said it so many times it would take me hours to screenshot all of them. Andrea and Zak have said it too, and actually the article itself even admits it. at the very last race Lando said how much Oscar has brought and that Lando himself has learned from him.

so big shock, "planetf1" faked a headline for clicks lol.

just to get ahead of the inevitable doom and gloom that sports media posts for engagement, let me pass on what I learned while in hockey fandom:

if the headline is dramatic, it's fake and don't give it clicks and ad rev. if it's not something like "grosjean leaps through fireball" which is easily verifiable then trust me, they won't be able to back it up in the article. remember when Lando did the landolog of him and Oscar karting in Italy and how much fun they had? at the beginning, he joked that Oscar had been a "little snake" for getting there early and practicing. he literally laughed while he said it. but sure enough, headlines on sites w names like F1dotcomBizFunHorny4U had "McLaren's Norris calls teammate Piastri a snake".

negative stories get engagement and melodrama gets even more. they'll worry about fixing it to not get sued way down in the article under the tenth video ad.

if the article was cribbed/didn't get a direct interview with a named source with an actual role within a team then it's either fake or stretched beyond reality for engagement.

even quotations can get chopped to hell and misplaced to fake a story - like people seeing Pierre explain his lack of relationship with Esteban by saying that other drivers might not be close friends either and to not make assumptions. despite quotes from those other drivers that they do in fact like their teammate (Carlos actually said this about him and Charles to Esteban and Pierre on the fanstage at Vegas). if people want to go hogwild with a quote to fit their negative personal narrative then they will. sites that exist solely for ad revenue and sponsorships will do everything to draw those fans in.

if DTS ever lands on the truth it's because that storyline wasn't worth the time in post twisting it into lies. so the fact that Oscar and Lando haven't had melodrama between them and keep saying how well they work together and like each other could mean that we get some unedited actual decent content! but since the 2023 season was so boring it might mean that the editors decide to do a hatchet job and bring in the usual talking heads to fabricate a drama between them. it ultimately doesn't matter bc DTS is only good for f1blr so that we can pull stuff for memes and gifs etc. when Lando recorded his viewing of some of the seasons he spent most of it laughing.

also this isn't the 80s or 90s or even early 00s Formula 1. the drivers are expected to stay much more even keeled out of respect for their teams and even the Pierre/Esteban situation (jsyk I do know their childhood history) isn't like they're out for each other's throats. they have a solely professional relationship now and they'd both agree that being civil is much better than not having an F1 seat. drivers are also way too busy nowadays with their own sponsorships and work outside racing to sit and fester these crazy rivalries in bars and pubs - as well as the media duties for their team that are way more since Liberty Media took over.

every set of teammates will experience ups and downs and tensions but they also have every incentive to get over it and not fuck up their work environment. especially at McLaren where Andrea and Zak now take a hard line about the drivers cooperating at all times for the sake of the team, that's never going to spiral into the kind of drama that media want. Lando beating himself up this season is because he's 5 years in and dying for that win, it's his mentality and it clearly didn't stop him from snatching podiums and points anyway. does he envy Oscar's sprint win, of course!! but if he hated or even resented Oscar for that Sprint win then he wouldn't keep bringing it up on Oscar's behalf all the time. he would do like other resentful teammates have done and simply avoid talking about it at all.

tl;dr anon, for your own sake please customize your F1 media experience or it'll drive you crazy <3 and just to say, I don't look at anything but F1.com or AP news to get updates on anything and I don't pay attention to anything else.

#inchreplies #I hope this isn't talking down to you anon I'm just wanting it to be helpful #and some folks aren't aware just how much wider f1 journalism straight up tells lies #wank adjacent #but not really

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popculturebuffet · 9 months

Text

Sam and Max Beyond Time and Space Retrospective: Ice Station Santa (Patreon Review for WeirdKev27)

Hello all you happy freelance police and welcome back! For those just tuning in for the better part of the year i've been taking a look at Sam and Max: Save the World courtsey of patron WeirdKev27, falling more in love with this franchise and these games each chapter. If you'd like to catch up, I've put links to each review into one masterpost

RIGHT HERE

So with season 2's production.. I don't have a lot. I tried but most articles I could find from the time are "Sam and Max Season 2 is happening and it's better than ever" and not much else.

It makes sense: Season 1 was Telltale Games big coming out party: while it wasn't the first game they made, that would be....

It was their big breakout success. So while season 1 was proving themselves by this point Telltale was a big name, Sam and Max were once again big names, and the episodic model had worked. So it's not a huge suprise that season 2's production was more: Let's do it all again but bigger and better!

So for season 2 the models are slightly more expressive, there's more mini games and the originals had widescreen support back when that was a feature. '

So what actually happens in this sequel? Well a lot so join me under the cut as our heroes take on a bloated hairy pagan god to save christmas, embark in a rigged trivia night, traumatize bosco for fun and profit, and run over some muppets. In other words it's another day at the office and i'm glad to be back.

We open season 2 with our heroes returning from a case, some time after season 1 which is said explictly to be last year, only to get a nasty suprise. A giant robot smashing up the place

It's not that souless abomination but the maimtron 5000. With our heroes assuming it's their goldfish plotting max's death, that old chestnut, we head outside for the first puzzle.. well okay we're SUPPOSED to head outside but I choose to instead dick around the office. The trophy closet continues to grow and i'm happy to see a jar of bliss join the stuff. It's not a big or flashy trophy granted, it's not a melted ted-e-bear heard or a whole human being. There's some nice new touches to the office too: the photos from hit the road and bad day on the moon are replaced with ones from season 1. IT's a nice little touch that helps vary up the office and allows it to feel refreshed while still recycling the set from last game.

The biggest and best addition though is some stuff swiped from Ted.E Bears charred ruins. I get the feeling they WANTED to include these last season but it simply wasn't fesable. At any rate you now have a mounted mafia anamatronic head over the desk and the wack a rat game is now free to play any time in your office. I did again, because I had fun and it's even more fun when you just touch the screen.

So we walk out onto main street.. and quickly get our first of many status quo shake ups for the season: Sybil's is thrown through the air and lands squarely between your business and boscos where the space for rent used to be. Or on top of it more likely. It's also teling just how used I got to Sam and Max's street that I know it like the back of my arm hair. Thankfully she's not inside but it was still unnerving to see such a key part of the first season tossed aside.

Thankfully the Maimtron himself... is pure comic gold. He's waxing lyrical incarnate, quoting countless pop songs. My faviorite bits from him are giving his number as "6875309" and "All the cops in the donut shops say way oh way oh". That one's more for Max's response "That's it no one quotes walk like an egyptian at me and lives!"

However bullets can't do anything against him. Thankfully he has a big wind up dealie on his back so you simply need to ask why do birds suddenly appear every time he is near. I mean the obvious answer as given by Lorne

Is just like me, they long to be, close to you, but since he's in metal box at the bottom of the sea since Max took office, it instead gives you an opening to turn the robot off. The sender turns out to be a hairy pagan god with powers untold. That right it's old saint nick and time for Christmas in late august.

One opening sequence later we're at the north pole and it's here we get some interesting structuring for this episode. For the first act of it you can't leave the north pole. Which was annoying at first as I wanted to see Season 2's settings and what's changed, but in hindsight works perfectly: it keeps you at the pole and thus keeps your options kept there. Likewise apart from a puzzle or two that requires you to go to the north pole, most of act 2 is on main street and the last one is a bit back and forth. It creates a nice gameplay loop without leaving you TOO overwhelmed.

But before we can get to the wonders of Santa's Workshop... we reunite with some old faces. Yes folks, the dreaded dark day of prophecy fortold in the scrolls has come. THE SODA POPPERS HAVE RETURNED

As you can imagine i'm not remotely happy their alive and survivied the great dakota wars with only a removal from office. Their mad about their christmas presents. Specs got.. something, Peepers got a night gown he just dosen' thave the hips for, and Whizzer got Tuberculosis. Same thing Sam got max. It's why they don't do secret santa any more. Those gags are funny, and at the very least Sam and Max are now as visably fed up with them as I am. They also aren't in this one too much and the developers make up for using them at all out of plot necsity by allowing you to throw snowballs full of bleach at them. Repeatedly.

It was one of the best days of my life. Also helping with the strain of these morons and specs returning is a little something from the past. See before I got into this chapter, Kev reminded me of what was INTENDED to be a running gag, but I simply never updated it. Persons of all ages I present the wall of misery

It was supposed to be a runnnig tally of characters I just.. flat out hated in fiction. Not just disliked, not just was mildly annoyed by in one version or another, the ones I CANNOT FUCKING STAND , the ones who truly bring out the rage in me. It ended up largely forgotten due to a combo of two things: my short term memory being shoddy.. and me simply not getting THAT angry that often when reviewing. I try to be fair to a work as much as possible, and prefer to focus on the positive. I"ll still be objective, i'll still come down on a works flaws, but at the end of the day the reason I got into this wasn't to let out my anger issues (which I do have and try hard to control), but to simply look at things I liked or things other people like as fair as possible. I WILL tear into something if it truly pisses me off, see my review of the boys comic, but I generally don't get my hackles up that high that often.

That being said.. as I looked at the wall I realized it had a place for that exact reason. If a character can not just annoy me (as a lot of this prototype do), but really make me hate them, really make it harder to watch an episode or read a scene if their around.. why SHOUDLN'T they get a badge of dishonor for it? Pissing me off is harder and harder these days, so why shouldn't someone get an award for it for somehow pulling that off? So I present to you

With thing one and thing two front and center. Thing three is absent because he's not a carnival of dicks crammed into one character model. If your curious whos who

First Row: Julie Powers (Scott Pilgrim (Comic)) Helen Lovejoy (The Simpsons) Billy Butcher (The Boys (Comic) ) Daisy Duck (Legend of the Three Cablleros Version, the rest are fine) Second Row: Mindy's Mom (Animaniacs Peepers (Guess) Whizzer (Oh come on) Roger Raincomprix (Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir) Yivo (Futurama: The Beast with a Billion Backs) As for what the Soda Poppers have to do puzzle wise...

Yup my anguish, my bringing back and old bit, my pelting them with bleach and possibly elf urine, it all amounted to... well okay you DO get to pelt them all with bleach and possibly blind them for life. I"ll give the developers that. This appearance gets a pass.

So we finally get inside the Workshop to find this is the night santa went crazy, as Santa is holding anyone trying to come into his office at gun point and has been having the elves making more militarilzed toys. And tourture me elmer. Naturally Max loves that last one. He even screams like a real person.

I will say Santa holding everyone at gun point.. is more than a bit unsettling and is very "product of it's time" given the.. well everything that's happened since this chapter happened. While mass shootings happened back then, they weren't nearly as common. and... I need a moment.

Okay back. I didn't even notice it while playing it oddly enough, probably down to it being a product of it's time and my brain treating it that way. Or the situation being silly enough that the horrible crushing reality simply didn't hit me and thus the chapter holds up okay.

It helps the workshop has a genuinely... creepy atmosphere> The music, a more offputting carol of the bells, the lighting it's all more ominous than previous settings. It contributes to the episodes depressing vibe as when we get to town in a bit it's also a bit off. Thankfully this is sam and max so while I was a tad unsettled.. it really didn' tstay that way for long as you can stick your guns to the north pole, talk with the elves on how things hav edeteroriated and how the elves sang a song when they left "It wasn't very happy" and make an elf cry to progress.

Elf Tears make trees grow

So we need to make one of the elves cry. And given this is sam and max it's naturally one of the most darkly hilarious things as the elf WANTS to cry.. but even threatning to rip out his eyes or kill his dog dose'nt work.. I mean the former at least makes sense. You know I forget sometimes how much horrible stuff these games make you do till I sit down and play this month's chapter.. or how much comedy gold you get out of the suffering.

Now we have a pail of elf tears.. .which I didn't even know you could pick up. I assumed growing the tree was what you did to progress. This one's on me for both not using the button to show you everything you can react to.. and on not turning the hint system up. See last game I honestly forgot half the time Max gave you hints, not helped by the fact a majority were just max being max instead of offering any advice. So for this game they instead worked out a better hint system. I mean you can still talk to max for giggles, but instead if you turn it on and the game thinks your stuck, he'll shout out what you specifically need to do. I needed to crank it up to get him to do it, and evne cranked up it's nicely just if you've been idle or wandering around long enough.

Thankfully once Kev told me I could us ether elf tears, I grabbed them and used them on a coinvent little tree outside. This gets us into Santa's Office, but dosen't really fix the problem right away as he still outguns us. And given this is sam and max we're talking about that says a LOT. Thankfully we get our lead in to act 2: an exorcism diagram. It's actually quite simple they simply need a magentic pole, which they have and the four horseman of the apocalypse action figures.

So collecting all 4 is our next goal and we're finally back home. And each area has one of the four horseman.

The first one I encountered, and ironically the last one I grabbed, was Boscos. And boy oh boy was I not prepared. So.. since the end of Save the World Bosco's somehow sunk further down the conspiracy whole. Besides dawning his most hideous disguise yet, himself, he's torn the store apart, taking all the fun and helpful condiments from season one and replacing them with a presumibly useful in the future set of photography equipment. The lights are dim, the security's somehow MORE draconian and bosco himself seems on a shorter fuse. That dosen't mean we can't light it as there's two really fun bits. The first is since bosco is hiding from a group called "T-H-E-M", who i'm not doubting exists since he was at least SOMEWHAT on the money about most of his paranoid delusions, any time someone says them he gives out a high pitched shriek. Props to Oogie Banks for making it so damn hilarious. You can just.. say it over and over ot hear it till Bosco eventually uses the security system on you. Btads is back baby!

You can also ask if he has any, which of course he dosen't this isn't a store.. but the payoff is what makes the joke:

As for bosco's horseman it's in his package

And that joke was ALMOST as subtle as the jokes the game makes. Bosco won't open it because he thinks it has a bomb inside but won't NOT open it because it might have his broom. So once again we have to ruin bosco's life. Id' feel worse but given he's taken trillions of dollars from us simply because he could, let's scar him for life again!

This requires the present machine. You can send random junk to people. We only need to send two gifts for plot progression: a ticking stopwatch to bosco for obvious reasons and a footbath to stinky's diner for reasons i'll get into in a moment.

The watch makes Bosco think the present is a bomb, and while he's disposing of it you can steal from him again. And if he has any problem with it.. them.

Onto our next one at Pimp Le Car, another very 2000's joke but one that holds up as it's just plain funny a custom car place would decide "you know what we need to not get sued by xibit? FRENCH!"

And running Pimp Le Car are The C.O.P.S.

The COPS are like the anti-soda poppers to me: their instantly likeable, made their chapter better by existing and every time they show up gets a smile out of me. And lucky for me Telltale clearly felt the same as their upgraded to Bosco's old role of shopkeep, via their custom car buisness. Their also as funny as ever.

Naturally their task is the best. To get their figure (a free hood ornament) you have to run over as many torture me elmers as possible while they spit out things likes "I have rights" and "I'm an american citzen"

That's 1/4 horseman, but before we go we can also get Stickers

For the desoto. Turns out you can get 5.. I only got one assuming it was a once a chapter thing. It's pretty neat.

Moving on, we have Stinky's Diner, our second new location and our replacement for Sybils. And I have to admit while I miss both Sybils and Bosco's as it was this shakeup was necessary: while the gameplay loop of visiting the duo worked for a game, changing up who does their roll was necessary. Telltales smartly kept both characters, they simply changed up their gimmicks: Sybil's focused on her relationship with Abe LIncoln and Bosco has gone deep down the paranoia rabbit hole.

Stinky's isn't ENTIRELY new, having shown up in Hit the Road as a quick gag and Season 1 as a background feature. Our heroes were mentioned being fond of it's salty order who hoped to cull the weak with his questionable food.

Sadly for our heroes and about a wash for the rest of civlization, Stinky is gone, apparently having passed between games with his daughter taking his place. The boys are suspcious. The fact Stinky is a habitual liar who has rigged her trivia contest so no matter what you answer you loose so she can feel superior doesn't help.

Winning at trivia is a lot of fun and a clever puzzle: the pattern is simple enough: Sybil and Abe are on a date and while their relationship is going fine, the date itself is not great as both want to murder Girl stinky but neither wants to ruin the date for the other, and my boy the Army Bug whose dealing with some ptsd and the recent loss of his father. Poor guy. I'm glad he's here but he needs some bug therapy. Maybe Buster Blaster can branch out

YOU ARE NOT YOUR FATHER

YOU ARE GREAT

YOU CAN DO THIS

GIVE ME 5.50

Since the bug and Sybil always give the same answer, a and d respectively, you simply need to tell abe whose desperate for advice to choose b or c, choose whiche ver one he didn't and you win. Stinky begrudginly gives you your prize.

As for the footbath I mentioned you mail that to Girl Stinky, and she's thankful enough to let you take her old sock.

Note this is just me personally. If your into that, good for you. It's just not for me.

Anyways the sock will be useful later, and the less I have to talk about someone else's dirty sock the better.

So that leaves us with our final horseman to grab, and that takes us back to the start.. the giant robut. Thankfully kev told me when I was stuck to go back there. So Jimmy Two-Teeth and co have turned the robot into a boxing league. Thankfully you can aquire a boxing doll from the north pole and engage in the rat equilvent of punch out.

The boxing mini game is painful. It's main problem is simple: it's a punch out homage.. that isn't designed to work like punch out. So if you say spent a LOT of time playing punchout in college and have all your reflexes for a game tied to this where you assume you can dodge either way when your instead supposed to go the same direction your opponents punching, your gonna have a bad time. Spoiler: I had a bad time. Not helping is the final fight with Jimmy gives him a super punch that can knock you out in one hit. Why they didn't tune this up for the console versions better is beyond me.. and probably time and space.

Our heroes win.. which leads to Jimmy Two Teeth, sad his wife left him, to perch on a ledge and prepare to commit suicide. Honestly i'm suprised this episode didn't have you kick a puppy or 12 at this point. We can't help him yet though, but we CAN help santa. Using a record from his office, we play the summoning chant the friendly demon song!

youtube

Jared Emerson-Johnson continues his hot streak from last season and shame on me for not looking up who was writing and singing these things. Admitely the puzzle itself is frustrating if you don't get it but the solution.. is neat. The beast possesing santa left a bunch of clues around the workshop.. and it turns out it's our old friend Shambling Corproate Presence! I'm so delighted they brought it back.. granted it's just a pink monster.. thing, but it's still neat they brought it back.

Turns out though while this does draw it out Santa actually left out the instructions as a way of fighting from the inside.. and our heroes didn't look on the back. The only way to restrain the thing is the ghosts of christmas past, present and future. And thus we've come to our final act. You have to get the help of the spirits of christmas past , present and future to help. And in a nice and, as you'd expect for this episode, fucked up twist, it's all undoing shit our heroes did. Well for the most part, one is saving them but two are christmases our heroes genuinely ruined.

So first is past, and this is where we help our old friend Jimmy Two Teeth. Kinda. We go back to season 1 and while Christmas Past dosen't care about them kidnapping Leonard for keepsies, they do care about Jimmy's son needing money for his toureets or jimmy's wife about ot leave him. The only way to fix this.. is to kindap jimmy's wife, bring her to him, and then take his boxing glove so his past self can get the tourettes surgery money, fixing the problems we caused in his life with more problems in his life.

Then we have christmas present. Earlier when we got the figure from Stinky, Max pressed it. And since that one was pestlience it summoned the bug's awful family. We throw a snowball at him, it triggers his psd, and this gets the others to leave thinking he's his own dad.

So it's on to our final one which thankfully isn't comitting any crimes. Horay! We simply have to save ourselves from hell in the future. We do so by firing up the sleigh, which has been sitting outside waiting for some coal. And we just so happen to have a terrible persons' sock. We use it to coal up, go rescue ourselves and max hits on his past self suprising no one.

So now we can release the spirits of christmas. They try appealing to the corprate presence's better nature.. and once they get that off their quota beat it. Unfortuantely it goes back into santa.

Fortunately this final boss fight.. is pretty neat. See earlier in the workshop there's a bunch of stuff to play with but none of it comes into play, a tad annoyingly at that.

And while I still contend it was a bit much.. I can't fault telltale for the payoff, as you use all the stuff in santa's workshop to knock him out. The package that brought shambling corprate presence here turned out to be for satan so we send it back.

The problem is who will save christmas? Turns out it's the soda poppers who like me Max wishes were deead but for once turn out useful. WEll okay peepers and specs are, Whizzer's only fucntion is "unrinate on stuff" but frankly it's a funny enough gag he can live till the end of the season. JUST TILL THE END OF THE SEASON. Speaking of great gags our heroes drop off. And why not.. it's only mid november.

Ice Station Santa is a mixed bag for me. There are a lot of great gags shoved in here as usual, the puzzles are mostly fun, and while the first act can be frustrating the atmosphere can't be beat. It's mostly great stuff. The more I wrote about it though the more it became clear that the tone.. is a bit of an issue. Some jokes like making the elf cry or the muppet slaughter are so dark they work, while other bits just .. don't quite land. There's enough of the old sam and max goofiness to make the chapter not get to ounsettling but there's a more mean spirited tone in this one i'm really hoping isn't a trend for this game. Sam and Max works better when it's more over the top insanity and our heroes being over the top callous instead of just depressing. Still i'ts a solid start to the season Next Month..ish: Sam and Max take a vacation! Naturally they have to save the day to actually enjoy it. Thanks for reading.

#sam and max #sam and max beyond time and space #telltale games #skunkape games #sam #max #freelance police #sam and max freelance police #sam x max

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mlobsters · 2 months

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supernatural s15e4 atomic monsters (w. davy perez)

tumblr trashed my original post, it said it was processing the video but the post disappeared entirely so i'm having to re-write this from scratch. i was able to screenshot what i wrote while it was hung which is something, but this is something that's happened to me a number of times (usually on video focused posts though) and i'm FUCKING SICK OF IT. i always find all the fucking bugs. UGH.

oh, a becky episode. i really, really did not like her character. i understand the intent may have been all in good fun, but i only ever received it as making fun of fans. especially the way her actor played her. and i will never understand the choice to have her drugging and kidnapping sam to marry him.

is dean having an action hero nightmare about all his brothers-in-arms who died on his watch. it's pretty and a+ production values. bunker looks so much cooler in the red lighting. waiting for an explanation on the facial hair, scarf???, tactical vest, fingerless gloves look though. giving very military incursion.

(just noticed this is a jackles directed episode. hmm.)

reminded of that article with serge ladouceur and he mentioned why they didn't use slow motion in fights:

Clearly, your producers always had in their creative vision a show that was dynamic, dark, moody, and expressive. Tell us about the meeting you had early on with series creator Eric Kripke, and how you all found that you were on a similar creative wavelength. Eric wanted the show to be embedded in reality. He didn’t want to create a fantasy world. What he wanted to see were stories where the supernatural would manifest itself in real time and in real life. This is what he wanted to convey and I was in sync with this concept as I was talking about a naturalistic approach to the lighting. Moreover, and as an example, he was against slow-motion. He didn’t want to beautify the fights by camera techniques. Even to this day we sometimes ask ourselves, “What would Eric want?” And that’s one thing.

imagine this doesn't qualify since it's a nightmare/vision/whatever

excuse to get benny back (extremely briefly). and the screechy noise is back too. zero chance i'm getting through this episode in one sitting. (update: this is day 3 or 4, since i had to retranscribe it on top of it all)

am i seeing things or does that look like a keffiyeh. oh, right. the evil!sam vision thing, i forgot about that

lovely lighting and yes to sweaty highlights all day every day

SAM You know, I knew you’d come looking for me. After Sioux Falls… I suppose you had to. DEAN What you did to them… what you did to Bobby… to Jody… SAM They tried to stop me. But I will not be stopped. DEAN Sammy, listen to me. This is the demon blood. You have to fight it!

what year is this now? anyway so is sam gonna tell dean about this nightmare/vision/whatever fuckery orrr.

fingers crossed today is the day i can finally get this episode done. i get halfway into the conversation with dean calling out sam on not being okay and brain is jumping ahead three stations (dean's gonna make an assumption about what's bothering sam and so sam isn't gonna actually tell him what's going on)

SAM Yeah. But every time I ask for it, you say, and I’m quoting, "I don’t want any of that hippie, Sarah McLaughlin grass-eater crap in the Meat Man’s kitchen". Which, by the way, for what it’s worth, you got to stop calling yourself "The Meat Man." It… it doesn’t mean what you think it means. DEAN Yeah, it does.

i mean meat->dick thing i get but does anyone use that phrase

SAM I’m good. DEAN No, you’re not. The past few days, you’ve barely come outta your room. Look, man, I get it, okay? With Jack… and Rowena… Rowena knew what she was getting herself into. She knew what needed to be done. SAM Doesn’t make it any easier. DEAN No, it doesn’t.

so, no on the telling dean about the nightmare/vision whatever. at least in these late seasons, if it's a plot significant thing, i can have some confidence that they will talk about it sooner rather than later instead of dragging it out for half the season. but it also could have been a showy action piece that was fun to make but not really amount to anything :p

SAM That… that’s real bacon, Dean. DEAN You’re damn right it is. Meat Man!

jackles your eyeline is all wonky, what are you even looking at

DEAN Well, local police are freaked. Never seen anything like this. They got no idea how to deal. SAM Of course not. That’s our job. We keep them from dealing with the truth, with what’s out there, and we carry the weight. It’s great. Meanwhile, they get to go back to living in their white picket fence bubbles. DEAN You know, ever since you were a kid, you wanted to live in a town like this. Lame, normal… SAM Yeah, we don’t get normal. And these towns, everything’s the end of the world. You’re late for work, your kid doesn’t get into the right school… whatever. They don’t… They have no idea what’s out there.

that's a lot more bitter than sam usually goes. must be feeling really disillusioned

well, things are looking up on the becky front. first impression seems like she gets to be an actual human now instead of just a breathless obsessive creepy fan

BECKY You mean my work. Look, what you were writing, it was real… like, really real. You sort of channelled Sam and Dean’s lives because you’re a prophet. CHUCK I… Yeah. Yes, I am. BECKY And, sure, I got a little obsessed, and it took me to a dark place. What I did to Sam… [shudders] So, after some pretty intensive counselling, I realized I wasn’t in love with the real Sam Winchester. I loved his character. So instead of reading your stories, I kept writing my own.

well, i appreciate they acknowledge that plotline was gross and awful, if we're supposed to like her now

CHUCK Your own… “Supernatural”? BECKY Where the guys didn’t have to hunt monsters all the time. They just sit around and do laundry and talk, you know? I mean, that’s what people like the most, anyway.

show could take a smidge of its own advice here. like with the xfiles, you needed those goofy ass episodes to take the edge off the mytharc that you couldn't quite do with the monsters of the week alone. spn humor doesn't hit that spot (for me, at least) so how about just a little domesticity as a treat instead. like 11x04 baby

CHUCK Well, I mean, people like monsters. BECKY Meh. Anyway, I got an online following, and it wasn’t paying the bills, so I started making these handcrafted miniatures. They took off, started turning a profit, and here I am. CHUCK Right. Right, right, right, right, right. But people like monsters though. They do. I mean, Leviathans are cool. What? They’re all teeth!

first the bmol shade, now the leviathans. yes, thank you

CHUCK Things were said. Uh… Now I’ve found msyself low on, um… resources. I went to ask my sister for help, and she rejected me. ‘Cause she sucks. And now I’m just… stuck. So, I thought I’d come see you, my number-one fan. And, I don’t know, see if you can help make me feel big again. BECKY So, you want me to… fluff you?

uh huh.

CHUCK I mean, no. BECKY You do. You thought you could just come back to me, your pathetic ex, your number-one fan, and get what you’ve always gotten from me… a nice big crank on your ego. CHUCK Well, I mean… BECKY Well, sorry, that’s not me anymore, Chuck. I am married to an amazing man, I have two great kids, and I like myself, Chuck. For the first time in a long time, I like myself. So, I don’t need you.

tell him, becky. good for her. now this is a character flip flop i am 100% on board with and won't question

BECKY I’m a writer, too, Chuck. CHUCK Oh. I mean, fanfic… it’s not really the same thing… BECKY Writing’s writing.

100%. the rest of her speech is very boiler plate online writing advice but sure. the show does get kind of navel gaze-y meta about writers/writing

BECKY Okay. If I had to give one note… the jeopardy, Chuck. It’s feeling a little… thin? Low stakes? It’s fun to hear the boys’ voices, but a story is only as good as its villain, and these villains are just not feeling very… dangerous? Not to mention, there’s no classic rock. No one even mentions Cas. The climax is a little stale. Boys tied up again while we get the villain’s monologue, which, frankly, isn’t one of your best. A little originality wouldn’t… … hurt.

all-in on the meta shade

HENRY You don’t have children, do you? Because if you did, you would know, that to see your child in pain rips your heart out. And you’d know that you’d do anything. You’d die for them. JANET Or kill for them.

lol kids or (some) brothers

so the kid is offering himself up to be killed, like madison. ok. the music for the montage at the beginning i was groaning at generic rock instrumental but once the lyrics kicked in it was perfectly serviceable. and i see it's radio company/aka jensen's band's song. which the wiki talks about it was not at his behest. it's a little odd but his voice doesn't sound anything like dean, so it's not like it's noticeable. i had no clue until i read the trivia bits for it.

“To be honest our editor inquired about it. He said, ‘I know you did some music over the break, do you think we could take anything and plug it in?’ I wasn’t angling for that, I wasn’t pushing that, and in fact we didn’t even tell Bob or Andrew or anybody. We just floated it in there and waited to see if anybody said, ‘I don’t really care for that song, I don’t know who that is,'” Ackles says. “And nobody said that.” In addition to “Sounds of Someday” Ackles says he had a few other music cues in his director’s cut, including a big one at the end. “Two of the three got taken out; mine was the last one standing,” he says of his new single. “That was a small victory. That was a nice vote of confidence, especially from a show that prides itself on music so much.”

cringed a bit and felt guilty with that last line, being how consistently i've ragged on the music in this show. the licensed stuff usually is good to okay, occasionally i disagree with the tone. but it's the original score i take issue with for the most part. but still :p

and chuck zapped becky and family to i guess not dead-"away"

right, i stopped watching this (two nights ago now) because we're talking about being suicidal, again

SAM Yeah. What Henry did… we’d have done the same thing. For Jack. If we had the chance. DEAN Yeah. Yeah, we would. Look, man, I get it. I get it. We have lost way, way too much. And it’s hard not to feel like just… cashing out. I felt like that. After Chuck, back at the crypt. But you know what brought me back? You did. By sayin’ that what we do still matters.

before i rant about the music and shots, i went and rewatched that scene in the crypt which i thought was 15x01? i don't know what dean's referring to though, because they don't really talk about it? maybe like, 14x20 in the cemetary with the stupid gun? dean almost killing himself to kill soulless!jack? or maybe the lead up to sam shooting chuck

on to my rant about the clip. the filming is really weird in this scene. it's shakycam but at times, especially when on dean, it's tilting and floaty in a way that makes it seem like they're not in the car but it's a dream or something. and they have that driving at night film set down pat so it was a choice or something. and the music? buh.

it's a combo of reminding me of the original musical score to the magicians and i believe it's got the spn-interstellar-ish theme again that was in a sam and dean car conversation ([suicidal] deathbed apologies) in 14x12 (this ep is christopher lennertz and philip white, 14x12 was lennertz and tim wynn)

and the dialogue itself is very... speechy. combined with the weird fimilng angles and not getting right up in their business, it's kind of lost that intimacy of the car convo and moved it into inspirational speech

SAM I know, I know, I know. I’m sorry. I know. But… but what I’m saying is that I don’t feel free. What we’ve done, what we’ve lost, right now, that is what I’m feeling, and… and sometimes it’s… it’s like I-I-I can’t even breathe. But maybe tomorrow. You know, maybe I’ll… I’ll feel better in the morning. DEAN And what if you don’t? SAM I don’t know.

and sam describing to me what sounds like flavors of depression and anxiety that i'm personally all too familiar with, it's a lot. the bit about maybe i'll feel better in the morning, reminds me of a song that has struck a chord with me on the depression front for years now. you can't really do anything but try to just keep going even though everything is so hard and hurts

youtube

Sometimes in the morning I am petrified and can't move Awake, but cannot open my eyes And the weight is crushing down On my lungs, I know I can't breathe And hope someone will save me this time ... But the lows are so extreme That the good seems fucking cheap And it teases you for weeks in its absence But you'll fight and you'll make it through You'll fake it if you have to And you'll show up for work with a smile And you'll be better and you'll be smarter And more grown up and a better daughter Or son, and a real good friend And you'll be awake, you'll be alert You'll be positive though it hurts

and this edit after the s4 magicians finale to this song changed me at a fundamental level (it's a fix-it)

youtube

(also on tumblr)

i know jared's history with talking about his mental health, which i've very much appreciated, and feels like bleeding some of that into sam which is a little unexpected but i think it's good, just tilted me a bit because sometimes things that are too relatable are.. too relatable :p

#supernatural #spnwatch #spn 15x04 #sam and dean mush #davy perez #spn clip #spn musical score #christopher lennertz #tim wynn #rilo kiley #a better son/daughter #Youtube #spn interstellarish music

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monstersinthecosmos · 2 years

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I didn't follow any of the pre-release promotional materials; do you have a link to the showrunner(s) stating/implying that queerness is merely "subtextual" in the absence of literal sex? (Apologies if you've shared it before and I just wasn't paying attention.) Also, thank you for your prolific and thorough critiques. I'm a more casual book fan and was tentatively excited to see the show forge a new narrative path while still guided by the same lifeblood, if you will. But at this point, hmmmmmm

I don't recall him commenting on it being about literal sex, THAT WAS ME EDITORIALZING LMAO.

I haven't been able to stomach the entire SDCC panel but I know they talked about it in there, I kinda peeked around for a transcript but didn't find one. ANYONE FEEL FREE TO SHARE THE DIRECT QUOTES please I don't have the strength. There's a summary article here, though, which touches on the convo a little:

(Don't even ask me to start unpacking the Fiona Apple comment dude what?)

This article also talks about the SDCC panel and doesn't directly quote him but it sums up:

There's just been article after articleeeeee of people who didn't read the books or just watched the film or whatever and keep going WOWIE IT'S NOT SUBTEXT, GREAT JOB, when like ? It was never subtext lol. And that's not entirely the show's fault, how mainstream perceives it, but they've been running with that and taking credit for it.

Like there's just been tons of headlines and praise like this -

I think the show & RJ have also been pretty blurry with how often they claim they're not a remake of the movie and yet constantly make digs at the movie and even reference it often on the show itself. So I think sometimes they're commenting on the movie when they forget they've already told us they're not remaking the movie. =P

There's also this quote (I didn't screenshot bc there's an ad in the middle LOL!) but:

"It’s aggressive subtext in the first book, but by the time you read books eight and nine, it was the love affair of the century. Without spoiling too much, subtext becomes text in our show."

(Let's not point out that books 8 & 9 are ... *checks notes* Blood & Gold and Blackwood Farm. Okaaaaaay Rolin. 😪)

Also sorry by love affair of the century do you mean Lestat goes around and has adventures and uses everyone while Louis stays safely tucked away at Armand's house until he's needed, or? Sorry lmfao I'm so fucking. dghadgkjs.

That interview is full of nonsense that will make you want to scream if you're feeling brave.

Anyway I feel like, I've been obsessively watching the production unfold for the past year and I kept getting so many red flags like there's been so many odd comments and little sexist quips, the complete misunderstanding (or lack of fucks) about what Claudia is supposed to mean in the story, etc. I just keep getting aggressive CISHET MAN vibes from this team and the lens they read VC through.

And yknow what, fair whatever I guess, we all read different versions of the same book and they're the ones that got to make it. But idk I like VC for the dark elegant spooky existential angst, I didn't need it to be gritty and open up with shit jokes. And five episodes in I didn't need it to use outdated, dangerous rape tropes and I also don't need it to oversell the domestic abuse. (Hint: Lestat was already abusive as fuck from the moment we met him, don't oversell!)

It's an okay show lmao. It's not recognizable as VC at all except that it recycles the names. None of the characters have been accurate so far. Even Lestat, where Sam Reid is doing so many fun things with his delivery and mannerisms that almost seem like Lestat, is just so fucking OOC and a caricature and just really lacks the depth and nuance and sensitivity of who he is in the books.

If you can turn your brain off and not look at it as VC there's some fun moments, but it's also full of continuity errors and just plot holes and bad writing when you look too close, so don't try to analyze it too hard or you'll have a bad time lol. Even the stuff that's really interesting and that they get right, they tend to lose interest in and drop, or they mix it into so much vampire soap opera shenanigans that it's hard to walk away knowing what the episode is actually about. It's just. Woof!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

#vampire pajama party on amc #amc iwtv

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unproduciblesmackdown · 10 months

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thinking of [thinking & talking of the rian & winston dynamic] while reading the short study article "“This Was Just How This Friendship Worked”: Experiences of Interpersonal Victimization Among Autistic Adults" as thinking & talking abt things re: winston billions has Been something of a framework / touchstone for doing so re: [autistic experiences] more broadly....from going "dare i say winston is Autistic" (yes) to "sure he's established as being in a duo with this coworker who's insulated as he's vulnerable & supported as he's undermined as an already unfavorable foundation to the dynamic, & then as it plays out we see it's unilateral, with winston being hurt on purpose onesidedly for fun or to push him to do (or not do) something, left to 'just roll with it' onesidedly after such treatment, put down including around other people, Only getting less hostile, more constructive treatment when & while that's what happens to be what rian feels like, Not when he feels like it, b/c that's what he feels like all the time & only gets sometimes just out of frame laughing too, all while the basis of this is rian doing what she wants at any point while winston can only respond "accordingly" and Put Up With It and be disappointed while having no real recourse but to possibly give up on the relationship entirely, which doesn't even necessarily extricate him from being used / bullied here....but what about 'i mean is it That Bad(tm)' and 'i mean but did the victim respond with perfect strategy' and 'i mean but does the person hurting/using them feel like they're justified & normal actually' (ofc they can & do any/all thee time" lol like. yes.

anyways and some fun banger quotes in general, as stated re: [of course this is also like, talking about Anything irl too]

Forster and Pearson5 asked autistic adults about their experiences of relationships and understanding of mate crime, which is a form of interpersonal victimization perpetrated by those considered friends (“mate” is a British slang term for friend).1,2 Participants outlined the challenges that they faced building genuine, reciprocal relationships and their experiences of victimization. They also spoke about their difficulties identifying unreasonable behavior from others, and heightened social compliance. These findings were consistent with previous research into relationships16–20 and peer victimization among autistic adults.6,21

Participants in this study also explicitly suggested that a personal relationship between the perpetrator and victim was more insidious than bullying alone, as it could make it harder to spot disingenuous behavior. This aligns with the suggestion made by disabled scholars that terming interpersonal victimization as “bullying” can make it appear “low level” in nature.22–24

The difficulty in identifying manipulative and implicit social intentions can be explained through the lens of the double empathy problem.25 The double empathy problem posits that differences in communication style can lead to mutual difficulties in understanding between interlocutors. Autistic adults have self-identified how these bidirectional breakdowns can lead to problems with reading below surface-level social intentions in other people, and have shared concerns over their potential for being manipulated.20,26 The double empathy problem helps to frame these concerns as an interaction between the person and context, as opposed to an innate vulnerability.27

[...]

Theme 2 drew together three subthemes, centered around how the participants perceived what had happened to them. They focused on their difficulty in trusting their instincts around what is acceptable social behavior, often giving others the benefit of the doubt at a detriment to their own needs. They also highlighted how difficult it could be to recognize victimization, and how they felt when they did not recognize it. Finally, the third theme focused on the notion of compliance and how it had pervaded their situation.

[...]

Questioning their own input had meant it had taken them time and support from others to process a situation, only recognizing later what had happened to them: “otherwise having peace and time to focus on myself and my other friends (as well as support from a few close friends), I soon recognised that both ‘friends' had been abusive towards me from nearly the beginning of our friendship” (P.15, man, 26).

[...]

Some participants said that they struggled to spot negative social intentions and identify abusive behavior (theme 2.2), or trust their own judgment about other people (theme 2.1), which is consistent with some previous research.26,51 Some of the participants seemed to blame themselves for not “spotting” the abuse while it occurred, labeling themselves as oblivious, however, a participant who did recognize that they were being manipulated during the situation itself also said it made them feel naive. It is worth noting that the ability to retrospectively identify abuse and the ability to spot abuse “in situ” are not the same, but that they may lead to the same emotional response.

[...]

There are also multiple factors that can affect both identifying abuse and knowing how to deal with it. First, the ability to pick up on often subtle signals exhibited by abusers, particularly in situations where coercion is used, requires knowledge about what a good healthy relationship looks like. Comments from some of our participants were indicative of victimization beginning early in childhood, perpetrated by parents and caregivers. Abuse from those who are meant to care for us and “know better” can impact on the ability to recognize unacceptable behavior in others later in life.52

Spotting these signals can also rely on not taking people at “face value,” and engaging in continuing reflection on what someone has said or done. For an autistic person who tends to be straightforward in their communication style and who says what they mean, it might not occur that someone they are interacting with is being disingenuous. This can be explained through the lens of the “double empathy problem.”25 The double empathy problem recognizes that difficulties in inferring the intentions of others do not need to be labeled as a social “deficit” or “one sided” to recognize its impact. It is important that we draw upon the double empathy problem to find ways of supporting people who feel they struggle with understanding social intentions without pathologizing this difficulty.

Second, identifying abuse can also be impacted by our perceptions of our own contribution to the situation. Several participants highlighted the experience of gaslighting and invalidation from perpetrators, and this had led some people to question their perception of the situation and blame themselves. This made it harder for them to recognize that what was happening was abusive, and to put a stop to it or leave the situation. Our findings did suggest that a good support network and time/guidance to introspect could be helpful in recognizing abuse.53 This is consistent with research showing the importance of peer support systems47,54 and suggests that it is important to support autistic people in developing good-quality relationships.18

Third, even if someone can identify abusive behavior, this does not always result in knowing what to do about it, or feeling like you have a choice to change the situation, which our findings around compliance (theme 2.3) highlighted. Some participants discussed feeling like they needed to appease perpetrators, or avoid confrontation, which is consistent with previous literature.5,21 However, this was not the only reason for compliance, and the circumstances that contributed toward it were often complex. Some participants complied out of recognition that it was the only way to maintain a semblance of safety within risky situations, for example, having to comply with the demands of others to avoid physical harm. For other participants, power dynamics were present that made the situation they were in more complicated, for example, the perpetrator was a family member.

[...]

A recent study examined the experience of trauma and PTSD symptoms in autistic adults, finding that the experience of “bullying” was one of the common traumatic life events reported by autistic people who had increased PTSD symptoms.48 The authors argue that autistic people may be more likely to experience trauma from events outside of current PTSD diagnostic criteria, which is not unlikely given the sustained stigma that many autistic people experience.63,64 Some of the acts that our participants described as “bullying” and being “taken advantage of” included domestic and sexual abuse, and financial exploitation.

There may be considerations to be made here about the way in which we ask questions about negative life experiences, and how different questions may elicit different responses. The line between abuse, bullying, and more nebulous concepts such as “being taken advantage of” is not particularly clear, and we know that bullying can have incredibly negative effects on an individual.14 However, it is important that future research acknowledges that despite autistic people being labeled as “literal” in their communication, they may downplay their experiences through the terminology they use.

#winston billions #sure will be like. pretty Informative about billions overall if we wrap this shit up & rian's behavior has still gone unchallenged #It Has by winston; but has even going ''hey he seems to be getting closer to / choosing to spend more time with this apparent Better #Friendship with tuk'' been written in as primarily About winston as a character or was it instead About getting him; the peripheral joke;#out of the way? which writing him away might also be about #a real comprehensive litmus test about how far billions will take its own questioning of power dynamics & norms #and/or; rather; what Kinds of situations it considers important to question at all #bullying sucks sure but i mean yeah Some people deserve it so that they'll become more neuroconforming #which uncoincidentally is for all intents & purposes the same as ppl Simply externally Acting Correctly(tm)#which of course includes their perfect alignment with what interpersonal hierarchies demand of them

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supersecretnerd · 2 years

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Do you think that big demon guy could be the one actually responsible for Kat’s parents’ deaths?? Considering she is supposed to be a hellmaiden, it’s possible that he could have felt threatened by her heritage and wanted to get rid of her and her family by creating an illusion with the apple

Are you referring to Buffalo Belzer? I mean, it's a possibility, but I don't think that'll be the case- Henry Selick has stated he wanted humans to be the sorta 'true evil' of the film instead of the demons being that, so I feel like having Belzer be responsible for Kat's parents death would be counterproductive to this concept. Plus, I feel like with the way Buffalo has been described thus far, he probably isn't too concerned about the events of the living world; he's just vibing with his Scream Fair.

However, it ain't too far fetched to say that they could've been demonic forces at play; with the way I've seen Hellmaidens be described by reviews of the film, it's possible that this role gives a person certain powers to see things other can't and young Kat could have seen demons in her apple, I just don't think it's likely these demons are related to Wendell nor Wild in any way.

Personally though, I have a different theory. However, my theory does contain spoilers for the film so it will be stated underneath read more

Based on this quote from a Nerdist article, link which will be provided, it states that "Kat’s parents were once key members in the community, her dad working at its successful brewery and her mom working as a librarian. Unfortunately, a deadly (and suspicious) accident at the brewery led to the town’s subsequent downward spiral." As has been stated in many other reviews I've read, the story of the film includes some wealthy folks trying to buy off land and businesses in Rust Bank in order to create a private prison in the area to profit off of.

With all this in mind, I'm wondering if these folks were trying to buy off Kat's father's brewery and when he refused to accept their offer, presumably because business was going well for him, went to more unsavory means to get their way. I'm thinking that perhaps the apple, which I'm assuming is a caramel apple since Kat was shown to be eating it on a stick, was one of the items sold at her father's brewery and somehow got tampered with by these wealthy folks in order to make it seem like his business wasn't following proper food handling precautions and get the business shut down due to public health regulations. However, instead it scared Kat and caused a tragic car crash that ended both of her parents life.

As for what the apple tampered with, I have two ideas.

1. It was just worms or something and the demon imagery was just being used to both show how traumatic this event was to Kat and to show that symbolically this event is one of the demons she has to face.

2. It was demons and the wealthy folks somehow contaminated the brewery's food with demons- perhaps only somehow like Kat, who is capable of being a Hellmaiden, could see them and the average person would not be able to see them, leading to them eating said demon and becoming horribly sick.

However, it is possible I'm just going overboard with this idea. I guess we'll have to wait for the film to come out to know which one of us is right; it could also be possible we are both wrong too!

But anyways, thanks for the ask, I had a lotta fun typing out my predictions and theories for this film! Anyways, here's the article link I promised:

#wendell and wild #wendell & wild

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brf-rumortrackinganon · 3 months

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Why do rumors about Harry and Meghan don’t seem to stick but rumors about William and Kate do? I mean, among a certain demographic or type of people at least. With rumors about H&M, I only ever see people who hate them repeat those rumors, and quite frankly, sometimes they start to sound a bit extreme to me if I try to take a step back from the internet & remember I don’t actually know these people. But with rumors about William and Kate, they get traction outside the sussex squad circle, particularly on Twitter. They get made fun of a lot and I just get this heavy feeling because I feel like there’s so much anger from the sussex squad that they would literally say the worst things about W&K (I see that there’s also so much anger towards Meghan and Harry but of course I have my bias so I feel bad about the ones about W&K more. It’s annoying when some social justice warrior on Twitter say things like “these people defending Kate, do you do the same for Meghan?”. Like, I’m defending Kate because I’m a fan, duh.) l. But anyway, outside our little circle here, people don’t take seriously the rumors regarding Meghan’s kids, for example. Like, some people here say there are rumors that Harry was violent to women, but outside the little circle of extreme royalists/wales fans, nobody thinks of Harry as a violent man. But they do genuinely believe the rumors about William and Kate even though they do not have any proof or whatsoever. They genuinely believe Kate is a victim of William, that he cheats on her, that he’s a bully.

I responded to someone who was spreading some wrong information about Kate’s sick leave (they said it was weird they didn’t post a photo for her birthday — i said they don’t do that every year, they said it was weird they didn’t release a photo of william taking care of the kids/it’s weird we haven’t seen the kids — i said it’s not weird because we only see the kids a few times a year, they said 9 months was weird — i said KP never said 9 months!) I literally simply corrected the wrong information the person was spewing. And then someone responded to me that I sound like the “leave britney alone” people, perhaps implying that i am a part of the problem because I am not entertaining the idea that Kate might need help?? Just because I think before jumping into conspiracy theories? Anyway, it was just a random person on the internet and I shouldn’t be bothered, but still… lol.

That was on reddit. I probably should just avoid that place if the things people have been saying make me feel bad but I wanted to set the record straight lol. Anyway, I also saw some people there quoting articles and stuff about William’s alleged temper. And I’m just like people have been talking about Harry’s temper for years too and they’ve also been documented in articles and books! I guess the difference for them is that Harry has been so open about his therapy.

I also have a confession to make. I was curious about the nature of rumors, so I did a little experiment and sent a tip to deuxmoi to see how easy it really is for anyone to just send it whatever. I didn’t want to make up something really potentially damaging, so I sent something innocent. I just said Meghan wants to work with Greta Gerwig. It got posted but didn’t get any attention. But I feel like if someone sent it something there like Meghan has a sex kink or whatever it still wouldn’t make as much traction as whatever sexual rumor they assigned to William. It would be seen as really disgusting (and rightly so). I mean, I probably shouldn’t feel that bad for a man who would be king and has the resources to protect himself, but people have been sexualizing William perhaps since he turned 18 and the rumors sussex squad spread about him are just another way of doing that.

It’s bothering me these days to be honest. I fear logging on to the internet fearing the things I will see about W&K. I certainly need to step back lol. I also remind myself there are things beyond our control. I look at it from a historical perspective, like there are rumors Anne Boleyn had six toes. So I guess it just comes with the territory for William and Kate that people could say absolutely anything about them.

Part of it probably is that it comes with the territory for William and Kate. Everyone in positions of power have an opposition that wants to weaken their impact so they use gossip as a tool to undermine them. Celebrities, politicians, athletes, rival friend groups in school.

But there are also two other reasons to consider.

First is that we don't actually know a whole lot about William and Kate. Despite being incredibly popular and famous, they're actually pretty private. We don't really know who William and Kate (as well as George, Charlotte, and Louis) are beyond what they have said in interviews or done in public on their engagements. They also don't speak to the press, fully adhering to "never complain, never explain." So because we don't know a whole lot about them, it's easier to make things up to justify, explain, or describe what we see. It sticks because they're never going to address it: not to confirm, not to deny, not to deflect.

Unlike Meghan and Harry. They're constantly talking to the press and constantly addressing whatever is being said about them. They give us information to that justifies, explains, describes what they do. We don't need to make stuff up because they're giving it to us on a silver platter. But more than that, specifically when it comes to the more egregious rumors like the ones about their children, they go straight to the narcisstic DARVOing, which is particularly effective at getting people to stop talking about you.

Second is that the Sussexes have the power of repetition. The rumors they create and the stories they tell about the Waleses stick because they keep being told. They sell the same story to People, Page Six, The Cut, E News, the Daily Mail, and Netfilix. Then they tell the same story to Scobie, Abigail Spencer, MIsan, Oprah, Tyler Perry, CDAN, DeuxMoi, Bouzy, and the social media bots. And all those publications, all those people, all those bots talk about it so it picks up traction, everyone repeats it, and it spreads like wildfire. Because the Sussexes have told so many people, there are many sources talking about it, so the general public is more likely to believe it - "I heard it from X, Y, Z, and 1, 2, 3, so it MUST be true."

Unlike William and Kate, who don't have pet reporters or pet publications or bots to fight these battles with. At most, they talk to one reporter for an exclusive every 2-3 months, if even. So because there's no "institutional backing" to Sussex rumors that spend the time and effort to keep them in the public space (like Oprah, Netflix, People, or even the Waleses themselves) long enough for the more mainstream public to become aware, the Sussex rumors die on the vine and everyone who talks about it looks unhinged.

That's why Kensington Palace speaking to Page Six was so groundbreaking. It's the first time the Waleses met the Sussexes where they are and hints that they're aware the Sussexes may have had a hand in creating the controversy. Usually when KP speaks to Americans, they do it through traditional mainstream press (the New York Times, Washington Post, NBC, ABC, etc.). They've never gone directly and personally to a Sussex/Meghan PR mouthpiece before.

(I don't count People as a Sussex-exclusive source because the BRF has used People long before Meghan came around. People takes stories from anyone with the money to pay them.)

#ask #brf #rumors #theories

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dumbestthingiveeverheard · 10 months

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Dumbest Thing I've Ever Heard: 8/2/2023

Fifth Place: Bret Stephens

Yesterday, Bret Stephens published a New York Times piece with the headline "The Hard-Drug Decriminalization Disaster." Highlights include him attempting to tie drug decriminalization in Oregon with anecdotes of crimes that have happened in that state--including somebody doing an inappropriate act in public which the author does not even attempt to tie to drug use and a person shooting up on a playground--which also happens in every other state in this country. This is not even mentioning Stephens attempting to draw a correlation between this measure and the increase in violent shootings in Portland from 2019 to 2022--even though violent crime increased as a whole from 2019 to 2022.

Of course, the article does nothing to argue the point that it is not the right of the government to determine if an adult decides to do drugs or not, and its attempts to discredit Portugal's drug experiment sees him admitting the problems Portugal is having now only exist because of funding cuts--only to then talk about how evil drug addicts are:

Here, too, defenders of the system point to funding shortfalls, especially for treatment. But the sticky fact that proponents of decriminalization rarely confront is that addicts are not merely sick people trying to get well, like cancer sufferers in need of chemotherapy. They are people who often will do just about anything to get high, however irrational, self-destructive or, in some cases, criminal their behavior becomes. Addiction may be a disease, but it’s also a lifestyle — one that decriminalization does a lot to facilitate. It’s easier to get high wherever and however you want when the cops are powerless to stop you.

Mind you, although I am not going to say that no addict is like this, I will say that the generalization is--at best--rather misleading. Even in our current system, people acknowledge that addicts are not "often" irrational people who need to be thrown in prison to deal with their issues--hence why we have things like rehab clinics in the world already.

Fourth Place: Allysia Finley

This is one I'm a tad late on, but the fact that one writer for The Wall Street Journal felt the need to publish an article with the headline "Climate Change Obsession Is a Real Mental Disorder" says everything you need to know about the newspaper.

If heat waves were as deadly as the press proclaims, Homo sapiens couldn’t have survived thousands of years without air conditioning. Yet here were are. Humans have shown remarkable resilience and adaptation—at least until modern times, when half of society lost its cool over climate change.

So the fact that people have died of intense heat all throughout history is--what exactly?

“Extreme Temperatures Are Hurting Our Mental Health,” a recent Bloomberg headline warns. Apparently every social problem under the sun is now attributable to climate change. But it’s alarmist stories about bad weather that are fueling mental derangements worthy of the DSM-5—not the warm summer air itself.

For the record, the article in question used--you know, actual science to explain how environmental factors can impact mental health. Of course, one could criticize this conclusion but the evidence for it appeared to be rather solid. However, why even bother to attempt an actual response when you could make fun of the headline? Even her response to this quotes a section from the study Bloomberg cited which said that further adaption could mitigate this effect--but in order for an effect to be mitigated, it has to exist in the first place.

Third Place: Rudy Giuliani

I don't even know what to add to this, Media Matters published an article today with the headline "Rudy Giuliani: “'If I'm a conspirator, I was a conspirator in performing completely legal acts.'” The problem is that doesn't make any sense, a conspiracy is a plot by two or more people to do something illegal, charging somebody of engaging in conspiracy means you are already charging them of being a conspirator in a crime.

Second Place: Ron DeSantis

Both sides went after him for this one, yesterday he tweeted:

As President, I will end the weaponization of government, replace the FBI Director, and ensure a single standard of justice for all Americans. While I’ve seen reports, I have not read the indictment. I do, though, believe we need to enact reforms so that Americans have the right to remove cases from Washington, DC to their home districts.

So Ron is basically saying that he's using an inditement as a jumping off a point to push for his policies--despite never having read it.

Winner: Michael Tracey

This man has the greatest defense for Donald Trump ever thought up, the law they indicted him on is really old:

This latest indictment is completely insane. They have literally charged Trump under the Civil Rights Act of 1866

Wait until he hears about this even older document called The Constitution, which we still have as law to this day.

Michael Tracey you've said the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

#bret stephens #allysia finley #rudy giuliani #ron desantis #michael tracey

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timeagainreviews · 2 years

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“The Power of the Doctor” is a mixed bag

Psychologist Barry Schwartz once said, "The secret to happiness is: low expectations.” His reasoning was that if a person approaches everything in their life with either low or no expectations, they leave themselves open to being pleasantly surprised. Last night’s episode “The Power of the Doctor,” had me thinking about that quote a lot. In my previous article, I mentioned I only had the faintest of hopes that now former showrunner, Chris Chibnall, could end his era well. The bar was so low that I really only dared hope he would not make yet another controversial change to the mythology. Anything beyond that would be icing on the cake. It would seem that after a five-year period of shoddy writing, my expectations were low enough to leave me pleasantly surprised.

Those of you familiar with this blog will know that my number one consideration for every story of Doctor Who is simply- did I have fun? While “fun,” is a rather subjective concept, it’s really why I love Doctor Who. I have a lot of fun watching it. Mind you, I don’t apply this to every piece of media. Some media isn’t meant to be fun. Some of it is meant to be challenging. Even Doctor Who can be more like a medicine than a treat. While theme and character development are important, sometimes the heart wants what the heart wants. Sometimes we love something in spite of its flaws. It was actually in Nash Bozard’s review of “Revelation of the Daleks,” that I first heard anyone take this stance. After ragging on about the absurdity of the story, he had to admit that when it was all done, he wasn’t bored. “The Power of the Doctor,” is by no means perfect, but it was fun.

As many great stories begin, this one starts with a train heist. I was reminded of the Capaldi era’s “Mummy on the Orient Express,” and also to some degree “Time Heist.” The Doctor and her crew aren’t able to pilot the TARDIS directly into the speeding train so they have to improvise with what is one of two ladders in this episode which must be dropped down from a less-than-ideal height. The fam tucks and rolls but gets a little too close to death for Dan’s comfort. Upon entering the train, they discover a group of Cyber Masters attempting to hijack a sort of coffin which presumably holds someone or something important. In what turns out to be one of a number of fake-outs on Chibnall’s behalf, it is revealed that it’s a mere child within the coffin. I say fake-out because it was my and everyone watching with me’s dreaded assumption that this little girl was the infamous Timeless Child.

Chibnall continues to utilise these types of fake-outs throughout the rest of the episode. You get the feeling that it’s his little way of nodding to the story he would have liked to have told under different circumstances. Coronavirus may have been a factor, but ultimately it felt a lot like a mandate from the BBC. While his era is not without its fans, it has been hugely controversial. What’s funny then, is that while a lot of this feels like Chibnall being restricted, it oddly makes him seem like a better writer. In having to hint at the story he wanted to tell, it allowed for subtlety that a story like “The Timeless Children,” lacked. When Vinder and the Doctor part ways, you could almost imply that he is her father by the knowing look he gives her. They even hold on this look for a moment in order to highlight its implied significance. I like being able to wonder if he’s her father. Just as I like to wonder if the woman from “End of Time,” was the Doctor’s mother. With room to wonder, there is mystery, or as David Lynch puts it- room to dream.

Dan leaves the show almost as quickly as he joined it. After breaking open his space suit during their mission, Dan decides life with the Doctor is too dangerous and leaves the TARDIS, presumably to end up with his love interest Diane. It was interesting to me that an episode that re-introduces Tegan Jovanka says goodbye to another companion for very similar reasons to her own when she also parted ways with the Doctor. The violence and death became too much. Speaking of re-introducing characters, how could I go any longer without mentioning Ace? As you may recall, Ace was my biggest worry about the centenary special. After seeing her in promotional photos, I worried they were going to make Ace a boring old woman with her business suits and fancy job, but I was pleasantly surprised by her portrayal. I’m sure it doesn’t hurt that Sophie Aldred has continued playing the character in audio format for the last two decades, but it was reassuring nonetheless.

The introduction to Ace and Tegan is a bit of a head-scratcher. Somehow, over the years, they have come into contact with one another and frequently work together on their Sarah Jane Smith-esque adventures. Ace is investigating a series of missing paintings, while Tegan is on the other side of the world tracking seismic activity. For no reason whatsoever, they assume these two instances are linked, and for no reason whatsoever, they’re absolutely right. After being recruited by Kate Stewart to help with official UNIT business, it is revealed that the Master has been adding himself to priceless works of art, something which never comes up again. It’s weird then that they dedicate so much time to this aspect of the story. They even rent out a gallery where Ace investigates a digitally removed painting. Seriously, there’s some weird cropping going on in that scene that prompted me to ask a curator friend what was up. According to her, it’s entirely plausible that they may not have had the budget to move the painting and therefore it would have been cheaper to remove it digitally. This somewhat begs the question why they didn’t just build a set or choose a different location, but whatever.

The Master appears in many different forms in this episode. So many that I might suggest they lose track of things a bit. We first see the Master in St Petersburg at the Winter Palace, posing as the mad monk Rasputin. Sacha Dhawan’s beautiful dark eyes are hidden under milky blue contacts which really sell the look. While I was collecting my notes about this episode I came to one puzzling question- why was the Master posing as Rasputin? It’s implied at the beginning that he may be the catalyst for the Russian revolution, but what that has to do with the rest of the story is anyone’s bet. I asked my friends and I skimmed through the episode on iPlayer, and nothing. I genuinely don’t know why he did that. While it gave us the opportunity to watch the Master gyrate his hips to Boney M’s “Rasputin,” the only reason I can think they chose Rasputin is that it looks cool.

When the promotional photos of Dhawan as Rasputin were released, I figured Chibnall was going to incorporate the bizarre (if not slightly embellished) account of how he died. According to some accounts, Rasputin proved to be notoriously difficult to kill. He was shot, poisoned, beaten, and drowned. It would have been a fun thing to incorporate into the story, as being a Time Lord would make the Master equally difficult to kill. Oddly this never comes up, and from what I can tell, he really only wants the Winter Palace as a base of operations where he and the Daleks and Cyber Masters can enact their grand scheme.

As grand schemes go, the Master’s Dalek plan doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Basically, the Master lures the Doctor in by holding the Earth hostage with stock footage of volcanoes poised to erupt due to Dalek intervention. The Master’s TARDIS has also merged with a planet that has been fully cyber converted. The planet hangs in the sky like a second moon harkening back to the Earth’s twisted double- Mondas. The little girl from the beginning turns out to be an energy being that takes the form of something you want to protect as a survival technique. The Master harnesses its power in order to bring his Deathstar-like monstrosity to life. The problem with most of this is that a lot of these elements exist purely to look cool, which is a continual problem of Chris Chibnall’s- great ideas without much exploration. The Doctor as a Weeping Angel looks cool. A guy with teeth in his face looks cool. The Master as Rasputin looks cool.

Another version of the Master that we see is the Master in the present day, giving a twisted lecture on plate tectonics and magma to a room of academics who have all been murdered by his tissue compression technique. UNIT comes and takes this Master away and he spends the rest of the episode giving Tegan, Ace, and Kate a hard time. The Master reveals that his tissue compression can be reversed and as he does, it is revealed that a small figure of the Lone Cyberman is actually a sort of Russian nesting doll full of Cybermen. This whole sequence was weird as the Master could have just used the Cyber Masters as he had been the whole time. I guess Chibnall wanted to see Ashad return. It’s fine though because the Master remarks how glad he is that he took the time to clone him down to every last detail, including battle damage! The line was about as shoehorned at Yaz saying “I love you,” to the Doctor at the beginning of the episode.

Speaking of shoehorned love, Thasmin is somewhat in effect, but I imagine not enough for the shippers out there. There’s no great kiss between the Doctor and Yaz, though there are implied moments of romance. More than the show ever implied before. Seriously, why pander to shippers? Have you seen some ships? They come out of nowhere at times, like this one. People want to see the Doctor and Yaz fall in love, so they invent a romance in their head. What I do like is that in this episode, Yaz is forced to view her own importance to the Doctor after seeing the number she did on both Tegan and Ace. We’ve seen it before with Rose and Martha. They’re not the Doctor’s first and they have to rectify that. Luckily, Dan has fucked off so the Doctor and Yaz get lots of downtime to partake in lesbian processing.

Did I say Dan fucked off? I meant to say the role of Dan will now be played by Graham. Now, if you thought the sudden appearance of Vinder was out of nowhere, just wait until Ace finds Graham inside a volcano! The episode shows us numerous times that there are multiple volcanoes set to explode, yet somehow Ace and Graham run into one another at the exact same time under one of many multiple volcanoes. Graham is down there doing his own Sarah Jane Smith-esque adventures. It’s sort of implied that this is what companions do after traveling with the Doctor- they continue her work. Fair enough, but still a bit too convenient. I’ll excuse it though because I rather like Graham, and watching him and Ace blow shit up with nitro nine is all I ever really wanted.

In a somewhat cheeky fashion, Chibnall has the Master comment on just how messy and disparate his plan sounds. It felt like a moment of fourth wall breaking where Chibnall acknowledged some of the criticism his work has faced. That and the Master saying the words “The Master’s Dalek Plan,” made me smile. It takes guts to do such a bad pun. I was glad to see him having fun on his last outing. It’s odd that in his final moments, Chibnall finally seemed to be enjoying his role as showrunner. It felt more like a love letter to the things he admires about Doctor Who and less like a chore thrust upon him by the network. Part of me had wondered where this guy had been hiding for the last five years.

The Master manages to capture the Doctor in a Dalek. No dodgems jokes though, it’s all business. Luckily Yaz witnesses everything and begins to recruit a posse. The Master has amassed his new “fam,” and the Doctor has hers. Thus we reach the title of the episode as we learn that the real power of the Doctor is the fam we made along the way. Or as Davros would put it- she turns her friends into weapons. But this isn’t about that. New year, new me. And it’s a very new Doctor as the Master’s real plan would have it. Using his cyber planet as a source of power, the Master force regenerates the Doctor into himself.

Ok, let’s get this out of the way- it’s a bit John Simm. It’s a bit of a callback. I think that’s fine because it’s great to watch the Master parade around as the Doctor. It was fun to watch Missy do it, and it’s still fun now. The bit where he pulls out the recorder of the Second Doctor made me warm and fuzzy. The Master playing an eerie rendition of the Skye Boat song was mad and forlorn. Great imagery. You really get a sense that Sacha Dhawan’s performance is channelling a kind of deep melancholy. He sort of sits there like a pot about to boil over. He possesses a demeanour which causes one to wonder if he were to lunge at you, would it be to kill you, or to kiss you? He may just break down and cry. He seems constantly on the verge of a nervous breakdown and I really like his take on the character. I wouldn’t want to be him either.

What’s strange, however, is the Master once killed off the Time Lords within the Citadel all because he found out he might have a little bit of the Doctor in him. I kinda wish the Doctor had called him out on his own double standard. But that’s the Master. He is a contradiction. Plus he’s also actively profaning the Doctor’s name. In the Master’s own twisted way, he’s living his truth. Reclaiming his body as his own by taking over the Doctor’s. Sure, a big problem with the Thirteenth Doctor and the Spy Master has been that it often ends with him pontificating while she’s tied up, and that’s still present. But the Master’s arc as a guy who is disgusted by his new truth to a guy who creates the next truth is a complete character arc for him.

As the Master reeks hell with Yaz in tow, a plan begins brewing, though I largely am not sure how. Vinder stows away on the TARDIS unbeknownst to the Doctor. I rather liked him in this episode. He had a badass moment where he puts the Master in his place. To borrow from Mike Tyson- “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” Or in this case, shot in the shoulder. Where I am most confused is where the Doctor’s AI comes into play. I’m assuming it has to do with the static charge, but I’m not exactly sure how it worked. I thought maybe it was a “Day of the Doctor,” scenario where over a course of years the TARDIS AI system makes a facsimile of the Doctor’s consciousness for the purpose of its use now? Is that what happened?

What really matters is that none of that matters because we’re now at my favourite bit. Everyone quiet down. Alright, get this- David Bradley, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy and Paul McGann all showed up. I mean, they were nearby, but they’re here… sorta! It was very much a Five-ish Doctors scenario. Sadly Tom Baker couldn’t attend and Madame Tussaud said no. Also, I think Shada’s canon now. The Thirteenth Doctor is also there, natch. She’s not quite crossed the rainbow bridge yet and the Doctor’s consciousnesses are here serving Missing Adventures book cover vibes in their matching red and black robes. All except the Eighth Doctor who looks suave as fuck. Love that for them.

One issue I feel has persisted throughout the Jodie Whittaker era is the BBC and the show’s desire to make her share the role of the main character. It’s incredible to see our favourite Doctors in one place, but even in her swan song, she’s forced to share the role. She doesn’t even get to have her own comic book, she has to share it with the Tenth Doctor. It’s like when Marvel used to try to sell books by throwing Wolverine in. I wish on some levels we could have gotten Jo Martin before or after Jodie. Part of me held out hope that she would regenerate into her in the end. I get that this isn’t just a regeneration episode, this is 100 years of the BBC, dammit. But still.

We did finally get to see Jo Martin do more and I couldn’t be any more excited about it. Somewhat surprisingly, and someone expectedly, they do not give her mystery away. What they do give is a lovely little bit of her coming in and being a chilly renegade, straight putting the hurt on the Master. What they did was leave me wanting more. More of her please. I’ll take one spin-off, thanks. I said it in the comments the other day that I was waiting for this episode before I could really take the entire era for what it was. Now that I know the Fugitive Doctor is to remain a mystery, I feel I know more about her, oddly. I mentioned last time that I was frustrated by the way she was written. Now I can quantify her character in my consciousness better.

Thanks to her friends and her AI selves, the Doctor gains control of her body once more. To stop the volcanoes from destroying the planet, the Doctor needs both her and the Master’s TARDIS. The Doctor gathers all of her friends around her TARDIS console like a remix of “Journey’s End.” By linking her TARDIS in tandem with the Master’s, they manage to jump the cyber planet forward to modern times when the volcanoes are erupting. The various stock footage shots of erupting volcanoes made me yearn for a bit of the RTD era which always felt like an invasion was happening everywhere. It wasn’t just the Doctor meeting Cybermen, they were showing up at your front door! Where are the people abandoning their homes and frantically rushing to leave the vicinity of their local magmatic spire? It seems small, but this involves the audience more than the knowledge that volcanoes erupt seemingly across the world at the same time of day. There aren’t time zones, silly. That’s why this episode wasn’t simulcast, it’s 7:30 pm everywhere!

The Doctor frees herself of the Cyber Masters. Ace and Graham have dispatched the Daleks in classic fashion, and Tegan and Kate prove themselves quite capable at demolition. Though I must say, I really need to know how 69-year-old Tegan Jovanka managed to drop into a dark hole and climb out unscathed. I’m 39 and I would have spent the next week in bed saying “Don’t touch me, I’m baby.” It’s the kind of discontinuity like Yaz and Dan seeing two old people get cracked like eggs by Weeping Angels and then appear in the next scene having somehow escaped. It’s not even that this is discontinuity, it’s that seeing Tegan with a serious limp would have ratcheted up the tension. Janet Fielding got some great moments that were very true to her character, but they missed a trick there. Imagine the next scene with her starting instead at the bottom of that lift shaft. Her leg is broken. She has to tie a bit of cable and rebar around her leg like a splint. She drags her way into the next room and still manages to save Kate from cyber conversion. It could have easily been more, but instead, it’s nothing.

The scenes which paired Ace and Tegan up with their respective Doctors left me feeling overjoyed. As a big fan of the Ace years with the Seventh Doctor, I was happy to see them get a proper emotional goodbye. Not just a voiceover done in post. It’s weird how natural it felt seeing them back together as if no time had passed. Both pairs. Having the Fifth Doctor say “Brave heart,” and Tegan say “Rabbits,” was fan servicey as hell, and I would have been upset if they hadn’t done it.

In a last fit of rage, the Master declares that if he doesn’t get to be the Doctor, then neither does she. The Master turns the floaty timeless child energy spider (I said what I said) and swipes the Doctor with it’s energy beam before collapsing. Yaz is forced to carry the Doctor back to the TARDIS like Kevin Costner in the Bodyguard. She then carries her over the threshold which I guess counts as the first Doctor Who gay marriage. The Doctor and Yaz are registered at John Lewis for anyone curious. Yaz takes everyone home like a good designated driver and later the Doctor wakes up from her blackout like “Whahappen?” She realises she’s regenerating so the Doctor takes Yaz on one last adventure- a bit of ice cream atop the TARDIS.

Whether or not you ship it, Mandip and Jodie are giving their whole ass in these scenes. I can count on my hand, maybe, the number of times we’ve seen the Doctor cry. Nine in “The End of the World.” Ten when the Master refused the regenerate. And the Eleventh Doctor when he’s pleading with Idris not to die in “The Doctor’s Wife.” It’s fitting then that the Thirteenth Doctor shed a tear for her oldest friend and semi-love interest. Both Jodie and Mandip left everything on the soundstage that day. It was a fitting goodbye for both characters. After Yaz gets dropped off, we learn that Graham and Dan have formed a sort of “friends of the Doctor,” support group. I liked this because it was more than a cute way of some great cameos (William Russell! William Russell!), but it was also an interesting take on the role of companion. Being the Doctor’s companion would leave scars, both physical and emotional.

The Doctor decides she needs to regenerate alone. She goes to Durdle Door, a picturesque vista overlooking a large body of water. She keeps her final moments short and playful, a bit like her. She tags the next Doctor in and braces for impact. Now, I know you probably all knew this was coming, but she regenerates into what BBC and Titan comics have always wanted- David Tennant. It’s always great to see Tennant, but I found myself strangely morose watching him appear. Seeing him in the trailer only compounded that feeling. Leading up to “The Power of the Doctor,” I had mostly ignored behind-the-scenes stuff other than what I saw on social media. It was a point of stress for me. But the David Tennant and Catherine Tate stuff I had absorbed a few months ago. I felt like I had gone from new Doctor Who to an older episode. But even more, I felt a tinge of regret at the state the show had gotten itself into.

Part of me wonders what Chibnall may have done given more time and less restraint. Part of me shudders to think it, but part of me sees that his story was unfinished. What happened to Lenny Henry’s character? Who were the Division? What was up with that Irish cop? What was the weird house? What was the whole point of the Grand Serpent? Who put the universe back after the flux? Didn’t the Daleks and Cybermen get genocided by the Doctor at the end of that story? What happened to the future Master? Was he crushed in that building alongside the Cybermen? Chris Chibnall once said that no showrunner adheres to what came before them. I can see why he said that, he doesn’t even pay attention to his own stories.

Perhaps waiting til the last episode to help me square away this era was naïve. If I hadn’t enjoyed the era by then, it was pretty apparent I still wouldn’t. Maybe it was a sort of morbid Halloween Michael Meyers deal when I need to see the body to know he’ll never be back. I need to see the life leave his eyes. In hindsight, I find myself still feeling about the same, but maybe a little more open to revisiting the episodes at some point. I don’t suddenly like bad writing because it has an ending. It does, however, give perspective. It is now a definite thing. The Chibnall era has a beginning and an ending. I had fun watching the final episode, which is more than I really hoped to ask for. Regardless of how much I may or may not have softened to the show, one thing remains a constant- I can’t forgive giving a brown man up to the Nazis.

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