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ashketchumseleventhbirthday · 2 years

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Early Autumn Cutting Winds

Summary: Barry and Dawn are enjoying an afternoon together, checking out the battles on the Tower. The weather is turning cold, but she stubbornly refuses to let out that she is cold.

Rating: K - Intended for general audience 5 years and older. Content should be free of any coarse language, violence, and adult themes.

Words: 1000

Notes: Kids worry about such stupid things.

Summer was coming to its bitter end in Sinnoh, and every wise person in the region could feel it. It was getting colder outside, the sun set earlier than usual, and all their cooler clothes found a space in the back of the closet while all their elaborated coats made their way to the front.

The seasons are respected and celebrated in the land, they are considered a blessing from Dialga, who ensures that no happiness be eternal, nor any pain be never-ending. There is a time and a place for everything, and this is a freeing belief to be had.

Alas, even as a true-born woman of Sinnoh, even though you put on her warmest clothes that day, Dawn is still freezing.

Since Barry had not managed to be placed in any time slot for the Tower Challenge that afternoon, he had asked her to join him in the stands, so that he could study and strategize the most efficient way to beat his father when the time came. Rather, he is there to mock the losers and jeer at the winners, and she had been enlisted to find any productive points that he could eventually leverage.

Despite being thankless work, Dawn obviously agreed to. She did not mind the task, it had use for her too, as those trainers would make their way into her chambers at the League sooner or later. Besides, she enjoyed the time that she spent with her boyfriend, doing what they both loved. She would have rather see him battle, or even battle herself, but this is no less amusing to her.

So here they are, on the open stadium of one of the highest floors on one of the highest towers in the country, with cutting wind blowing from all sides. She ought to ask Cynthia if this installation complies with League safety specifications, because it does not feel like it.

Dawn is sitting right next to Barry who excitedly yet nervously watched the match unfold, as the winner would likely be called into the Tower Tycoon’s room. In fact, one of them might very well defeat Palmer and land themselves the symbol, and it is killing her boyfriend.

The regional champion knows that he wanted to battle as well. His legs that bounced up and down the whole time were a dead giveaway. He was up on his feet at every opportunity he could get, shouting his opinions as well as complaints down to the pitch. She could not help the grin from forming on her lips every time he got up.

Maybe Barry had the right idea, and she should have moved around and shouted for a bit as well. That could have prevented her from freezing even more.

Dawn tried her best to keep herself warm, hiding her hands in the pockets of her jacket, her legs bouncing up and down a little bit, but nothing really helped. It did not take the blond trainer too long to notice that something was wrong with her.

When he sat down again, he slightly turned to her.

“Are you cold?” The teen asked his girlfriend lovingly.

The blue-haired girl, however, is bull-headed and shook her head, a gentle smile on her lips.

“No, I’m fine.” She said, trying to sound convincing enough, despite the creaking of her teeth.

Evidently, it was not enough, and her boyfriend saw right through the lie.

“Nice try, Dee-Dee, but I’m not that stupid. You’re shaking.” He pointed out.

“No, I’m fine!” The champion insisted, again.

He looked over at her and sighed. Then, he grabs her arm lightly as he pulled her hand out of her thin jacket pocket, immediately intertwining her fingers with his as he put both of their hands in his own pocket, where he held Stark Mountain stones for heat.

“Well, I’m cold.” He declared, petulant. “Warm my hands, will you?”

Dawn chuckled. “Fine, but just for a while.”

“Maybe you should wear some gloves the next time.” Barry told his girlfriend, laughing as he looked at her unimpressed face.

She eyed the blond trainer. “Very funny. The equinox was just last week, and the weather is fine. I don’t need gloves, and I’m not even cold.”

The girl tried her best to get her hands out of his vice grip hold again, but he is not having any of it, holding her hand ever tighter with every wily manoeuvre.

“Sure, you’re not cold. That’s why you’re shaking, and your hands feel like a pair of icicles.” He commented, leaning over to her to press a soft kiss on her lips.

“Yes, of course. I run cold.” She scoffed.

“The last girl who said that turned into a Frosslass.” He reminds her. “Don’t be too proud, Dee-Dee.”

Dawn chuckles bitterly. “You warning me about pridefulness. That’s rich.”

“Yeah, but you’re still cold.” Barry argues with a smirk.

“No, I’m not!” She repeats, furious.

The blond trainer leaned ever closer to her face, as if he was going to tell her a secret.

“You can’t fool me. I know you better than you know yourself.” He whispered against her lips, winking at her as he pulled her a little closer to him, keeping her as warm as possible.

Dawn really wanted to complain and to assert her independence from him, mostly just because, but she was, indeed, very cold, and his embrace really helped with that.

Between one battle and another, as there is a quick intermission to clear out the pitch from the collateral damage from the Pokémon attacks, Barry raced to the elevator back down to the ground floor. A few minutes later, he reappears with a warm blanket that could cover her legs.

For the rest of the afternoon, not once did he let go of her hands, always staying right by her side, to keep her warm.

Stupid Barry, making me like him. Stupid cold, making me cuddle him, Dawn muttered at one point.

Her boyfriend just smiled.

*_*_*_*_*

4th Gen Masterlist

#4th gen #twinleafshipping #dawn #barry

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sinkingtime · 1 year

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Do you want a Frozen seeequeel?♫

Sequel to the first movie, that is. I was dissatisfied by the second. It's not even that bad, really, it just didn't work for me as a sequel to the older one. And then, as Voldemort once said, I had a clever idea.

We start by sidelining Anna.

According to standard musical theatrical analysis, by which I mean Sideways on youtube, a good musical starts with an important song and dance. From the first scene, from the first frame if the mandatory logos allow. This serves two purposes.

The first is to tell the audience that this will be a musical, and they need to adjust their disbelief accordingly. That's basically served automatically, by its very existance.

The second is to introduce the setting. The status quo that our hero must defend, or try to change, or otherwise exist in.

So my movie would start with both sisters singing as they walk out of the castle, through the city, carrying picknic basquets. The song is about how great things are and how happy they are. No actual reference to the first movie, except maybe a single line by Elsa saying things are good "now".

As they go by, various random townspeople join in, for just a line, mostly about how prosperous the city is and how much they all love their queen. Also, the city is covered in snow, but a charming winter day, nothing catastrophic. Everybody but Elsa is wearing winter clothes; this is normal for this land.

Also through the town are various ice sculptures, of animals and people. Only noble beasts, so falcons, guard dogs, majestic horses, etc. The ladies are in elegant dresses, the men are in either armor or uniform. At some point, but not necessarily during this song, we should see Elsa manifest a new one out of nowhere, in a space that seemed empty enough to take some decoration.

The sisters reach Kristoff and he joins them, at first minorly like another random townsperson, but he starts singing more, and Anna is the one that falls back into just accompanying them. At some point he takes her basket to carry.

I also want something I don't have the musical background to describe: Elsa and Kristoff don't sound well together. They're out of tune, or harmony, or something. Not enough for the song not to be good, Anna sounds well with both and she always gets at least a single line between each of their transitions, but if you took her out and let them sing together the song would not be good.

And furthermore, this without Anna's performance changing in any way between them; if you edited it to swap her lines around, the lyrics may become nonsense, but the music still works. Because she's not intentionally mediating between them, she happens to legitimately be what they have in common.

So the three reach their picknic spot, the song comes to an end, and the last line is Kristoff's. "Anna, will you marry me?". Camera closes in on Elsa's face, frozen in shock. We hear Anna agreeing enthusiastically, generic celebratory noises from both of them, and Elsa's eye twitches once. Title card.

The first half-to-two-thirds of the movie will be taken up by wedding preparations. It is to be the event of the century. Lots of logistical difficulties, and also small bits of some supernatural emergency. I don't know exactly what that should be, it doesn't really matter, except for three things.

As it escalates, it needs to be able to create the kind of chaos that leads to the final act.

It is not Elsa's fault. It's ok if she briefly thinks it is, but that should be quickly disproven.

There isn't anything nefarious. Nature itself, some mystical creature(s), something like that.

Elsa is distressed by the wedding, but still determined to make it be good. Anytime someone asks if she's ok, she just tells them that "everything needs to be PERFECT!". Lots of other people are also stressed by their part in the event, so this is plausible.

At some point she needs to almost panic, take a moment to control herself, whispering "don't let them see", before going to talk to someone about something.

Kristoff helpfully offers to just not do that, have a normal people wedding, but Anna tells him they can't. They already announced it to all the neighbouring kingdoms. They can be married in secret before, if he wants, but they'll still need to do the big party afterwards; it's part of her princess-y duties. And now his. So they both get back to organizing whatever has been asigned to them.

Also, this may be a little dark, but I like it. At some point someone, possibly Anna but it could be a random townsperson, needs to deliver a message to the queen. So they turn towards the coldest-looking part of the immediate environment and say it, possibly prefacing with a "please tell her majesty-". After all is said, we follow a little gust of wind, which flies through town until it reaches Elsa. She pauses to listen to nothing, for the correct amount of time that the message took, then she nods and starts walking that way.

There should be more music, of course. Anna's is directly about the organizing of the event, probably with a large chorus of townspeople and outside contractors. Some early visitor could get another telling us how beautiful this kingdom is. Kristoff goes to deliver the invitation to the trolls, who have something along the lines of "I knew it!". Olaf probably has something naive and charmingly misinformed about married life.

Elsa gets the important one (this is her movie). It's about how she just reconnected with her sister, and now she's going to lose her and be alone again. She's resigned, not complaining; she's done it before and she can do it again. Naturally I have no music to give you, but I do know the title: "Ever after was so short".

Kristoff is the only one who actually understands how the queen feels. I kinda want him to accidentally eavesdrop on her song, but also not; it would be the simplest way to convey that he gets it, but it may also imply the music is more diegetic than it should be. I don't know.

Anyways, he tries to arrange to speak with both sisters at once, to clear things up on that. But by this point everybody has already noticed the supernatural complication, they're all determined to not let it interrupt the ceremony, so everybody is busy dealing with their respective part. More visitors come in.

That's when the disaster escalates. The city is actually torn asunder, most buildings collapsed, trapping the people. Elsa and Kristoff are knocked far away, into the forest; she was trying to figure out that menace, he was following her to try and have that conversation.

In town, all the ice statues come to life and rush to the people's defense. Everybody is surprised, but not much; this is part of why Elsa is a great queen. Or a great patron goddess, at least. A captain of the city watch starts giving them orders, not quite sure if he can, but they obey; they recognize him as a legitimate agent of their creator. So he coordinates the search-and-rescue. Maybe we see some artisan patching up a "wounded" statue, with ice and snow.

At this point she learns or figures out how to deal with the magic. Maybe he relays a cryptic clue the trolls gave him. However the solution works, she needs his help; or at least she needs some help, and he's the only one around. So they head off to do it, with a song about how they will save the day.

Except he says "we" and she only says "I". This is the one song that it's ok if it doesn't sound good, specifically because those two don't match properly. They also don't coordinate for the actual solution, and fail. She crumbles down to cry and blame herself.

This is the part I said may be a bit too dark. He screams that she always does this. That they know, because of her creepy government surveillance powers, that she knew Hans was coming, but she just let him kill her. Always looking for a cause for which to sacrifice herself.

(He's wrong, she's been developing that trick in response to having been ambushed that one time, but she shouldn't have the composture to correct him, or at least not now.)

He further tells her that he's not surprised Anna never told her, they're both very alike in that regard, but she still sometimes wakes up crying, having nightmares about that day. She starts to blame herself, but he interrupts again. He told her precisely so she would stop trying to put all blame on herself, and accept some help.

He finally tells her what he had wanted to talk about, though he hoped Anna would be here. Should they cancel the wedding? She's outraged, asking how dare he hurt her sister like that. But he says he doesn't want to hurt either of them. They were all happy before, they can just go back to that. No doubt she would agree, if Elsa had ever deigned to just explain how she feels.

She still tries to refuse; Anna's happiness is more important. He naysays that. They will be family. All of them are important. That's basically the whole core of the movie, Elsa must learn she's not losing a sister, she's gaining a brother. After she's finally convinced they get up, gather themselves, and go save the day again. They have one more chance, which presumably will be a little harder now for some reason.

This would also be a reprise of the "save the day" song, but sung right this time. That's why it was okay if the first time wasn't so pleasant, the eventual soundrack collection can just have this version.

They do indeed fix the whatever-needed-fixing. Over in the city, all the ice statues resume being just statues. After a moment of confusion, the people understand that this means the crisis is over, and start cheering. And carrying them back to their places.

Elsa and Kristoff enter the ruins of the city, triumphantly, welcomed by the entire people, Anna at the front. She rushes to hug her sister, they both thank each other for being okay. Then she goes to kiss her fiancé.

Before they finish, Elsa raises on an ice plathform that wasn't there before, to announce that she now declares these two wed, before all these witnesses. They both try to convince her not to, this ceremony was ruined, but she shushes them. Too late, royal decree. The people are already cheering. The end.

Over the credits we see images, in a different art style of course, alternately of Elsa directing the reconstruction efforts, and of Anna and Kristoff visiting various places during their honeymoon. The final still image is of both of them returning, being welcomed by the queen and the crowd behind her. Probably all set to an instrumental cover of the opening song.

And one more thing. I don't particularly care about "gay Elsa" either way, but for the message of this movie to work it's important to make absolutely clear that her newfound bond with Kristoff is as siblings, and specifically nonincestuous siblings, thank-you-very-much. So for that reason, I would go ahead and make that canon.

Sometime in the wedding preparations, a messager is relaying to her answers by various neighbouring kingdoms. The kings of <some place> ask to politely inquire if she has given any thought to marrying herself. "...do they have a daughter?" "A son, your majesty." "Then, no".

#my writing #fanfic #disney #disney's frozen #i came up with this pretty much in one go #when i first saw frozen 2 #some time ago #actually don't remember how long ago #not when it first came on d+#but not recently either #turns out it's easy to write when you don't need to actually write #and allow yourself to just describe the emotions and ask the reader to imagine that they were properly conveyed #and seriously sideways is great #it's one of those things where even if you know that you don't REALLY quite understand the nuances #it's still explained well enough that it is interesting #you should check it out

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weirwoodking · 3 years

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WHY WAS MICHELLE CLAPTON SO AGAINST LETTING ARYA BE PRETTY? (trying to help you in reaching your daily anti got post quota)

okay the first thing I saw was the words “Arya” and “pretty” in the same sentence and I thought you were trying to start up that discourse with me and I got scared for a sec.

But honestly, the real question is why wouldn’t Michelle Clapton let anyone look good? That woman was apparently on a mission to be the sole person responsible for the decline of creative costume design in the period drama genre. She tended to just design one outfit for each character that would last them 2-3 seasons. It looked stale and boring, especially since GRRM puts so much description and meaning into the clothing in the books. Like when Tyrion thinks about how Sansa “wears sorrow on her long dagged sleeves”, or how the blinded Arya has to learn to tell the difference between her different colored socks by feeling which one has stitching along the top. The Night’s Watch are the only group who wears all black, and you have to keep it that way, or else it loses its meaning. Cersei likes wearing green because it brings out her eyes. All of the clothing in the books adds into the character. And it’s also just creative. GRRM gave Clapton so much to work with (each house literally has its own colors to wear, it shouldn’t be that hard!) and she just chose to ignore all of it. Again, this is just a general problem with the whole production, like how D&D said that following the books “wouldn’t earn them bonus points.” They had zero respect for the material they were adapting, believing themselves to be better at doing this story than THE ACTUAL AUTHOR.

Since you brought up Arya, I’ll just focus on the outfits that people tend to hate the most: the costuming of show!Dany, show!Sansa, and show!Arya during the last two seasons. Obviously, they were horrible, and they only got like 2-3 outfits each throughout that whole period (maybe there were more, but they were so unmemorable and indistinguishable from the others that it doesn’t even matter). But let’s just brainstorm on what to do instead.

Dany: simple. STOP WITH THE FUCKING MONOCHROMATIC DRESSES. They were so lazy throughout the whole show. It was just blue, then white, then black or white fur. Dull dull dull. Put Dany in some winterized Dothraki-inspired clothing, with riding leathers, a chainmail shirt, thick horsehair pants, a black and red cloak, and flat-soled boots. If you’re going to keep ignoring her short hair, at least stop with the Party City wig that keeps magically conjuring more volume of hair out of nowhere. Give her a long braid.

Arya: Put her in the fucking Stark colors. And let her wear more than one outfit. The one she had was fine as a single outfit (that one-shouldered cloak thing wasn’t too bad), but not every single episode. Like Dany, Arya would most likely choose to wear pants most of the time, but she probably wouldn’t mind throwing on a wool dress once in a while. Perhaps have her in the formal dress style of her House/the North when they all meet Dany. For her hair, I don’t know why they wanted to scrape all the hair back off of Maisie and Sophie’s foreheads like that. Was it in their contracts that as much of their faces had to be showing on screen at all times possible and the hair would block that? Anyway, it’s just horrible styling for a couple reasons. 1) one of Arya’s characteristics is that her hair is always messy, it shouldn’t be in a tight style, and 2) if you’re gonna do braids in dark hair, you need to make them stand out, or else they get lost and the audience can’t see them. There’s a line in the books that mentions how Alys Karstark has strips of leather in her hair, and I think that that’s a great thing to build off of. Braid strips of leather or fabric into the northern girls’ hair, or add bands of bronze or iron around the braids. For Arya, I would either have her hair be completely loose and wind blown, or with small braids in the front of her hair that have accessories in them so they can be seen:

Sansa: holy shit just put her in a grey and blue wool dress. Everytime I think about show!Sansa’s costumes I just think about how Michelle Clapton said she gave her those dumb circle-chain necklaces because that’s what she likes to wear in her own life. Lady... if Sansa was your fashion-self-insert... you have bad style. For Sansa, I would, obviously, dress her in her house colors, as well as blue. I’d have her in mostly wool and fur, very little leather or metal, and inspired more by Celtic and Slavic folk clothing. For her hair, again, why, oh why, did they scrape it off her face like that? It makes her look so severe, and older than she was. You also can’t even see the back of her hair where the action is, because she’s facing the camera most of the time! I would give her braids that would be seen, and would frame her face. Perhaps braided pigtails:

Or a crown braid:

Now, something that annoys me about the whole show in general, not just with Dany, Sansa, and Arya, is the lack of crowns. Where’s Robb’s crown! Where’s Dany’s crown! Where’s Stannis’s crown! For the Stark sisters, I think that they should have had circlets, because they’re princesses. Jon was the king... he was their brother... they were princesses. It also solves the empty-foreheads problem. I would give Arya a simple, light bronze circlet, akin to the one Val is described to wear. And I would give Sansa something a bit more intricate, and made or dark iron to contrast her hair. One of my favorite hair styles in all of film is Éowyn’s hair during the funeral in The Two Towers. I think something like that would’ve been great for Sansa.

Also, last note, but I think it would be neat to show the characters doing their hair. Sansa walks into Arya’s room and we see Arya finishing up one of her braids. Arya walks into Sansa’s room, and Sansa is letting out her hair for the day. Show women interacting with their hair more, don’t make it feel like it’s just LEGO hair that they pop on every morning.

#oh holy shit this got long #sorry #ask #anon #anti got #long post

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chudleycanonficfest · 3 years

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Took Far Longer Than It Should've

Day 9, Story #1 is by CandyMan91

Title: Took Far Longer Than It Should've Author: CandyMan91 Pairing: Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley Prompt: Soulmate AU Rating: General Audiences

A calm and quiet morning Ron Weasley woke up like it was any other day, except it wasn’t any other day, it was his birthday. Excitedly, he walked down the stairs in his too-short pyjamas that once belonged to his brother Charlie and settled down at the dinner table.

His mother had made him his favorite, pancakes with a side of bacon and pumpkin juice. As they sang happy birthday Ron suddenly felt a slight warm sensation on his left wrist, he dismissed it as nervousness or perhaps hunger. As he reached for the syrup the left sleeve of his pyjama shirt rolled up.

“What’s that?” asked Ginny sitting on the chair on the left of Ron.

“What’s what?” asked Ron as he poured the syrup over his pancakes.

“That mark on your wrist,” Ron turned his wrist over and indeed there was a stranger mark on his wrist. It looked to be a dog similar to a Crup, except it was missing its forked tail, a Jack Russel terrier if Ron was correct. There used to be one at Uncle Bilius’s place back when he was alive.

However, there was also a different mark, unlike the other which was a dark maroon. This one looked like a faint periwinkle blue. It was also not a dog, but instead an otter. It looked as if the dog was chasing the otter, but not like a hunter chasing its prey, but like a playmate.

This conversation was brought to their mother’s attention and as she settled her eyes on Ron’s stranger mark she gasped.

“Arthur!” she said in a loud voice. Ron’s father’s eyes shot up from his copy of the Daily Prophet, and as he saw the random mark on Ron’s wrist, his eyes widened beyond what Ron thought was possible. He looked at his wife as if to ask what to do, before he cleared his throat and settled down the newspaper.

“Listen son,” said his father. “There are special people in the magical world, more so in certain ways than if I may say powerful wizards like Albus Dumbledore.” Ron nodded, not getting his father’s explanation. “When these people turn 10 years of age, something weird occurs to them. They like you get marks.”

Ron’s eyes nearly bulged out of their skull, was his father serious? Was he really more special than the most powerful wizard since Merlin?

“They are known as soulmates,” said his father. “They are people who are destined to belong to one another. That mark you have on your wrist is or will appear on your soulmate at 10 years of age.”

So that was it. He had the same mark as another person, and according to his father that person and he were destined to be together. Ron could see by his parents’ faces that although it seemed like good news, they weren’t necessarily good ones.

“But,” said his mother. “You see Ronnie, some people are quite jealous or confused about this. When it’s time for you to grow up and get a girlfriend or a boyfriend, they won’t necessarily be your soulmate. And as such they won’t even bother staying with you, because to them someone with a soulmate is as good as stolen.”

Ron gulped, was that what made him so special? A sort of brand that turned him into some sort of freak?

“If you want to we can hide it of course,” said his mother hurriedly as he saw his face fall at the news. Ron couldn’t have nodded faster. Her mother went to her room and returned with Bill's old leather wristband. As she wrapped it around his mark he couldn’t help but ask.

“How will I know when I meet them?”

His mother gave him a warm encouraging smile. “You just will.”

On a simple house in Hampstead Hermione Granger couldn’t believe it. It was her birthday, not only on a Saturday giving her free time to read any book she liked and avoid her teasing and mocking classmates, but a witch had just turned into a cat in front of her. She couldn’t believe it, she was a witch, that’s why she could never fit in. She was special, and she was going to a place with special people like her.

It was her father who had brought up the thing as they had decided to dub it.

“Is that why Hermione has that peculiar mark on her wrist?” Professor McGonagall, if Hermione was correct, looked strangely at her father. Her mother put her hand on Hermione’s back, who felt her cheeks go pink at the attention. She removed the ribbon she used to hide the thing.

Professor McGonagall’s eyes widened as they saw a periwinkle blue otter being playfully chased by a Jack Russel terrier, unlike the otter the dog was a faint dark red or maroon.

“Oh my,” escaped from her mouth, before she realized it.

“Oh my?” repeated Hermione’s mother.

Professor McGonagall proceeded to explain everything she could about Soulmates, how they worked, their view in the wizarding world, as she continued to speak fear began to set in Hermione. Of course it wouldn't be that simple, as she asked what they could do the old witch suggested hiding the mark until she was older. It looked like Hermione would have to wear her red ribbon for a while longer.

Ron Weasley was talking to Harry Potter and not only that, but it seemed that he liked him as much as Ron was beginning to like the legendary boy. As he brandished his wand about to show his new friend a spell that hopefully turned his old grey rat yellow he was interrupted by the arrival of a girl.

She had bushy brown hair, a button nose, along with buck teeth, but she was still pretty. She has asked the same question as the other boy that had come through moments ago, as their eyes met Ron felt a tug in his stomach and he had to gulp and look away when he thought he was about to blush under her gaze. He missed as she too settled her gaze away from him.

He cleared his throat and hoped Fred and George hadn’t tricked him.

“Sunshine, daisies, butter mellow, turn this stupid, fat rat yellow.” he said, and nothing happened. He felt incredibly embarrassed and the pretty girl wasn’t making it any easier.

“Are you sure that’s a real spell?” said the girl. “Well, it’s not very good is it?” And Ron stopped listening after she started rambling on. Maybe looks were deceiving as his mother said, as the pretty witch looked to be everything but sociable. “–I’m Hermione Granger, by the way, who are you?”

“I’m Ron Weasley”

She didn’t know what she had done wrong, she was trying to help him. Perhaps, she had been a tad bossy or maybe she could have phrased it a bit better, but was she really as annoying in the Wizarding World as she was in the Muggle one. Perhaps, her classmates hadn’t been wrong about her.

And she wondered just why Ron’s words had hurt her more than any other. It had hurt enough for her to break down and go to the girl’s bathroom and miss not only her classes, but the Hallowe’en Feast as well.

As Hermione got out of the bathroom stall she was faced with horror as a troll was right in front of her, its foul smell filling the bathroom. She screamed, and then the door banged open. Had the teachers come for her? But, she only heard a slight familiar voice… and Ron’s voice.

As the troll’s club fell down on its small head and the three went back to the Gryffindor Tower they all thanked each other and went to bed. Why hadn’t she recognized Harry’s voice, but Ron’s voice was something like the voice of an old friend? The boy barely tolerated her, and he made no attempt at hiding it.

As she woke up the next morning she joined Harry and Ron on their way to breakfast. Ron went to talk to his brothers about something she hadn’t heard clearly leaving her alone with Harry.

“Thank you,” she said. “Again, for saving me… If you hadn’t got there in time…” she didn’t finish her sentence as a shiver ran down her spine at the memory of the beast.

“You should thank Ron,” said Harry to Hermione’s surprise. Her expression must have told Harry something because the next moment he was explaining himself. “I reminded him that you were still in the bathroom, and you didn’t know.” The green-eyed boy looked at the back of his ginger best friend. “Never saw anyone run that fast.”

Hermione too looked at the back of Ron, but instead of admiration as Harry had shown her cheeks went pink.

They were at a DA meeting, she looked as beautiful as ever of course. They were practicing their Patronus charm, Ron was having a hard time making it Corporeal, for the time being he could only get a wisp of smoke. He tried focusing on his happiest memories, but somehow most of them ended up with Hermione’s face.

But, that would only remind him of the truth, that he had a soulmate somewhere in the world, that destiny had set to screw him up with a bird or a bloke somewhere in the world, that no matter how much he wanted to he could never have what he so wanted, but he couldn’t control himself. He looked at her wild set of brown curls, her beautiful plump lips, her button nose and her beautiful brown eyes. To hell with his soulmate, if he had to carve the mark out of his skin with a knife he would bloody do so if it meant having Hermione.

Suddenly, there was applause and cheering in the room. Ron turned his head and his eyes just couldn’t believe what they were seeing. Hermione had successfully conjured her Patronus, but that wasn’t what shocked Ron, her patronus was an otter. She looked up at him, and seeing him had made her blush as she turned her gaze away from him.

An unrelenting barrage of happiness coursed through him and with the knowledge that Hermione Granger of all people was his soulmate he conjured his own Patronus.

“EXPECTO PATRONUM!” he casted and a Jack Russell Terrier shot out of his wand and ran around the Room of Requirement, there was another round of applause which was now directed to him. It ran around the room and started chasing around Hermione’s otter, it playfully ran behind the other Patronus and the otter started swimming in the air as Ron’s terrier happily barked at it.

Ron set his eyes back to Hermione who looked as shocked as he had felt moments before, Ron gulped and unwrapped his old leather wristband that he had always been careful to use as a way to cover his mark. The wristband fell to the floor and his mark was available to everyone in the room, with all his Gryffindor courage he walked across the room towards her and showed her his wrist.

The otter which had been a faint periwinkle blue seemed to shine as it was no longer translucent. Hermione gasped as he looked from his wrist back at his eyes. She unlaced that red ribbon she always wore in her right wrist and the same mark appeared. They looked back at each other, and something shunned bright in their eyes, Ron couldn’t take it anymore and he put his lips to hers. He could sense her momentary surprise, before he felt her arms wrapped around his neck.

The gasps, the cheers, everything seemed to pass over their heads. As they detached the look that they had for each other told Ron something.

It Took Far Longer Than It Should've.

#chudleycanonficfest2021 #HP fest #hp canon pairings #canon fest romantic #submission #romione #ron x hermione

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secondbeatsongs · 3 years

Note

After reading your four posts I HAVE to know what your thoughts are for the adult/older audience (I forget which they said its gonna be) reboot and what could it mean for the plot with Sam's actress not returning

I have heard of this reboot, and honestly? no thoughts. head empty.

well. maybe a few thoughts...

I haven’t heard much about what the actual plot is going to be like, though I have heard rumors that Freddie is divorced and has a kid, and that bothers me in ways I can’t get past

like, of course I know that in real life, there are people who are divorced and/or have children by the age of...26?

(no, wait - Freddie’s birthday is Feb 4th, and if they’re sticking with a ‘94 birth year, he’d be 27. and yes, I know that off the top of my head; shut up)

anyway yes, there are actual real-life people who are divorced and/or have kids by 27, but I think it’s a really weird direction to take the plot with him. in the show, his ending just killed me, and I’d hate for him to have been unhappy (or mostly living with his mom!) for the past 9 years

when it comes to Sam’s actress not returning - I mean, good for her, honestly. I’ve read only a bit of what Jennette McCurdy went through during her acting career, and I’m happy that she got out and is doing her own thing now. like yes, I will miss Sam because she was a great character, but Jennette’s happiness is way more important!

also, jesus christ, people have been vicious about there being new characters? and I genuinely do not care. so what? lots of shows add new characters during a reboot/revival!

the amount of racism people were hurling at the actresses for the new characters is despicable. there’s no other way to process that - it was horrible, and nobody should ever attack people like that. I feel so bad for the new actresses! they don’t deserve this at all, and it’s horrifying.

now, all of that being said...uh. I don’t really expect much out of this show.

look, you know me - I loved the original iCarly, even though it was very stupid, had really questionable morals at times, and made almost no sense! I adore it, and it makes me happy.

so I will be watching the iCarly revival...but I don’t expect it to be as enjoyable (or anywhere near as enjoyable) as the original.

it’s not their fault - that’s just how revivals work! nothing is ever going to be as good as (or better than) the original show. it’s just impossible.

(I mean, I’m holding out hope that Leverage will be, but that’s it, y’know?)

I fully predict that the iCarly revival will be disappointing. I think it might be boring, or unfunny, or try too hard to be “relatable” to a generation that it lost touch with 9 years ago. I am prepared to heavily dislike it.

and even though the revival will technically be canon, I reserve the right to ignore it if I don’t like it. and if I ever post one of my iCarly fics that I’ve been poking at since 2017, I will take joy in tagging them as not canon compliant, because there’s no way I’d change my work to reflect whatever probably-dumb decisions the show is probably going to make.

anyway, there is a bright side to all of this: I will now get to continue thirsting over Jerry Trainor! he grew his hair out again, and it looks nice! :D

so like. even if the show is bad, at least there’s that!

#icarly #personal #icarly reboot #mexipika #i-ashhart #asks #not requests #yes I write fic #no I don't really post it #no you can't have my ao3 #but if I ever post my fics #they're gonna be masterpieces #and you will never be able to prove it was me #:)

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ouatsnark · 3 years

Text

DEBUNKING A STUPID OLD ARTICLE

Or better known as 20 Biased Things This "Author" has made up to hate on CaptainSwan

So this stupid fan submitted drivel circles the fandom every so often and I thought it might be fun to pick it a part bit by bit. Because after all, that is what I do! Below is why I disagree with everything they say.

Claim 1: Hook Doesn’t Deserve a Happily Ever After

The article acknowledges, correctly, that Regina does not deserve a happy ending either. I agree. Neither deserve it.

But which one of them earned it?

Killian Jones earned it because, unlike Regina, he didn’t expect it. He didn’t try to re-write history. He showed remorse for what he’d done and apologized to at least some of his victims - something Regina did not do until she magically drained some of the evil from her heart. And he sacrificed his life for the greater good, was tortured and doomed to death but still kept fighting to help Emma and the others.

So no, maybe Hook doesn’t DESERVE a happy ending but he sure as hell earned it. And you know who does deserve a happy ending? Emma Swan. And Killian Jones was a huge part of her happy ending.

Claim 2: Their trip to the past should have changed everything.

“We get that writers wanted Emma to demonstrate a closeness to her parents that she'd never known through this timeline circuit, but it just doesn't work for fans”.

What fans? Because amongst the general audience and the CaptainSwan crowd... its the best two hours of the series.

Yes, their adventure probably should have changed things but this is not an uncommon plot in fiction.

And really, how is it a point against Hook and Emma's relationship? OK you didn't like the plot of an episode so CaptainSwan shouldn't have happened? I am not following the logic here...

Claim 3: Hook is a Hundred of Years Older than Emma

They use a picture of Fook here who is not over 100 years old, first off, and secondly who cares?

I’m guessing the 30 year difference between Emma & Regina are fine? How about Rumbelle? Or the 135ish age difference between Emma & Neal?

The age difference is the least of anyone’s worries especially when Killian looks the same age as Emma and since Emma was an adult when they met.

In fact, the age difference is a part of what makes their relationship fun. She even teases him about it.

Also one thing I love about their age difference is that it lends to the idea that Hook survived this long to find his true love. So that Emma could find true love. It's destiny.

Claim 4: Emma abusively interrogated Hook in the hospital

Who is this? a HookedQueen stan?

“We'd never seen Emma physically harm someone for information before.”

She threatened Gold once… She shoved Regina up against a wall & demanded answers. She held a knife to Regina’s throat. I think someone is cherry picking.

 Never mind that this was before they were together. Rivals to lovers, anyone? I won’t even call them enemies. Killian’s enemy was Gold, not Emma.

From a CSers perspective: I thought it was funny. They weren't together and he was still a villain.

Claim 5: They’re on Opposite Paths

“As mentioned above, some fans think that Emma became the Dark One in order to catch up to Hook in the evildoer department, but there were many instances where she exhibited villainous tendencies far from Rumpelstiltskin's famous dagger.

This whole passage is rife with … falsehoods and nothing to back them up with.

1. What fans? The Regina Mills stans? Because the CaptainSwan fans RIGHTLY call it for what it is: Trying to lower Emma Swan to Regina's level which has happened with every other character! It is not Killian they're trying to "catch her up to". It is Regina. And someone higher up thankfully stopped them as evident with Killian suddenly becoming the Dark One. If you think that was planned then you're fooling yourself.

Instances of the show trying to bring everyone down to Regina's level:

Snowing's baby snatching

Snow defending the town against Regina's mother but it being labeled as murder

Killian suddenly having killed his own father, like Regina killed hers, and David's father as Regina killed Snow's.

Emma being vilified for saving Marian because it ruined Regina's relationship

2. This article just said the only times she shows villainy is when she tortures Hook but now all of the sudden she’s shown many instances of villainy? You can’t have both!

"Technically, Hook went back and forth between light and dark for a while, some of it not by his own choice, and Emma's darkness manifested in several different ways, so maybe they'll be able to save their relationship by chalking it up to "personal growth" rather than "irreconcilable differences.””

3. Yes, Hook stumbled upon his journey but at least he admitted his wrongs and never claimed to be a hero. But “irreconcilable differences”? S4 he was being controlled by Gold & wouldn’t have chosen that path. In s5 he was being controlled by the darkness & would have not chosen that path.

This journalist also claims that Emma & Hook do not have any shared goals. Since the very ending of S2, their goals have lined up: protect Henry, save Storybrooke and be together.

Opposites do attract. Emma and Killian are prime example of light and dark coming together.

Side grumble: I expect this person also wrote an article about how Rumple and Belle were on different paths and could never really make sense or have a long lasting relationship? She wanted him to let go of the darkness while he did not want to.

Claim 6: Emma Betrayed Hook in the Giant’s Realm

Not really sure why this is a big deal.

1. They weren't together

2. She didn't trust her instincts

3. She didn't leave him to die

Emma also sacrificed the lost boys, despite Snow’s protests, to get to Henry. Henry DOES come first. Despite what this article tries to say later on.

The bigger argument here would be... he left her to rot in a cell but since this seems to be slanted toward "Emma bad" I am thinking this was written by a HookedQueen stan. Am I wrong? I don't know.

P.S. Killian felt betrayed by Emma so it's understandable why he'd leave her. He had no loyalty to her at that point. Also. Still a villain.

Claim 7: Irreconcilable Differences

"It's one thing to have parents with healthy different perspectives; it's another when your mom is basically the Harry Potter of Storybrooke and your stepdad is into justice Voldemort-style."

So basically the author doesn’t acknowledge that Killian Jones gave up his thirst for revenge? Perhaps they should re-watch that S6 episode with David?

Emma & Hook are pretty much on the same path from 3x01 onward. In season three they unite to find Henry. Killian finds that he's found a purpose again thanks to Emma's leadership and once again discovers the man he wants to be which puts him onto the path of hero. Emma is a hero. They are both heroes.

Where is the differences? Never mind that they have being abandoned by parents in common. Also, they both wanted to belong but were too use to running until someone reached out to them; Henry to Emma and Emma to Hook.

Claim 8: Hook Gave up his Ship for Emma

“What's the number one rule in love? You put your loved one's happiness first, which even means letting them go if it comes to that. Had she known what the cost might be, would she have demanded the gesture?

We'll never know, but we do know that loving someone means never asking them to give up what truly makes them happy, whether it's a jalopy in the driveway or on the sea.”

This is a word salad that means jack crap.

Emma never asked him to because she didn’t need to. He wanted to.

Never mind that she never requires him to give up sailing. He still has his ship. And he gets to be with Emma. He gave up pirating because he wanted to be a better man. His love for Emma inspired him to better himself.

How the hell is that a negative? It isn't unless you're just grasping at straws.

Killian Jones giving up his ship for Emma was a grand gesture of love and selflessness. A gesture he didn't tell Emma until she asked which is so significant. Remember when he said he would win her heart not because of any trickery but because she wanted him? He had several chances to do so but he waited. He didn't use that gesture to sway her opinion of him. He let her find her way to him on her own.

Claim 9: Hook Shot Belle

So apparently because he wasn't punished for shooting Belle and because Belle should have had long lasting issues from being shot...

Hook and Emma make no sense together.

Did I get that right?

Hook doesn't consider himself forgiven.

I'd pay more attention to this if:

1) It were Henry, Snow, or David. Yes, it was still wrong but this does not effect Emma. He did not shoot Belle to hurt Emma. 2) He hadn't still been a villain. 3) He'd never apologized or shown remorse which he has and he did.

Emma acknowledges that he was a villain, knows he is working to change that and has committed to seeing the good in him. And despite what this article wishes, there is good in Killian Jones.

Also he received instant karma by being run over then spent some time handcuffed to a bed and force fed jello? I mean, yes, in a perfect fictional world, he might have spent some time in jail for that. But since this is fiction and since we did see him sacrifice his life later on and show remorse over this… I am much more forgiving.

Apparently this is because "Emma is the sheriff and she should arrest him" well... Emma let Regina walk free in Season 2. She let Gold continue to be a part of the town despite the numerous times he stabbed them in back, tried to destroy their lives or left them for dead. So why harp on this? The only reason to is because you're anti-CaptainSwan.

Perhaps this is more anti-OUAT? Which, honestly, that's fine. But don't call out one ship when it's an issue for the entire show. And I have never claimed that OUAT is a good show. It isn't.

Claim 10: Emma is Emotionally Distant from Hook

This is just BS.

1. She only opens up to him. (S3 finale she does so on the bench & right before she gets the wand to work, when she watches her childhood videos, talked with him about her parents betrayal and her fear of the future)

2. Cried over losing him.

3. She risked her heart, soul and her life to save him. You don't go to such lengths for someone you're emotionally distance with.

She had her walls at first but they were mostly down by Season 6. The truth is that Emma had a tendency to try and deal with things on her own because she was afraid of losing those she loves. I think she felt like she needed to try and control the situation herself as much as she could.

Sometimes I don't think people understood who Emma Swan was.

Claim 11: No authentic development or dialog

So because they don't discuss whose doing laundry... they aren't believable as a couple?

Mmmmmm. Ok.

How about movie nights? Pancakes anyone?

Being an ensemble show it's really hard to show domestic scenes between couples when you have so many other story lines to jam into a 45 minute run.

CaptainSwan doesn't just have flirty dialog. They have much more meaningful dialog than discussing laundry.

Take the above for example. This is the first time Emma has someone standing in front of her telling her that she comes first. She has never had anyone put her first.

Other meaningful conversations:

1) Story time in S6 when Killian is trying to help her remember who she is and how she is going to defeat the evil queen. 2) The way he helps her forgive her parents in S4 3) The way she talks to him in S4 about seeing the man he's become 4) When he encourages her about her magic

And sometimes actions speak louder than words.

1) He followed her into Neverland - a place he hated and feared that held so many bad memories 2) He followed her through the portal into what could have been death 3) She risked her heart and soul for their future in S5 on several occasions. When she took the darkness to make him a DO and save his life, when she crossed the river of lost souls to reach him and when she put her heart to the test. 4) He went up against Zelena in S5 to help her and against Rumple in S6 to buy her time so she could defeat The Dark Fairy. To people far more powerful than him. 5) She joined forces with Gideon and Rumple in S6 to try and get him back. Risking her life.

Claim 12: They have too much Teen Drama

So they claim that Emma can't move beyond her past to have a future with Hook but ... how does this make sense when she goes to hell and fights to bring him home so that she can have that future with him? Why does she ask him to move in with her? Because she IS overcoming her past and her fears. It's not happening overnight. It was a 6 year long process.

Geez.

But apparently the "teen drama" includes being human. Please name me a couple in history that haven't lied to each other? About something? Also tricked? Not sure when that comes into play unless we're talking about Dark CaptainSwan.

Claim 13: Zeus Breaks the Laws of Magic to get them back together

"Randomly breaking the laws of magic via a Greek god in order to keep "Captain Swan" together is ridiculous and even their supporters are not having it."

I'm sorry... there's a CaptainSwan fan out there that doesn't love the fact that Emma and Hook WERE ORDAINED BY A GREEK GOD!? Who? Where? When?

This article is so biased... like who have they been talking to?

Anyways, lets answer the question. Why do Hook and Emma deserve special magic defying treatment?

Because they are true love & he just helped them defeat Hades.

Try paying attention.

After the pain and torment of nearly losing each other forever, that reunion induces such a state of euphoria. If you're a CaptainSwan fan, that is. That they were indeed going to get their happy ending. And it just raises their level of epicness. Not only did they pass a true love's test but now a Greek god basically said "these two kids belong together" and made it happened. What more of a sign do you need?

Side grumble: This must be an OutlawQueen stan. They're mad that Regina's handbag was turned to dust with no hope of returning. Robin was seriously a useless prop. His entire existence was for Regina's angst or happiness. He didn't have side stories. He didn't really have a back story. He mostly only interacted with Regina. Why would Robin be more deserving? He just abandoned his children to his rapist & a murderer and his girlfriend who murdered his first wife and killed thousands? His only existence was for Regina’s happiness or angst.

Claim 14: Hook Was Going To Take Out Emma's Whole Family

This passage was so unclear…

Is this about Season 2? Season 2 finale was more about Regina taking out Emma’s entire family… but I somehow think Regina's presence at the Thanksgiving table isn't questionable whereas Hook's is? Yes, he stole the bean to save his own neck. But he did come back then risked his neck and his ship/home to save Henry. He'd spent decades trying to leave Neverland but he didn't even hesitate to return knowing he'd have to face Pan again. Pan. A villain he says is the most treacherous villain he has ever faced.

And if we're talking about Season 5... that was Dark Hook. Killian never would have done that. It was the darkness inside him fueling it. Huge difference.

Anyways, if we're to follow this logic then I expect there's a scathing article about the other guests at the Season 6 dinner scene? Why is Rumple allowed to sit with them? Why is Regina? She tried to murder Emma and her entire family on multiple occasions and she wasn't consumed by darkness nor did she ever show remorse. Hook at least showed guilt over his weakness at being unable, at first, to resist the darkness. Regina never did. And Rumple openly says he chooses himself and his power every time.

Claim 15: Emma Didn't Listen To Hook About Marian

Emma is a savior. She says that she couldn't leave Marian behind to get killed. Which Hook even agrees with! He says she made the noble choice and then he cautions her.... but ultimately he helps her get Marian back and even delights in Emma having a bit of a pirate in her when she knocks Marian out!

But this gets blown into "well she didn't listen to him here so she isn't going to listen to him about children.. oh and Emma is the reason Robin is dead"

Excuse me? So it's Emma's fault for saving a life but not Regina's for false imprisonment and even murder? No. try again. Marian would not have been in that cell if not for Regina murdering innocent people.

Also lets not act like Emma never listens to Hook at all. She does.

Claim 16: He's A Pirate, She's The Savior

“This is particularly true when we consider how he's never been prosecuted for any of his past crimes, let alone his current attempts on several of their lives.”

Oh but its OK for Rumbelle and OutlawQueen? Except Killian did sacrifice his life… and while Gold did too, it didn’t stick. The only one who hasn’t sacrificed anything is Regina. I will be expecting an article on how "Emma & Snow’s Friendship with Regina Makes No Sense" next.

Also what current attempts? The only attempt he has made on their lives was Dark Hook and you can't say he wasn't prosecuted. He sacrificed his life! He was consumed by darkness and he gave up his life to stop the dark ones forever.

That is so disingenuous it's unbelievable.

Hook never tried to kill all of them. Regina did. Rumple did. Hook was only ever trying to kill Rumple who is even more evil than Hook is so you'll have to excuse me if I don't care.

Claim 17: Emma Let Henry Live With Regina So She Could Shack Up With Hook

This never happened…

Henry has been living with Emma since S3. We see him at Regina's more during S5 but that is because everyone turned their back on her ... everyone but Killian Jones that is.

But we see that Henry is living with Emma and Hook in S6. He is there for breakfast (the scene where Killian says he's gonna cook them a meal). He is there when Killian is pushed through a portal by Gideon. And the night before Emma & Killian's wedding we see Henry going upstairs to his room.

You know which mother kicked Henry out of the house over a man? Regina. 4x02.

Claim 18: Emma Transformed Hook Into A Dark One Against His Wishes

Yes, yes she did. And she admitted it was a mistake. But they were able to move past it. Their love overcame it.

Honestly out of all the opinions made in this article I would respect this one the most. I get that people, who do not understand Emma, hating what Emma did there. I get it. It was wrong. And she nearly paid a big price for that mistake.

 But why is that harder to accept than Snow White befriending the woman who destroyed her life, murdered her father, tried to murder her baby and forced her to give her child up?

Honestly I think this is more about "why OUAT doesn't make sense" than "CaptainSwan doesn't make sense" because a lot of this can be pointed at other characters and relationships too.

Claim 19: Emma Forgot All About Neal For Hook

Oh maybe this was a Swanfire fan!?

"the supposed love of her life who was only afforded a few brief years of happiness in his complicated, painful life."

So we're going to ignore his abandonment and sending her to prison for his crimes? And whoever said he was the love of her life? She was young. He was the first person that came along that made her feel like she belonged and let her believe they could be a family. But then at the first test he let fear of his past override everything and he ran.

Why shouldn’t she forget Neal? He didn't believe in her super powers. He laughed at her pain. He found a fiance instead of returning for her and only when it was convenient for him did he pursue her again in S3.

Claim 20: Emma Put Hook Before Henry

“Remember back when Emma believed that Hook would be a terrible influence on Henry? “

When? She called on him to babysit? She told Regina that she trusted him.

 “Just taking Henry to the Underworld in the first place is Mommy No-No #1.”

I do wish they’d left the deleted scene in there where Henry threatens that he’ll find a way to come along. But I don't consider this as putting Killian before Henry. I consider it a mistake - one Emma owns. But does Emma own that mistake all by herself?

They went to the Underworld to right a wrong. Killian had given up his life to destroy the darkness but Rumple had, once again, betrayed them all. So essentially Killian ended up dying for nothing.

Besides, are we going to say that Robin, Regina Snow and David also put Killian before Henry? Why would they do that?

Robin should not have gone either since he had two children depending on him. Snow and David should not have gone either because of their baby. Regina should have put her foot down too when it came to Henry.

But they all made that choice. Love is worth fighting for and that ultimately is what led them down to the Underbrooke.

Emma putting Killian before Henry would be her staying in Underbrooke to be with Killian. Also when it came down to choosing between Deckhand Hook and Henry... Emma chose Henry.

And in my opinion it is Regina that puts her happiness head of Henry repeatedly. She chose her curse over his mental well being. She tried to murder all of his loved ones despite what he would feel so that he would only be hers. Regina is the one that pushed Henry away in 4x02 over her broken heart and risked staying in the Wish Realm forever to chase a fake version of Robin. Never mind that time that she set Henry up to spy on the Dark One to get her happy ending.

Conclusion:

Once Upon a Time's writing is rubbish. But CaptainSwan is the one thing the show got right. You want to ask me about what relationships do not make sense?

Snow befriending Regina after all that Regina did to her. Especially since Regina couldn't show remorse until it was her serumEQ half and only after some of her wickedness was drained out. There is no reason the Charmings ever should have trusted her.

Regina and Emma's friendship. Regina spent two seasons trying to murder her and corrupt her relationship with Henry. Regina then spends the rest of the seasons belittling Emma's ideas, questioning her leadership and just being a bully. I mean there's a whole list of things here.

Belle falling in love with Rumple. A man who enslaved her and who would never give up his dark powers and embrace the good she supposedly saw in him. He used her life like a pawn to get his own happiness. It's kind of sick.

Wish Henry calling Regina mother when she murdered his grandparents and called it a mistake and took the only mother he ever knew away from him.

Zelena and Hades. Like I don't even know where to begin there.

#captain swan #cs hate debunked #anti regina mills #anti outlawqueen #anti swanfire #anti swanqueen #anti rumbelle

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stoportotouch · 2 years

Note

For the thought meme, thoughts on subs vs dubs specifically when it comes to opera?

ooh excellent question honestly! and i have. various different thoughts on different levels actually.

first off i am and always will be a complete shill for the chandos english translations of operas. eno uses them and while they aren't necessarily 100% accurate to the actual words in the original language they retain the original feeling and they often bring something fun and new to the table. i particularly like the chandos ernani -- it's silly and basically a very long series of dick jokes but that's all ernani really is. (i will point out at every opportunity that silva's cabaletta is about how he can still get hard. sorry but that's... what he's talking about subtextually.)

i think part of it is... are they trying to exactly reproduce something that might not map 1:1 into an english translation from the original language? some translations do try to do that -- those are mostly older ones from like. when the operas first premiered -- and those are the ones that fall down. some things that would make not just linguistic but cultural sense in, for example, italian just won't make linguistic or cultural sense in english. if you're translating for an english market then you should make sure that you're making sense in the language.

to return to the chandos ernani, which is a particularly stupid opera that i no less love, it doesn't necessarily try to reproduce carlo quinto's exact personality in the italian version which is basically that he is proud and haughty and... up himself, really, until he becomes holy roman emperor. he has a very fun dangerous -- and possibly a little unstable -- edge to him that he maybe has a little in the italian but that he only really displays in the recitative before his big aria in the original. put simply in the chandos translation he becomes... kind of a madman rather than an 18-year-old very ill-suited to the absolute power that he has.

considering that the obvious reference with ernani is "...napoleon went a bit far, didn't he?", that makes a lot of sense as a character note. and it also gives us the extremely funny line "THE HOLY WILL OF HEAVEN SHALL NOW BE MYYYY WILL!" (which is a fairly accurate translation of "la volunta del ciel sara la mia!" -- "the will of heaven shall be mine!"), but changes the emphasis a little from the implied "oh boy the opportunity to serve god!" to "i'm god now my good bitches". (and, finally, the utterly skeevy line "come with me and let me spoil you", which is in an otherwise very skeevy translation of a not particularly skeevy aria in the italian.)

my one criticism of the chandos ernani is more that the italian ernani already has objectively a perfect line in it, and that is "sangue sangue vendetta vendetta" ("blood blood revenge revenge"). while the chandos translation gives it its best go with "bloodshed bloodshed and vengeance and vengeance" i don't think anything will ever be able to truly equal "sangue sangue vendetta vendetta".

i would say though that like... opera in translation isn't actually a new thing. there are various operas that were either premiered very close to each other in different languages (trovatore/trouvere and vespri) or that have multiple versions in different languages (don carlos/don carlo). with singing some languages are more difficult than others and italian is generally accepted as one of the easier ones and english one of the more difficult ones/one with a higher barrier to entry so it does have to be a bit of a balancing act between accessibility for the performers and the audience. but it isn't something that is... necessarily a big deal.

in re. subtitles (or surtitles, since they're projected above the stage) specifically, i trust them less than i (would be inclined to) trust a translated performance that admits to being in translation. they can both be manipulated to get across what the person doing the surtitles wants but i like it less when it's surtitles, not least because i find it distracting when it's a performance of an opera that i know and i catch a surtitle that's like. "that is not what that means?"

the most egregious example of that was in the royal opera's don giovanni, which has many problems, including translating "scellerato!" "sconsigliata!" (which i would be inclined to translate as "bastard!" "if you don't shut up...", or something similar) as "you are bad!" "so are you!" now, this was... generally an incompetent and insensitive production of the opera, and so they changed it from donna anna essentially chasing this guy out of her room after he tried to assault her to "actually she wanted it". but also i didn't personally like that, and it was a stupid way to translate it.

#ask #ollie considers #opera tag #toobaornottooba #what is your song o?#really didn't like that don giovanni #fun seeing it with a friend though #but for one thing... abuse apologia #and also i got a headache from it #text

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sergeantsporks · 3 years

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Another Shot At Life

Rating: General Audiences, Gen

TW: Child abuse, emotional manipulation

Ao3

Hunter accidentally makes his way into the human realm and can't get back home. But he's discovering that might not be such a bad thing.

Ch 3/7: Rainstorm

Ch 1, Ch 2

Vee wrinkled her nose at Hunter as she passed him. “Are you seriously never going to change?”

Hunter tugged his cloak more firmly around him, setting down his sketch of the portal door. “I like my uniform. It reminds me of home.” He pulled off his gloves. He’d need titan blood to get home—he couldn’t risk anything happening to the bit on his gloves.

“You’re going to start smelling.”

“Vee, be nice,” Camila commented as she strode by, “But—yeah, Hunter, I think she might be right.” She grabbed some odd… weapon, maybe? It was like cloth attached to a curved handle. “I’ve only got a couple of appointments today, I should be home soon. We’ll watch something together, I’ll make popcorn. You’ll like popcorn, Hunter.”

Hunter jumped up, skidding in front of the door. “Are you crazy?” he yelped.

“What?”

“It’s pouring out there!”

Camila blinked. “Uh… yeah? That’s why I have an umbrella? Sweet of you to be concerned, though, thank you.”

Vee giggled. “Oh! Hunter, the rain doesn’t boil here.”

That was what Uncle Belos had told him, but... Hunter glared distrustfully out the window at the water pouring down from the sky. “Are you sure?”

Camila stepped out onto the porch, holding up her cane weapon. It extended, forming a canopy over her head. She held a hand out to Hunter. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

He gingerly reached for her hand, and she grabbed it, pulling him under the… umbrella? She gently tugged him out from under the porch overhang, splashing into a puddle. He scooted closer to her, staying under the protective dome of the umbrella.

Camila held one hand outside of the canopy, the raindrops splashing harmlessly on her skin. “See? Not boiling. You try.”

Hunter tentatively reached out, his hand stalling at the edge of the umbrella’s protective area. Camila nudged his hand out, and he winced as the first raindrops hit his skin, reflexively jerking his hand back in.

It was fine. No burns. No heat. He poked one finger out, drawing it back in quickly. Still nothing.

Camila put her hand over his, and he tensed. She gave his hand a squeeze. “Hunter. I promise I won’t hurt you.” He reluctantly let her pull his hand out in the rain, flipping it palm-up, and cool, fat droplets splattered down on his open hand. “See?”

Hunter blinked at the rain, wiggling his not-burning fingers. “…Huh.”

Camila walked him back to the porch. “I have to go back now, see you two soon.”

She got in her car and drove off. Hunter stood on the porch, watching the rain.

“Are you going to come inside?” Vee asked in the doorway.

Hunter stuck his hand out in the rain, then pulled it back in quickly. Nope. Still not boiling.

“Hunter?”

Hunter took a deep breath, and stepped out into the rain, tilting his face up. Raindrops splattered down his face, and he was almost instantly soaked. He kicked a puddle, and a laugh escaped his mouth. It didn’t boil. It really didn’t. He whirled back around to face Vee.

“It doesn’t boil!”

She looked vaguely amused by the whole thing. “No, it doesn’t.”

Hunter jumped in a puddle, soaking his feet. “Ha!” He dashed up to the house and grabbed Vee’s hands, dragging her out into the rain. “Isn’t this great?!”

She kicked a puddle at him. “I’m cold-blooded!”

“Oh. Yeah. It’s not that cold, though.”

Lightning flashed across the sky, followed by an echoing boom, and Vee shrieked, disappearing into the house. Hunter gave the sky a regretful look, and followed her, closing the door behind him. Red fluttered to his shoulder, then chirped irritatedly at how wet he was, and flew back into the air, shaking water off of its feathers. Vee was nowhere in sight, but she’d left behind puddles of water that he followed up the stairs and to her closed door. He tried the knob. She hadn’t locked it this time.

Hunter poked his head in the room. “Vee?”

Her eyes blinked at him from under the bed, and she hissed.

Hunter reached under the bed. “Hey, what are you—”

Sharp, needlelike teeth pierced his hand, and he jerked back. “Ow! Hey, what’s wrong with you?!”

“I don’t want to,” she yelled, “Go away!”

Red landed on the ground, starting to hop under the bed, chirping softly. Hunter reached out and grabbed it. “No! She’s scared, she might hurt you on accident!”

Red warbled reproachfully at him, and gently pecked his fingers until he let go. The little palisman hopped closer to Vee, nudging her hand and chirping reassuringly that she was okay, and no one would hurt her—not that she could understand it.

“Vee?”

There was another peal of thunder, and Vee hissed again.

Hunter got flat on his stomach, peering under the bed at the basilisk. “Hey. Does Camila know that you’re scared of thunder?”

Vee shook her head.

“Okay. I won’t tell.”

Vee crawled out from under the bed, cuddling Red to her chest. She flinched as another peal of thunder echoed, but didn’t go back under the bed. “Why would I want to hide it from her?”

Hunter sat up. “I—uh—I mean…” he thought about it. “I—I don’t know?”

Vee nudged him. “You’re soaked.”

“So are you.”

“Yeah, guess I am.” Vee stood up. “I’m going to change into something dry. You should do the same.”

Hunter squeezed water out of his cape. “I’m fine.”

“You’re going to catch a cold, and you’re going to get the couch soaking wet.” Vee opened a closet and threw a towel at him. “Get changed.”

Hunter made a face at her, but traipsed back down the stairs, picking up the clothes Camila had left for him. They were a bit big, but not so big he couldn’t just put his belt back on. Goosebumps rose on his bare arms. He did not like this. There was no defensive value to this outfit. He glanced regretfully at his dripping-wet armor. The padding on the inside of that would take a while to dry out. He shouldn’t have gone out into the rain wearing it.

There was another rumble of thunder, and Hunter heard a crash from upstairs. When he got up there, Vee was under the bed again. She didn’t hiss when she saw him, though—a little voice in the back of his head said it was because he wasn’t wearing the uniform of her abusers.

Hunter reached under the bed again gingerly, ready to pull his hand back if she tried to bite him again. “Hey—c’mon out, it’s just noise.”

Vee grabbed his hand, pulling his arm under the bed. “Whoa. You’ve got a lot of scars.”

Hunter yanked his arm away, tugging at the short sleeves he was wearing in a useless effort to cover all of his arms. “Hey! Don’t…”

Vee crawled out from under the bed, sitting next to him. She tugged up the sleeve of her own hoodie and held up her wrists, which had thick scars on them. “They kept us chained up, and the manacles rubbed away the skin.” She tugged the hoodie sleeves back down. “No matter what form I take, the scars still follow me.” She stared at him expectantly.

Hunter crossed his arms, staring up at the ceiling. “When I was… little… I didn’t listen. I was always getting into trouble. Emperor Belos, he… he has a condition. And… he gets these attacks. And… when I was still new, I… I wanted to help. And… he would lash out. It wasn’t his fault,” he added hastily, “He isn’t trying to hurt me, he can’t control himself during the attacks, and I kept getting too close, and… And then when I got older, I finally learned my lesson and stopped trying to help. It was my fault. All of them were—I never listened, I talked back, I was awful.”

Vee set Red in his lap. “Hey, Hunter? How many of those scars actually happened during an attack?”

“A-all of them.” Hunter scratched his palisman’s head, hands trembling. “I would set him off when I misbehaved, because emotion makes curses act up, you know, so when I made him mad, it would—”

“Hunter!”

He jumped. “What?!”

“That’s not—he hurt you!”

“It was my fault! I deserved it!”

Vee groaned, putting her head in her hands. “You need help.”

Hunter crossed his arms again, pressing his arms to his stomach so that the extra fabric of the shirt would hide the scars. “I’m fine.”

Vee sighed, opening her closet door and tossing him an over-sized hoodie. “Whatever you say.”

He tugged the hoodie over his head, and relief swept over him when his scars were covered up. “Um… Don’t…”

“Let me guess; tell Camila?”

Hunter pulled the hood of the sweater up, twisting the drawstring around his finger. “Yeah. That.”

“Hunter, Camila is… she’s a good person. You don’t have to hide anything from her. What are you scared she’ll do?”

“I—I don’t know, I just…”

“She won’t hurt you.”

“I know that, I just feel like…”

“Feel like what?”

“I don’t know!”

“Hunter?”

Hunter threw his hands up in the air, startling his palisman. “I just—I’m scared. Okay? I don’t know what I’m scared of, I’m just scared. And I know it’s stupid! I know you keep telling me that Camila won’t hurt me, I know she hasn’t hurt me, there’s no reason, I just… I just still feel like I need to hide.”

“Who are you hiding from?”

“Camila. Kikimora. Belos—I don’t know. I just…”

Red snuggled into his hood, chirping softly.

It’s okay. I’m here.

Hunter pulled his knees up to his chest. “Why do you hide from the thunder?” he shot back at Vee, “It can’t hurt you, it’s just sound, and hiding under the bed isn’t going to protect you from it.”

Vee sighed. “Yeah. Okay. That’s fair.” She stood up. “Did I ever teach you how to use the stove?”

“I know how to use a stove.”

“Okay, come on, then. I’m freezing—you owe me some hot chocolate.”

Xxx

Camila shook water off of her umbrella, leaning it against the door and stepping inside the house. Vee was huddled under a pile of blankets, Red the cardinal perched on her head, and Hunter was sketching that odd door picture again.

“Oh, hey, you got changed!”

He nodded. “My uniform got soaked.”

“Anything interesting happen while I was gone?”

Vee shot Hunter a very pointed glance that Camila wasn’t sure she wanted to know the meaning behind, and nodded. “It thundered, and it really scared me.”

“Aw, Vee, mija, I’m so sorry. I’ll pick up some earplugs the next time I go shopping, okay?”

“Thanks, Camila.” Vee extended a hand from her blankets and scratched Red under the chin. “Red helped me through it.”

“Really? That’s sweet.” Camila smiled at Hunter. “Thank you for sharing your palisman with Vee. That was very nice of you.”

His whole face turned beet red and he flipped his hood up, pulling the drawstrings tight and mumbling something incomprehensible.

Camila set her purse down. “Alright what do we want to watch? Tomorrow’s my day off, so we can stay up late.”

Vee brightened. “I want to watch Stephen Universe!”

“Again?”

Vee shrugged. “I really like Amethyst. Besides, I think Hunter will like it.”

Camila laughed. “Alright, Stephen Universe it is.”

Xxx

“I’m going to tell the emperor.”

You can’t hide from me, Hunter.

“Red!” Hunter snapped awake, fumbling for his palisman. The bird landed on his chest.

It’s okay. I’m here.

Hunter gently patted the bird, sinking back into sleep. “Yourrrrrre okay,” he murmured, closing his eyes again. “You’re…”

Don’t talk back to me!

Hunter, you cannot upset me! The curse will hurt you.

“Hunter?”

Someone shook him, and Hunter lashed out, punching Camila right in the face.

The blood drained from his face, and he put his hands to his mouth. Oh, Titan. Oh, he’d—oh, no. “Sorry,” he squeaked.

“Ow!” Camila fell backwards, holding her nose. “Ow—you’ve got a strong arm.”

Hunter didn’t move. He held stock still, eying her warily. Camila was nice, but he’d just attacked her. That wouldn’t just fly.

“Sorry if I startled you. It was just—you looked like you were having a nightmare.” She blinked at him, her face lit up by the blue glow of the TV. “Hunter? Hello? Are you okay? Say something.”

“Sorry,” he said again.

“Hey—it’s okay. Heck, I’ve gotten bitten by Vee when I startled her before. If anything, I should learn not to surprise people. Are you…”

Hunter curled his knees to his chest, resting his chin on his knees. “Just… a nightmare.”

Camila gingerly reached out, putting her hand on his shoulder. It was… odd. It felt nice. Comforting, even. “Hunter, I… I know you don’t like talking about your home life, but has Belos… does he hurt you?”

Hunter recoiled. Why did everyone keep going on about that?! “Not on purpose! I—it’s the curse, and if I make him mad, it makes him lash out, and—it’s my fault, really.”

“Hunter, he shouldn’t hurt you, curse or no!

“It’s not his fault!”

Camila shook her head. “There is no excuse, Hunter. None. I don’t care if he has a curse. He shouldn’t—and he certainly shouldn’t blame you for it.” Camila wrapped her arms around him. “I am so, so sorry that he made you feel like you were the problem. And I am so glad that you’re here now, instead of there.”

Hunter felt tears spring into his eyes. No one had ever… apologized to him. And Camila was just so… warm. And soft. And he hadn’t even had to do anything—she didn’t ask him to do anything, she didn’t need him to do anything, she just… wanted to help him. She was the exact opposite of Uncle Belos.

And it was worrying how much he liked that.

#toh #the owl house #toh fanfiction #toh hunter #camila noceda #vee noceda #my writing

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kellyvela · 3 years

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Has GRRM ever said in any interview or on his blog that he hates Sansa's complete storyline after 4th season? I dont really follow all of his fan/media interactions but from what I can recall he has spoken abt how LF in books wont give sansa to ramsay or how noone had issue when Jeyne was given the Ramsay storyline in books etc. Asking this question to you bcs you rightly point out how ppl misunderstood his interviews/posts ( sansans/targ stans etc) & I cant recall him ever saying he 'hates' sansa's story in the later seasons of the show ( not s5 in particular but even s6 to s8).

Capclave 2013:

A change that has repercussions for season 4 is Marillion’s tongue removal from the first season. Martin said that the change was made (from an anonymous singer being the victim of a de-tonguing) because they wanted Joffrey to maim someone the audience would recognize. He believes this is an issue because of the part the singer plays in Sansa’s storyline, how he affects her interactions with others in the book, and he doesn’t believe another character will be fulfilling that role on Game of Thrones.

—GRRM talks season 4 & beyond - Winter is Coming - October 13, 2013

2014 Fan Reports about Capclave 2013 (*):

In a convention panel this year, George said on the record that he had no idea what they were doing with Sansa or where they’re taking her storyline, which now makes sense perhaps. He was not pleased when he was talking about it, so who knows what’s going to happen with her! Knowing GRRM, that could mean they’re going off the canon reservation, and/or that they’re going to be making a lot of shit up

I have notes I’ll be responding to (thanks!) but enough people commented about Sansa that I thought I’d share that tidbit, since it happened back in September iirc (was the same panel where he criticized the exclusion of Tyrell brothers)

—starkalypse - June 3, 2014

GRRM’s comments at capclave about Sansa (which I was in the third row for, for those asking about legitimacy) were among others during the panel that had a general theme of dissatisfaction with show changes. He was not in good spirits for that con and didn’t really have anything positive to say regarding the show. So take it with a grain of salt; there are deviations away from the books in the episodes he gets writers credit for, so maybe they’re doing something stupid or they really don’t have a gameplan!

—starkalypse - June 4, 2014

(*) These reports were posted in June 2014, during the airing of Game of Thrones Season 4, about Capclave 2013 that happened in October 2013.

Just after the rape episode:

How many children did Scarlett O’Hara have? Three, in the novel. One, in the movie. None, in real life: she was a fictional character, she never existed. The show is the show, the books are the books; two different tellings of the same story.

There have been differences between the novels and the television show since the first episode of season one. And for just as long, I have been talking about the butterfly effect. Small changes lead to larger changes lead to huge changes. HBO is more than forty hours into the impossible and demanding task of adapting my lengthy (extremely) and complex (exceedingly) novels, with their layers of plots and subplots, their twists and contradictions and unreliable narrators, viewpoint shifts and ambiguities, and a cast of characters in the hundreds.

There has seldom been any TV series as faithful to its source material, by and large (if you doubt that, talk to the Harry Dresden fans, or readers of the Sookie Stackhouse novels, or the fans of the original WALKING DEAD comic books)… but the longer the show goes on, the bigger the butterflies become. And now we have reached the point where the beat of butterfly wings is stirring up storms, like the one presently engulfing my email.

Prose and television have different strengths, different weaknesses, different requirements.

David and Dan and Bryan and HBO are trying to make the best television series that they can.

And over here I am trying to write the best novels that I can.

And yes, more and more, they differ. Two roads diverging in the dark of the woods, I suppose… but all of us are still intending that at the end we will arrive at the same place.

In the meantime, we hope that the readers and viewers both enjoy the journey. Or journeys, as the case may be. Sometimes butterflies grow into dragons.

—The Show, the Books - Not A Blog - May 18, 2015

Report about the last Game of Thrones Script that GRRM wrote:

No Wedding for Sansa and Ramsay: Without question, one of the most controversial changes the show made in trying to streamline the books was by slotting Sansa into the role of Ramsay’s wife and rape victim in Season 5. In the books, Ramsay marries and assaults Sansa’s best childhood friend, Jeyne Poole—who is being forced to impersonate Arya—instead. (You can actually see Jeyne briefly sitting next to Sansa in the show’s pilot.)

At the time Martin wrote this script, though, substituting Sansa for Jeyne was not yet the plan. Martin has Roose Bolton tell his bastard son: “We have a much better match in mind for you. A match to help House Bolton hold the north. Arya Stark.” It should be noted, however, that in Martin’s script, Sansa isn’t free from menace either. At his own wedding-day breakfast, Joffrey still threatens to rape the older Stark sister—once he’s “gotten Margaery with child.”)

—Game of Thrones: The Secrets of George R.R. Martin’s Final Script - Vanity Fair - December 7, 2018

A month before the Game of Throne S8 Finale:

Sansa’s story, in particular, has really deviated from the books. Ramsay Bolton — that marriage obviously was with a different character. When they start deviating like that, did you initially have any emotional reaction, even though you worked in Hollywood for many years yourself?

GRRM: Well, yeah — of course you have an emotional reaction. I mean, would I prefer they do it exactly the way I did it? Sure. But I’ve been on the other side of it, too. I’ve adapted work by other people, and I didn’t do it exactly the way they did it, so ….

Some of the deviation, of course, is because I’ve been so slow with these books. I really should’ve finished this thing four years ago — and if I had, maybe it would be telling a different story here. It’s two variations of the same story, or a similar story, and you get that whenever anything is adapted. The analogy I’ve often used is, to ask how many children did Scarlett O’Hara have? Do you know the answer to that?

I know it’s different in the book and the movie …

GRRM: Three children in the book, one by each husband. She had one child in the movie. And in real life, of course, Scarlett O’Hara had no children, because she never existed. Margaret Mitchell made her up. The book is there. You can pick it up and read Mitchell’s version of it, or you can see the movie and see David Selznick’s version of it. I think they’re both true to the spirit of the work, and hopefully that’s also true of Game of Thrones on one hand, and A Song of Ice and Fire on the other hand.

—George R.R. Martin on the Stark Sisters and Ending ‘Game of Thrones’ - RollingStone - April 22, 2019

James Hibberd’s Book:

GEORGE R. R. MARTIN: Jeyne Poole was included in the pilot—she’s shown giggling next to Sansa—but she’s never seen or referred to again. I actually wrote Jeyne into “The Pointy End,” my first script, when Arya killed the stableboy. I had some stuff with Jeyne running to Sansa being all hysterical and dialogue in the council chamber with Littlefinger saying, “Give her to me, I’ll make sure she doesn’t cause any trouble.” That was dropped.

DAVID BENIOFF: Sansa is a character we care about almost more than any other. We really wanted Sansa to play a major part in that season. If we were going to stay absolutely faithful to the book, it was going to be very hard to do that. There was a subplot we loved from the books, but it was a character not involved in the show.

GEORGE R. R. MARTIN: I was trying to set up Jeyne for her future role as the false Arya. The real Arya has escaped and is presumed dead. But this girl has been in Littlefinger’s control for years, and he’s been training her. She knows Winterfell, has the proper northern accent, and can pose as Arya. Who the hell knows what a little girl you met two years ago looks like? When you’re a lord visiting Winterfell, are you going to pay attention to the little kids running around? So she can pull off the impersonation. Not having Jeyne, they used Sansa for that. Is that better or worse? You can make your decision there. Oddly, I never got pushback for that in the book because nobody cared about Jeyne Poole that much. They care about Sansa.

—Fire Cannot Kill a Dragon: Game of Thrones and the Official Untold Story of the Epic Series by James Hibberd - October 6, 2020

GEORGE R. R. MARTIN: My Littlefinger would have never turned Sansa over to Ramsay. Never. He’s obsessed with her. Half the time he thinks she’s the daughter he never had—that he wishes he had, if he’d married Catelyn. And half the time he thinks she is Catelyn, and he wants her for himself. He’s not going to give her to somebody who would do bad things to her. That’s going to be very different in the books.

—Fire Cannot Kill a Dragon: Game of Thrones and the Official Untold Story of the Epic Series by James Hibberd - October 6, 2020

I hope it helps you.

Thanks for your message.

#sansa stark #grrm

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mysticdragon3md3 · 3 years

Video

youtube

Ranma ½ is GENIUS. Here’s Why by Bonsai Pop

The thing I really appreciated about Ranma ½ when I was younger, was that it was a discussion about gender without getting sidetracked by sex, the way most “sex comedies” did, especially at the time. At the time, publishers tried to market Ranma ½ as a “sex comedy” in the vein of raunchy college-setting Hollywood movies or fanservicy Male Gaze series (compare “Futaba-kun Change” or the proceeding “harem genre” that Ranma ½ started). But Ranma ½ felt more like a discussion about gender more than sex, or even more than sexuality. And being an AroAce kid, who didn’t know what AroAce was at the time, but was very confused about my gender, I really appreciated Ranma ½’s focus on gender over sex, fanservice, and heterosexuals navigating (sexual) relationships—which, I *cannot* express enough, was the saturated majority of all anime/manga, that even came close to discussing gender, at the time. I just wanted a discussion about gender, gender roles, complaining about presumed traditional ideas about gender, and how to define one’s own gender despite society’s pressures about gender. I wanted a discussion about Strength, that the martial arts genre did so often, without an advocation for sexist ideals, toxic masculinity, stereotypes about “feminine” being weaker (even as warriors), fixated only on romance, or any number of female stereotypes, etc. I feel like I can’t remind people enough of how it was back then, when not only were these toxic mysoginist ideas portrayed frequently, but they were also portrayed as good, true, “right”, or unquestioned. At least when Ranma Saotome was being a sexist jerk, he was punished for that terrible thinking or eventually had to reconcile with his dissonance. And Akane Tendo was revolutionary at that time too. It used to be that on the Shonen genre side, we had only hyper fem, passive, romance-fixated, love interests, OR nagging, cold female characters that really felt like the author was conveying all their horrible views on women in general, OR sexy eye-candy that had close-ups on their boobs or butt so frequently, that it completely made their lack of focus on romance or anything else in their personalities, secondary. Then on the Shoujo genre side, we had girls who were fixated on nothing but romance, constantly jealous and possessive—and often over guys who hadn’t even proven themselves worthwhile to pursue romantically. Let’s face it: A lot of Shoujo leading men were often jerks, treated their female love interests badly, and for some reason, she was just supposed to play the devoted “Lady Murasaki” and be totally “in love” with him. Whyyyyyyyyyy????????????? Even worse on the Shonen genre side too, because he treats her badly, it doesn’t get portrayed as bad treatment, he doesn’t understand why she’s angry, so she just looks like a volatile nag all the time, often existing only to be objectified or serve as a flimsy motive for his character arcs and actions. It was a pretty bad time. Not that now has eliminated those problems, but when Ranma ½ and Akane Tendo seem like the shining lights of something different, maybe then you can understand how much I sorely needed Ranma ½ and Akane Tendo at that time.

Really surprised that this video essay didn’t mention Jackie Chan. The thing that differentiated Ranma ½ from so many martial arts battle anime/manga at the time, was that Ranma ½’s style of martial arts was inspired by Jackie Chan. Meanwhile, all the other Shonen martial arts manga/anime were so serious and based more on “cool”, “action” genre toned martial arts movies.

I’m intrigued by this video essay’s idea that Ranma ½ the series isn’t sexist, but rather, characters within the series are sexist, and are so in order to make a point about how them being like that is messed up. I need to grapple with this because one of my problems in looking back at Ranma ½ is that it can be a little transphobic and/or homophobic at times. Like, I’ll never forget when Tsubasa Kurenai was introduced and, Akane, this character that we’re supposed to completely sympathize with during this series, just keeps screaming in Tsubasa’s face that they are a “pervert”, simply because it’s revealed that Tsubasa identifies as a boy but dresses as a girl. I think the episode just ended like that, and that was supposed to be a joke, but I don’t know whether the reveal’s shock intended on the audience was supposed to be conveyed through Akane and we were expected to have the same reactions as her, or if we were supposed to be shocked at Akane’s reactions and her reactions being ridiculous were the joke. I dunno; it was a long time ago, I don’t remember much context, and I really should look it back up. But frankly, there’s a lot of Ranma ½ to sift through and that’s more time than I have, writing this post. Akane does seem to repeatedly have instances of being perfectly nice to characters, but when she discovers they’re actually guys, she spends a lot of time yelling “pervert” in their faces. Sometimes I don’t know if we’re meant to see how ridiculous Akane is being or if we’re meant to agree with her. Again, I watched/read the series a long time ago, and maybe if I re-watched/re-read it now, it would be clear to older me. Because, when it happens between Akane and Ranma, Ranma has a specific line, grummbling about how Akane was perfectly nice to him, up until she found out he was actually a boy. And Ranma was a bit nice in his characterization up until that early line of dialogue, so maybe we were supposed to be on his side in that thought. So maybe Akane spending the rest of the series yelling “pervert” at Ranma (repeated so often it’s essentially their running gag), is supposed to be a joke laughing at how irrational Akane is being. o.o? I’d hate to think we’re supposed to be on Akane’s side, repeatedly calling Ranma a “pervert” over a curse that he had no control over getting, and early on was portrayed as a misfortune that the audience was supposed to sympathize and pity him over. Maybe the whole thing is supposed to point out Akane’s flaws, since everyone in the series is pretty messed up. (Even Kasumi unsettled me a bit when I was younger, in that she dropped her entire life, to replace her mother’s role when she died. For me, being a young girl who didn’t buy into those traditional female roles, that were still at the time, strongly pushed onto girls in society, that was a little unsettling. Still love Kasumi as a person though.) Akane did have reason to “hate boys”, as the series specifically states early on, but I’d like to think that she was given this flaw as a point to grow away from. Just as this video essay calls to attention Ranma being sexist and, over the series, eventually growing out of it. But back when I was young and initially into Ranma ½, I feared that some of these sexist or even homophobic ideas in Ranma ½ were actually reflective of thoughts that Rumiko Takahashi advocated. After all, there’s a point in Maison Ikkoku where Kyoko berates herself by saying all women are fools. Maybe I was too young to see the nuance in a character berating her own mistakes in her love live, vs the implication that all women are “properly” stereotyped into being obsessed with love and end up acting foolish for it. Nowadays, I can see how we can berate ourselves whenever our specific actions can slot us into generalized stereotypes, and we curse ourselves for falling into proving stereotypes true on occaision. But back then, when I was younger and watching Ranma ½ for the first time and reading Maison Ikkoku for the first time, I was afraid that such lines were reflective of Takahashi believing such stereotypes as truth. Which is why I was so happy when sometime after Ranma ½, Inuyasha had a canonically gay character, and instead of Inuyasha calling him a pervert the entire time, he just got exasperated with his non-stop flirting, the way that all the female characters from Ranma ½ are tired of guys who won’t take “no” for an answer. At the time, I thought, “Yay! Takahashi has evolved to a less homophobic stance!” But maybe, all this time, she was always against such things, and merely portraying them, even through characters we were supposed to sympathize with, merely to show how messed up such ideas are. I really like that thought which this video essay presented.

But I will disagree with this video essay on 1 thing: The manga is better. I’m not trying to be elitist. I realize that comedy has a very subjective sensibilities, and the anime leans into awkward silence type comedy, whereas I am sick of that type of comedy. But so many visual gags and jokes in the manga, and Rumiko Takahashi’s style in general, involve panels that are almost completely re-drawn, with only 1 element changed—the gag element—suggesting that the eye is supposed to read from panel to panel quickly (since the human eyes/brain filters out a lack of change, and is hard-wired to focus on changes from previous conditions). To me, this suggests quick punchlines, whose sudden oddity is supposed to shock, implying an intended fast pacing to the jokes. And yeah, Takahashi will draw seemingly normal scenes, detailed with all the normalcies of a commonly recognizable environment, then suddenly the next panel is exactly the same except a character is contorted into a silly pose or an absolutely ridiculous creature with an intentionally nonsensical facial expression has suddenly appeared, amid that completely “normal” scene, with all its “normal” details _redrawn_. It’s why the “evil oni” episode in Ranma ½ had a ridiculous face, despite its supposedly ominous background. In fact, anywhere Takahashi can fit a gag face, especially if it contradicts the surrounding scene’s/story’s serious tone, she will do it. She has even said in interviews that if scenes are too serious, she will try to put in a gag in the corner. I remember reading Maison Ikkoku during a depressive episode (for both me and Godai) and suddenly Yotsuya had poked his head through a hole in the wall, into the scene, shining a flashlight onto his own face, like a kid telling a ghost story, all while he made funny faces and Takahashi’s typical gag with the sign language “I love you” gesture. The woman cannot let things stay serious (except for Mermaid Saga, parts of Inuyasha, and some short stories), and I love her for it! ^o^ But the way she suddenly injects ridiculousness into scenes and character designs, suggest, at least to me, an intended fast paced delivery with the jokes. That sudden shock when you notice Yotsuya making faces in the corner of a depressing scene. That sudden shock, when Ranma is hiding from his mother, and is clinging to the ceiling or futons like Spiderman, and Akane is just supposed to act natural so Ranma’s mom won’t notice where he’s hiding. To me, this suggests the punchline is supposed to come at you like a sudden punch, unlike awkwardness that hangs in the air. So when the anime tries to make the joke linger, I just don’t enjoy it as much as when my brain can dictate the faster pacing I want (and believe better fits) while reading the Ranma ½ manga.

Also, the manga is better because those manga filler episodes were not as well written as the manga. Rumiko Takahashi is a master of short stories. And that shows when you run into the less-effective filler anime episodes–even when you don’t know they’re filler episodes! I remember watching the Ranma ½ anime before reading the manga, before there was even internet lists of which were the filler episodes, and coincidentally, all the filler episodes did not make me laugh out loud, whereas every episode up until that point, had made me uncontrollably laugh. I feel like the anime thought that because Ranma ½ was an episodic, very silly series, they could just insert anything and it would fit. But clearly, only the manga-based episodes—and even individual scenes!—had the nuance of Takahashi’s writing and pacing, to make even an episodic, ridiculous series work.

Also, I love how this video essay just lavishes the love on Rumiko Takahashi. ^o^

Another thing this video essay pointed out that I appreciate about Ranma ½ is how indifferent Ranma is to all the advances of his suitors or even accidental fanservice. All the consequential “harem genre” series that tried to emulate Ranma ½ always seemed to include male protagonists who were surrogates for the audiences’ intended horny reactions. But Ranma was neither turned on, enticed, nor tantalized by even accidental fanservice falling into his lap. (As Mother’s Basement has noted, harem genre protagonist have a penchant for accidentally falling and grabbing a girls’ boobs, or their face falling into her boobs, or accidentally put into a position to forcibly see up her skirt, etc.) If anything, he’s more embarassed that he accidentally walked in on girls in undress, rather than enjoying the view OR reacting so long, that the scene drags on, fixating on the accidental nudity/groping/fanserivce. And I was about to postulate that maybe because most harem genre and fanservice series are usually made by straight men for an audience with a Male Gaze. But Takahashi wrote Maison Ikkoku’s Godai, right before she created Ranma ½, and he very much enjoyed the view, took peeks, and fixated on any accidental fanservice. So it’s actually Ranma himself who had reactions and a perspective that were very agreeable to this asexual.

I hadn’t noticed before this video essay said it, but Happosai really is condemned much more for being the “pervy old man” archetype, whereas other series are very permissive towards that same archetype, even when they’re being sexual predators. I’d like to attribute this to Takahashi bringing a woman’s perspective, but Sailormoon was also written by a woman and (if I remember correctly) Rei’s grandpa’s pervy ways were reprimanded in only 1 episode then permitted as a running gag in the rest of the series (thankfully, not often). Then again, lots of the Shoujo genre also advocated for many toxic traditional ideas about gender (like girls picking romantic partners who don’t respect them, and girls being fully devoted/invested in such guys, because they “once” meet the bare minimum for human decency by being nice to them once). So maybe it was uniquely Takahashi’s prerogative to not let the “pervy old man” archetype slide as supposedly “endearing” silliness.

#ranma 1/2 #ranma1half #rumiko takahashi #video essay #analysis #gender #manga #anime #nostalgia #old otaku #martial arts genre #shonen genre #reactions #reminicing

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gra-sonas · 3 years

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Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019) Rating: General Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Michael Guerin/Alex Manes Characters: Alex Manes, Michael Guerin Additional Tags: Canon Disabled Character, Dogs

Summary:

Alex's face softens. "I know you're careful. Sorry, it's just hard not to worry. But back again to my initial question. Do you know what today is?”

"I don't know, Alex. It's February 13th, so I didn't forget Valentine's Day or something. We ruled out the thing at Isobel's, and it's still Saturday. No matter how much I'm wrecking my brain, I can't think of anything else. Please tell me I didn't forget anything important."

"No, you didn't, no worries. I'll put you out of your misery. What do you think about taking a short trip across town?"

This is my contribution for day 3 of @malex-cupid. 3.3K of fluffy Malex.

Dialogue prompt: “Do you know what today is?”

-------------

“Do you know what today is?”

Michael pretends to think about the answer before he says "Saturday."

Alex rolls his eyes. "Smartass."

Michael smirks. "Takes one to know one."

Alex smirks back. "I'm badass," he says.

Michael laughs. "True."

"Come on, Michael, try again. What day is today?"

Michael groans. "It's that stupid thing Isobel roped us into attending, isn't it? I thought it was next weekend."

"That one is next weekend. Which reminds me, we have to get our suits from the cleaners." Alex pulls a face. He hates wearing formal attire, especially ties. But Isobel would have their heads if they didn't dress up for her fancy party.

"We'll get through it together, and any chance we get, we'll hide in one of Isobel's guest rooms, and I'll suck you off." Michael waggles his eyebrows suggestively. He looks ridiculous, but it makes Alex laugh.

"If she catches us, we won't live to see another day," he points out.

"Well, I'll have to be fast then. It's unfortunate that she also can pick locks with her brain these days."

"You're not going to suck me off in two minutes, if anything I'll claim that my stump's hurting and we can go home early, where we'll take our sweet time sucking each other off."

Michael looks worried. "Has your stump given you any trouble lately? Should I take a look at the prothesis?"

Alex smiles. "No, Michael. It fits perfectly, and for some reason it even adjusts to the occasional swelling? I have no idea how you engineered it, but it almost feels as if the prosthetic becomes a part of me when I put it on. It's incredible, and it has given me that much more quality of life." He leans closer and kisses Michael, soft and sweet. Michael beams.

"I'm so glad. The material is so cool, I'm glad that I decided to give it a try, and now that I no longer need to rebuild a working console, I want to find out what other useful things I can build using it."

"As long as you are careful and—," Alex starts.

"Yes, I know," Michael interrupts him. "No worries, I've been paranoid about hiding who and what I am my entire conscious life on this planet. I won't risk it now just to brag about an invention that includes alien tech."

Alex's face softens. "I know you're careful. Sorry, it's just hard not to worry. But back again to my initial question. Do you know what today is?”

"No, you didn't, no worries. I'll put you out of your misery. What do you think about taking a short trip across town?"

Michael nods. "Sure, I have no other plans for today. Can we drive past the Crashdown to pick up some coffee?"

Alex looks at his watch. "If we call from the car and ask whether Javier could bring our order to the curb, we can do that. But we have to leave now. We have an appointment at eleven."

Michael pulls Alex up from the couch. "Okay, let's go. I'm really curious what you're up to!"

They call the Crashdown from the car and Arturo himself stands at the curb to hand them coffee and a box with heart shaped cookies through the window. Michael tips him generously, and then they're on their way again.

When they pull up outside of a red building fifteen minutes later, Michael's eyes widen.

"Alex, this is the animal shelter. What are we doing here?"

Alex turns around in his seat to face Michael. "Well, I thought we could go inside and look at all the rescue dogs in there, and if we like one, and the dog likes us, that we should take them home for a trial run. What do you think?"

Michael's eyes are wet. "Alex. This is—perfect. So much better than some kitschy Valentine's gift. Don't get me wrong, any gift from you would be amazing, but a dog, Alex. A dog! We've talked about this so often. Why now?"

Alex's smile softens. "Because we talked about it so often. It's pretty obvious how much you want a dog, and honestly, I want one, too. My therapist has talked about a therapy dog in the past, but I think a dog that's ours is even better. It can either stay with me while you're working, or come with you to the junkyard when I'm meeting clients. And if push comes to shove, we have a large yard where the dog can stay on its own for a couple of hours."

Michael flings himself across the car's middle console and pulls Alex into a fierce hug. "Thank you, Alex. Best pre-Valentine's gift ever."

Alex smiles into Michael's shoulder. "Come, let's go inside, I have a feeling we'll meet a very special someone in there today."

They enter the shelter, and a young woman shows them the way to the large backyard behind the building. Three different agility courses are set up, and there's a pool where three dogs are playing with an old football, splashing in and out of the water.

"This is what heaven must look like," Michael says, and the awe in his voice tells Alex that coming here was an excellent decision. He's counting at least twenty different dogs of various sizes, and they all seem happy and excited. He turns to the young woman.

"So, how are we going to do this, Janet. Are we supposed to sit down and wait until a dog approaches, or should we throw a ball or something?"

Janet points at a bench that's set up under a large tree. "If you want to take a seat, I'll get a basket with some toys for you to use and play with the dogs." She leaves, and Michael leads Alex over to the bench where they sit down.

Most of the dogs have stopped playing and running around, they are looking at Alex and Michael instead. Michael takes Alex's hand. "I'm nervous."

Alex squeezes his hand. "I don't think they are dangerous, relax, Michael," he soothes.

Michael laughs. "Not what I mean. I'm nervous because I know one of them's going to be ours, and I want to make a good impression."

Five dogs are brave enough to come closer, their tails wagging. Michael holds his hand out for them, and once the brave dogs are close enough, they start sniffing and licking Michael's fingers. After that it's just one large furry puppy pile with Alex and Michael in the middle, and more dogs joining. They pet as many dogs as they can reach, always careful to read the body language of each of them. But they are all very friendly and excited to meet them.

Janet returns, a large basket filled with various toys in her arms. Some of the dogs start barking happily, apparently, they know what the basket means. Janet sets it down in front of the two men. "Many of our dogs love to play fetch, you can also go over to the agility courses and see what each of the dogs can do."

Michael picks up the basket. "Thanks, Janet, I think I'll go over and play with the dogs. Do you want to come with me, Alex?"

"I'm actually good right here for another moment, thanks. Maybe I'll come over to you later."

Michael smiles at Alex and gives him a kiss. "Okay, love you."

Michael squeezes Michael's arm. "Love you, too. Have fun!"

Michael walks over to one of the agility courses, basket in hand. And like he's the Pied Piper, most of the dogs follow him, yipping excitedly.

Janet turns to Alex. "I'll leave you to it. If you have any questions, I'll be inside."

"Thank you, Janet, I appreciate it." She turns around and walks back to the house, and Alex focuses his full attention on Michael. He's started to throw balls in different directions (no doubt giving some of them a little extra spin with his telekinesis, but there's no one around, so Alex relaxes and enjoys watching Michael having the time of his life).

There's one dog in particular, that seems to have the largest heart eyes around Michael. It doesn't run after any balls Michael's throwing, instead he picks up a plushie from the basked and carefully places it in Michael's outstretched hand. Michael pats the dog's head and tells him what a good boy he is. Alex smiles.

The dog is gorgeous, a little taller than a German Shepard, dark fur and a tail that's wagging a million miles a minute. Alex can picture himself and Michael with the dog in front of the fire. Not a lapdog exactly, but he doesn't mind.

A minute later, the dog leaves Michael's side and while Michael's busy getting acquainted with some of the other dogs, Alex's eyes follow the black dog. He walks over to a sunny spot near the pool, where smaller dog's curled up in the grass, seemingly uninterested in playing with Michael.

Going by the fur marking's, Alex thinks it could be a beagle. He smiles, remembering Mimi's "prophecy". The black dog noses at the beagle's ears and licks them, then he nudges the dog as if to say, "come with me".

It takes another few nudges before the dog gets up (and yes, it's definitely a beagle, an older one by the looks of it), and follows its black brother over to Michael.

When Michael notices the duo, he stops throwing balls and kneels down. "Oh, do you want me to meet your friend? Hello sweetheart." He scratches the beagle behind the ears and the dog almost goes cross-eyed with pleasure. The black dog wiggles closer and buries his nose in Michael's half-open shirt.

Michael looks over to Alex, and Alex smiles. "Guess we're not just picking up one dog, huh?"

"Would that be okay? They seem to be friends, and I couldn't stand to leave one behind, especially since this little lady seems to be a bit older. Do you think we can handle two dogs?"

Alex gets up from the bench and walks over, and the moment he reaches Michael, they look up at him and start nosing at his feet and legs. When they are finished sniffing at him, they look at him with huge puppy eyes.

"Oh, you two, this isn't fair." He kneels down carefully, holding on to Michael's shoulder for balance. The moment he feels stable, he has his arm full of two dogs, one large black one, and a smaller beagle.

They lick his face and almost barrel him over in their excitement, if it wasn't for Michael's steadying hand (and a smidge of telekinesis) at his back. "Thanks," he manages to get out between increasingly wet and enthusiastic doggy kisses.

Michael chuckles. "Guess these two have made their decision. Now it's up to us. Can we, and do we want to adopt two dogs? I know we've talked about a dog, and this morning I didn't even know we'd get one. And now there are these two. What do you think?"

Alex smiles. "You know, we have a big house, an even bigger garden, I don't see why we shouldn't adopt both. They insist on a two week trial anyway, so why don't we take these two sweethearts home with us and see how it goes?"

Michael manages to place a smacking kiss on Alex's cheek without them tumbling over, then he helps Alex stand up. The two dogs stay close to them and follow them back to the house.

They find Janet at the reception desk. She looks up when she hears them approach.

"Oh, that went quick. Did you meet a dog you like?"

Alex realizes that she can't see the two dogs at their feet from her position. "Actually, we met two dogs."

"Two?" Janet stands up and looks down. "Oh, I see. These are Buffy and Lando. They met here and it was love at first sight. They are pretty much inseparable, and since she's basically a senior dog, we'd rather not separate them, I'm sorry."

Alex shakes his head. "There's no need to separate them, we'd like to take both home with us for the trial period. You know, they picked us, and now it's our turn to pick them, and see whether we're a good match."

Janet's smile gets excited. "That's wonderful to hear. They've been here for a while, and the fact that we don't want to separate them has prevented their adoption so far. If you'd like to take them for a short walk, I need about twenty minutes to get all the papers ready. Leashes are over there by the door."

They return from their walk half an hour later, relaxed and smiling. Neither dog's wearing a leash anymore. When Michael notices Janet's look, he says, "She wouldn't leave our side, and he wouldn't leave hers, there really was no point in keeping the leashes on."

Janet nods and hands them a clipboard with several sheets of paper, yellow post-its marking the spaces where they need to sign. Alex grabs the clipboard and takes a seat at a nearby table, while Michael looks at the wall opposite of the reception, where several dozens of photos are pinned to a large cork board. Happy new pet owners with their adopted pets. He can't wait to add their photo to the wall.

Once all the papers are signed, Janet gets two large bags from a nearby storage room and hands them to Michael. "The bags contain bowls, leashes, and dog beds. We don't expect you to buy everything before it isn't clear that you'll adopt the dogs."

Michael nods. "Do they have favorite toys or blankets we should take with us?"

"No, they usually play with the toys we provide. I can put a few tennis balls into one of the bags if you want," Janet offers.

Alex shakes his head. "That won't be necessary. I—uhm, I actually may have bought some toys. And a box of tennis balls." His smile is a little sheepish, but Michael isn't having any of it. "You are brilliant, and I love you." He smacks a kiss on Alex's cheek.

"Alright, you've got my number, in case there are any issues, please don't hesitate to call. If everything goes according to plan, I'll see you in three days for the first mandatory visit."

They smile at her, bid their goodbyes, and when leave, their two new canine family members follow them unprompted.

"I have a really good feeling about this," Alex says once they are back in the car, both dogs comfortably snuggled up on the back seat.

"Me too," Michael admits. "You've made me a very happy man today, Alex. Truly the best pre-Valentine's gift ever." Alex laughs. "It's not just a gift for you, Michael, I'm also a very happy man today. I'm very excited that we're taking this next step." He looks back at the two sleeping dogs. "It already feels like they're part of the family."

On their way home, they stop at the pet store, and pay an obscene amount of money for dog food, bowls, leashes, harnesses, the most comfortable supersized dog bed (suspecting the dogs would rather share then sleep in two separate beds), and way too many toys. They don't care that this is only a trial, they know that Buffy and Lando are meant to stay with them.

When they get home and set everything up, the dogs immediately curl up in the large dog bed together, completely ignoring the two separate beds they put up to give them a choice.

"We already know them so well," Michael says proudly, clinking his glass with Alex's. There's a fire burning in the fireplace, and they're sharing a bottle of red wine that goes well with the pizza they've ordered.

The dogs are snoring, and Alex's and Michael's hearts are full.

Michael goes on a quick walk with the dogs while Alex gets ready for bed. They're trying to keep the dogs out of their bedroom, but it's not happening. Lando drags in the dog bed in before they can close the door, and while they'll have to set boundaries eventually (because there are things they'd like to do in their bedroom without an audience), they won't start tonight.

They place the dog bed at the foot of their bed, and the dogs curl up together. "Uhm, we'll get to that eventually, I guess," Michael says, but then he lets himself being pulled into Alex's arms and they fall asleep within minutes.

It's a quiet night, and when they wake up in the morning, the dogs are already up to drink water in the kitchen. Alex and Michael exchange lazy kisses, until Michael wiggles out of Alex's embrace. "I'll take them out for a couple of minutes, that should do until we can go for a real walk after breakfast."

Alex gets up to pee, then makes a beeline for the kitchen to make coffee before he returns to their bedroom. He snuggles up under the covers, when he hears the front door open and shut, which means that Michael's back.

The dogs enter the bedroom first, and Lando walks up to Alex's side of the bed. He gets up on his hind legs and puts his front paws on the bedframe, like he's extra careful not to step on the mattress.

"Good morning, handsome. You are such a good boy, Lando," Alex croons and pats Lando's head. When he sees something gleam in the sunlight filtering through the blinds, he reaches for Lando's collar. There's a ring attached to it. A ring with an iridescent piece of an alien spaceship console embedded.

Alex blinks back tears and tries to remove the ring from Lando's collar, when Michael drops on one knee next to the bed. His eyes look a bit wet, too.

"Alex Manes. You're not only the man of my dreams, you're the man of my life. We've been through so much, and I love you more than should be humanly – or alien-ly – possible. Would you do me the honor of marrying me?"

Alex can't stop the tears from falling now, but he nods and reaches for Michael. They kiss and hug, and Michael helps Alex to remove the ring from Lando's collar. When Michael puts the ring on Alex's finger, it fits like a glove.

"Michael, the ring is extraordinary, thank you so much. I can't wait to marry you." They kiss again, but before Michael can get up from the floor, Alex pulls a thin silver chain out from under his pajama top he only put on a few minutes ago when he was in the bathroom. There's a ring attached to it. He opens the clasp and lets the ring fall into his open hand. Then he shows it to Michael.

"Adopting a dog with you was only meant to be a first step, I'd been meaning to propose to you on Valentine's Day, though. I just love you so much, more than anything or anyone, and I want to share my life with you. Forever. Marry me?"

"Yes!" Michael's reply is short, but he barely waits for Alex to put the ring on his finger (it also fits perfectly), before he gets up and lets himself being pulled into Alex's outstretched arms. They laugh and kiss and tumble all over the bed, and Buffy and Lando start barking. Soon enough they manage to jump on the bed and join the celebration.

When Alex and Michael adopt Buffy and Lando officially two weeks later, they do so as Mr. and Mr. Guerin-Manes, their wedding rings clearly visible in their we've-adopted-a-dog celebratory photo.

#malexcupid21 #malex #alex manes #michael guerin #rnm fic #malex fic #my fic #buffy manes

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littlewalken · 3 years

Text

TZN Exclusive Interview: Andy Robinson

On Garak, "Star Trek", "Dirty Harry" & Sci-Fi Idealism

TrekZone Network sat down with Andrew Robinson, who played the Cardassian Garak in "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine", in Hamburg prior to the "Evening with Andrew Robinson", organized by FKM Events. We talked about Garak's past and future, Robinson's current projects and the idealism of science fiction fans.

TrekZone Network: Is this the first time you are in Hamburg?

Andrew Robinson: No, I was here 12 years ago for a convention with another organizer. So this is my first time back in 12 years, I believe.

Andy Robinson at the FKM Evening in Hamburg

TZN: Long time.

Robinson: It has been a long time. And as they say, a lot of water under the bridge...

TZN: You have been to Germany in the meantime?

Robinson: Yeah, I've been here several times. For one reason or another and in several different places. I have come here for a whole bunch of reasons. Even just as a tourist. But I have never made a film here or anything.

TZN: Your first stint as Garak was in the third episode of "Deep Space Nine". When you first got that role, did you anticipate or did you know that it was going to be a recurring role?

Robinson: No, not at all. Originally, the role of Odo, that Rene Auberjonois played, came down to three of us. Myself, another actor and obviously Rene. Then Rene got the role. Then they asked me to come in a few weeks later to read for this other role, which I thought was just going to be one episode. But it turned out that they were looking for a way to get the character of Doctor Bashir more involved with the show and so they, they were testing a storyline for Doctor Bashir and obviously the storyline was: he meets this older Cardassian, presumably tailor. Is he a spy? Who is he? This very mysterious person, the last Cardassian left on the station.

They wanted to see if there was any chemistry between Siddig and myself as actors. And of course we hit it off immediately. We had a great time with each other. And so it was based on that when they saw that episode, I think it was "Past Prologue", and they saw that we were working well together then they decided to add more episodes of Garak. Which I am eternally grateful for.

TZN: Do you regret that you were not cast as Odo?

Robinson: No, no, no, no. Not at all. As an actor, and an actor of a certain age, after a while you become very philosophical about these things. And genuinely so. Whoever gets the role, that was their role, you cannot feel remorse or try to second-guess or be bitter. And it always is the right actor as far as I am concerned and certainly with Rene it was the right actor. He was wonderful as Odo.

TZN: The part as Garak turned out to be rather substantial as well, of course.

Robinson: O, Garak was one of the best characters, I mean this, he was one of the most enjoyable, fully satisfying characters I have ever played in my life. And the fact that it is the only time in my life, too, as an actor, that I was able to develop a character over a seven-year period, and not be overused. By that I mean often if you are a regular on a series, they run out of things for a character to say and to do, and so the character just ends up repeating himself/herself, and the actions and the plotlines and after a while it becomes what they call the law of diminishing returns. The character becomes reduced. With Garak, because I was not a regular character, I appeared occasionally, I think I was in 39 episodes, and when I appeared, it was for a reason. Almost always it was for a reason, There are a few episodes when I wondered what I was doing there... But that always happens and at least they paid me, so that was fine.

TZN: Is there anything you would have liked to do as Garak on screen? Or any aspect of his character, his personality, that you would have liked to develop?

Robinson as Cardassian Elim Garak

Robinson: They did start this love story. But then they could not find the right actress. And so they had this one actress playing Ziyal and they did not like her, so they had another actress playing Ziyal who looked like my granddaughter, so that made me feel a little perverse. Then they just decided to forget about it. But it would have been wonderful to have had a bittersweet love story, someone who breaks Garak's heart, who tries to unlock the mystery romantically and cannot do it.

It is one of the reasons I wrote the book, to explore that part of Garak, Garak's heart. Because as an actor, you fall in love, well you do not always fall in love with your characters but the ones that you do fall in love with, it is a very deep relationship that you have with the character, and the character does take on a life on its own. Because as an actor, that is what you try to do. You try to transform yourself into this character's life. Obviously, I am not Garak, I am not Hamlet, but you find those places within yourself that can make that transformation.

I was not a "Star Trek" fan when they hired me. I had no idea what the "Star Trek" universe was, who Cardassians were, who Klingons, Romulans, I had no idea about any of that.

TZN: You had never seen anything, never heard about it?

Robinson: I had heard about it but never saw a thing. And a Cardassian? I had no idea what that was.

TZN: Then the makeup was applied...

Robinson: Yeah, right. But they did show me the episode, in "Next Generation", I think David Warner was the first Cardassian or was Marc Alaimo the first?

TZN: Marc Alaimo.

Robinson: Yeah, but it was that two-parter where David Warner's Cardassian character is torturing Picard and I thought, well, that is a really interesting-looking guy. That was the first episodes that peaked my interest. I thought, they deal with substantial things. And the acting was wonderful. Of course, David Warner has always been one of my favorite actors.

So I started writing a diary. As if Garak had a diary and I would write things, and I would make up things about him. And it is what you do, it is what an actor does sometimes for any character. You try to create a story, a life for this character. And when the series was over, I realized there were still things I would have loved to say about Garak and that is why I wrote the book "A Stitch in Time".

TZN: Did you start with the diary when you recognized that Garak would not be a one- or two-episode thing but a recurring role?

Robinson: Yeah, exactly, I think I started in the second year. I also started it when I started being invited to conventions and I realized, after two or three conventions, there were four or five questions people who would always ask me. How long does it take, your makeup... But I thought, would it not be interesting if I if at the conventions did something different. And so what I would do is that I would get up and I would read excerpts from these diaries. It became enormously popular, and that in a sense spawned a lot of things, then as actors we all started saying, well, maybe there is something that we can do rather than just get up and talk about our makeup and so forth. And that unleashed a whole bunch of stuff. Even Siddig and I wrote a play together that we did at several conventions and it was really a rather challenging play, dealing with string theory...

TZN: What was it about? I read just before this interview that you had this play...

Andy Robinson in Hamburg in June 2008 (Photo credit: Klaus Wittmack)

Robinson: Well, basically Garak and Bashir meet up in this place and it is like, nobody knows, but it looks like a convention with "Star Trek" fans there. And so they had to conduct this very tricky business in front of these people sitting at tables and sitting in chairs watching them. It was very, very, very postmodern. (laughs)

And there was a time when we were working on the play in front of an audience, too. Towards the end, when we finally got it written and got it right, that was when it was at its best but while we were experimenting with it, I think a lot of people fell asleep. (laughs)

Getting back to those diaries, [Michael Scott] co-wrote a book with Armin Shimerman ["The Merchant Prince"] and he said to me, "You should turn this into a book!" and that was when I did. And it was actually the first "Star Trek" book that was written without what they call a ghostwriter.

TZN: Are you thinking of writing another novel about Garak?

Robinson: No. I actually have said everything I could possibly say about Garak. I really have. Plus, if I did, I would then because of the corporate nature of Pocket Books, the Simon and Schuster division that does the "Star Trek" books, I would then have to follow all these other books that have been written about Garak and that does not interest me at all. Because the story I came up with was actually, oddly enough close my story, especially when Garak was a young man.

TZN: You did write another short story though, right? Set after the book.

Robinson: Right.

TZN: That was the last thing we have heard from Garak. In that story, he is not in a very positive state of mind and not in a good place.

Robinson: No.

TZN: So if we could jump forward in time, to a time and place after that, where would we find Garak?

Robinson: Dead. Honestly, because when I wrote that novella, first I was interested in putting - because I live part of the year in Paris -

I was interested in having Garak in Paris and see what that was like. Paris is like a museum now, and I thought that they would have really preserved it in 400 years and it would have become the museum of the world. But when I got Garak to Paris, it became very depressing. That is why I think he was not in a great state. I realized that if I had have written much more about Garak, he probably would have had to die. I do not want to go into why because it is all political and you are not here about politics. (laughs)

TZN: When did the producers tell you about who Garak's parents were?

Robinson: The big reveal was of course with Enabran Tain, who was the head of the Obsidian Order. I know that the mother appeared at one point when they were on Cardassia in that last series of episodes that I was in and that they ended up at Garak's mother's house, hiding. But the story of Garak and his parents really is what I myself put together, in terms of the relationships.

TZN: Did you have a hunch though that the storyline could develop into the direction of Enabran Tain being revealed as Garak's father?

Robinson: O, no! It was a big surprise to me. It was great!

TZN: Just like for the viewers.

Robinson: O, yeah, absolutely! But that is how I felt every time I would get a new script from the writers because the writers loved writing for Garak, that was the pleasure. It was evident that they liked writing for Garak because of the language, the dialogue that they would give him which was so delicious and so much fun and very ironic. One of the things you certainly know is that in America irony is not at the top of our list. As a people we do not really appreciate ironic humor. I think that one of the things that made Garak popular is the fact that he did have a sense of irony. That to everything he said there was a twist and there was always a subtext. And indeed probably he was lying but enjoying it and enjoying the fact that he was lying and seeing how far he could get away with it and who was gullible and who was smart.

Andy Robinson in Hamburg in June 2008 (Photo credit: Klaus Wittmack)

TZN: There was this one episode with the implant, "The Wire". That embodies everything you just said.

Robinson: Yeah, and that is by far my favorite episode.

TZN: We asked our readers to hand in some questions for you beforehand. One of them is: how long did it take to apply the makeup?

Robinson: At the beginning, it took about four hours, I would say. And then they got it down to about two hours. Towards the end they got more dexterous, thank God, because sitting in the chair for four hours meant that I would have to come in long before dawn and it was just excruciating, it was horrible. Even two hours was bad enough. It is the only thing about Garak that I do not miss at all.

TZN: Did the makeup inhibit you in the way you could express yourself?

Robinson: Well, that is the great, mysterious thing about working with a mask like that. For one thing the technology is very good, there were I think seven prosthetic pieces and they were all very flexible, very pliable and so you put it on and you think, my God, it is like this corpus, you're encased in it. But then you were fine, you could move. You were not, you were not limited the way Rene was limited with Odo because he could not eat, he lost a lot of weight. That is something I should have done!

But he had to take his lunch through a straw and so he could not move much at all because it was a mess. If he marled just a little bit, then he would have to sit in a chair and have to go through a whole process to get it back to that smoothness. That obviously was not my problem. My problem was the claustrophobia that I have, which I experienced actually last night. I went to a bar in Paris with some friends to watch the French lose to the Dutch. (laughter) Really lose. And deservedly so, I mean it. The French should get rid of that coach of theirs because he is awful.

I was at the bar and everybody was crowding in around me, I had to leave at the interval, go home and watch it on my own television. That was the thing about the Garak makeup. That was one thing but then this heavy wig that they put on top of me and then, because they wanted Cardassians to look big, they made the costumes out of the material that you make furniture pads, furniture textiles, and so all the costumes were very heavy and once you zipped them up it was like you were in a sauna, literally.

Actually that is where I lost a little weight, a lot of water weight anyway. When you get under the lights, underneath the makeup and the wig and the costume, there were rivers of sweat, I was soaked underneath. Not very glamorous (laughter) and I certainly did not smell like a flower.

TZN: I have got another reader question here, that touches a different subject. Did you know that there is speculation about Garak's sexuality?

Robinson: Oh, yeah. I started it.

TZN: Really? Then this might be interesting to this reader. He calls himself your gay fan Dominion and he asks a lot of questions like: Why haven't we seen a gay character in "Star Trek"? Have gays become extinct in the 24th century? Do you think there will ever be a gay character in "Star Trek"? Do gays not belong in "Star Trek's" future?

Robinson: O, yeah. There will be gay characters. Certainly now there will be, for one thing, America is still very puritan, we are very squeamish when it comes to sexuality. I remember when I very first played Garak, I played him gay! I thought this would be great! He sees this young man, this young, very attractive doctor on the station, he is lonely, he is the only Cardassian there, this doctor is curious about him, and if you remember, this was a great moment because Sid totally went with it! When he comes up and he puts his hand on his shoulder, Sid did this great thing, it was this sort of an electrical charge that went through him and so I played him totally gay in that episode.

Garak's First Scene

Of course the producers did not actually tell me not to play him gay but then they started writing him a little more macho and more like a Cardassian. But I said, "Listen, one of the great things about Garak is that he is not Gul Dukat, he is not one of those macho, militaristic guys, he is your finesse Cardassian." So we struck a compromise but I was always very clear. I did not get into it in the book. Quite frankly, I was going to go in that direction. I had written a whole thing about Garak's sexuality because I felt that Garak was sort of - talk about bisexual, I think that he was multisexual, essentially that anything that moves is fair game for Garak. He has a voracious sexual appetite.

But as I say, especially on American television you have the odd gay character now but it is all going to be just cosmetic. In terms of commercial television ever getting into real sexuality, that is not going to happen. "Star Trek" is very conservative, there is a conservatism about "Star Trek" that I think "Deep Space Nine" in a sense went against. It defied that conservatism. "Deep Space Nine" was not as black and white as the other "Star Trek" shows. It was different. It was not people in a rocket ship doing one-night stands on a planet to planet to planet, coming in and battling the evil aliens or some kind of monster or whatever. It was a community unto itself on the edge and this is what I loved about the show, every one of the characters on "Deep Space Nine" had a moral dimension about them. Each one of them was in touch with their dark side.

That episode "In the Pale Moonlight", when Garak introduces Captain Sisko to the concept of realpolitik, that okay, if you want to get rid of the Romulan threat, what you do is, you kill them. And you kill them in a not very nice way. So you just eliminate your enemy. Of course that is not fair play, that is not the American way. I was surprised, I loved that episode because it was very mature in that sense. It said you have to grow up, this is the world you live in now. And of course the world we live in now is very morally ambiguous to say the least.

I rambled, I am sorry. We went away from sexuality but I think there has to be more gay characters. I do not know what this movie is going to be like but this movie I believe is about Starfleet academy?

A gay Sulu? According to Robinson an interesting idea

TZN:It is a prequel. It is not entirely set on Starfleet academy but shows the young crew in their early years getting together.

Robinson: Right. For instance, I wonder, George Takei, who has come out, who is an openly gay man, and actually now I think he and his partner are going to get married since the California Supreme Court has now finally legalized gay marriage. But I wonder where they are going to go with his character in this prequel. It would be very interesting.

TZN: You did some work behind the camera as well. You directed I believe an episode of DS9. How was that for you, the experience to suddenly tell your colleagues what to do?

Robinson: Yes, right. It is funny, it was very different getting on the other side of the camera and not just working with the other actors, I mean they were fine. But it was the first episode I really had a lot of trouble with because it was my first episode ever directing something. And of course when you are directing "Star Trek" you have the added dimension, the added complication of the special effects. Although they have great special-effects people and you just get out of the way and let them do their work but still you are always trying to visualize what the picture looks like as a director.

But I must say that directing the "Star Trek" episodes really in a sense changed my life because it was the first time I started directing. From there I went on to a lot more directing, mainly theater because I have always been more of a theater person than a film person. And that really gave me the courage to continue in that direction as a director which I have and which has actually led to my current position. I am a fulltime teacher now. I run an acting program at the University of Southern California. And that all came out of directing.

TZN: You have been an actor, you have been a director, you have written a book, actually is there anything artistic you would still like to do? Singing maybe?

Robinson: No, I do not think so. Actually, it is true, it is interesting you should say that. I would actually love to do a musical. I really would love to do a musical, you are absolutely right. I would love to do one of these great musicals. But I still go back and forth. I am going to do a play this summer in San Francisco as an actor. I will continue to direct. I do not know how much longer I will run this program because I created this actor-training program and that was exciting.

I am going to be actually talking about that today. I work with young actors in terms of how does one train to be an actor, what is it that one does? I am being able to put some of my own ideas and thoughts about what actor training is into a coherent program that goes over three years, that trains professional actors. That has been very exciting. That is part of who I am but I think the territory of being an actor is that you do reinvent yourself from time to time. You have to reinvent yourself from time to time. Not to change, you really have to transform because that is the business.

TZN: In your career, you played many roles, and you guest starred in "Bonanza".

Robinson: No, you could not possibly remember! That is incredible. No, o my God, how could you... That is amazing. Yeah, that was the very last season of "Bonanza", too. And I think it was my first work in television.

TZN: How was it to play with such very famous actors like Lorne Greene?

Robinson: Well, see, it was very nice. They are household names but I had just come off from doing my first film with Clint Eastwood. So playing with Clint Eastwood was like playing with God. And then everyone else, they are wonderful actors, but still, my first film experience was the "Dirty Harry" film and that was extraordinary. I must say I enjoyed doing "Bonanza" because it was a show that had gone on forever. I helped kill it because that was the last season... Having the experience of doing "Dirty Harry" which was a feature film, that interested me a lot more than doing television.

Andy Robinson in "Dirty Harry"

TZN: You did very many TV series. The list of your guest appearances just goes on and on and on.

Robinson: Yeah, I did and most of the time I was the villain. That was courtesy of "Dirty Harry". After I did "Dirty Harry" nobody could see me as playing anything but the villain.

TZN: Is there any of these series that you would have liked to be on as one of the lead actors or main cast?

Robinson: In America, there is a series that just ended. I do not know if it is here, I do not know if it has come here. They did five years of it. HBO has these. I do not know if you know Home Box Office? It is a cable network in America. They had these series, "The Sopranos" was their flagship, their famous series. But they had another series called "The Wire". Have you ever heard of "The Wire"?

TZN: The title sounds familiar but that is all.

Robinson: It is interesting because you had me talking about that episode of "Deep Space Nine" that is called "The Wire", that was my favorite episode. Well, this series, "The Wire", is probably the best television series I have ever seen in my life. It was a brilliant series that took the city of Baltimore and it investigated the city of Baltimore in a dramatic series format on every level from drug dealers to police to schools to unions and it was an amazing series. I do not know how it got done because in America we are not big on socially-relevant thematic. We want our entertainment to be pure and uncluttered with things we have to think about. But this was a brilliant series and I, every time I watched the series, thought, o my God, I would love to be on that series! That was one of the few things I ever watched where I felt that way. I hope it comes here, I am sure it will come here. It has to. If it does, you must watch it because it is extraordinary.

TZN: I am afraid we have to wrap up already. One last question: Is there any question that you would really particularly badly like to answer but have never been asked?

Robinson: Wow. I have to say I think I have been asked every question that I can possibly imagine. Short of questions that I would prefer not to get into. No, I do not think that there is. I do not think that there is at all. I find that "Star Trek" fans for the most part, especially in Europe, are relatively sophisticated. I think that there is an idealism about following a series like "Star Trek", especially in this world.

Can we imagine ourselves projected into 24th or 25th century or wherever and still functioning. Obviously, it is weird. As you said earlier, here we are, four- five hundred years later and where have all the gay people gone? Where have all the people of color gone in a sense. That has always been something. What has indeed happened to poverty and what has happened to racism and fundamentalism and terrorism and all the things that bedevil us. I really do hope that science fiction continues to evolve and the way certain writers have challenged themselves to think about what happens to all of these social issues in the future and how we project solutions for them or perhaps not solutions but perhaps just accommodations, how do we learn to live with each other because in the end I think that that is what the "Star Trek" series perhaps offers its best insights about. Then I think that it is also great dramatic material which is the great question how do we learn how to live with each other without violence and without predatory behavior.

TZN: That ends this interview on a very thoughtful note, I think. Thank you very much.

Robinson: It was a pleasure, thank you, it has been great.

#garak #star trek deep space 9 #andrew j robinson

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princeoftheroses · 3 years

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Since you want asks, PLSSSE I want your Utena TH0ughts. WHAT is your favourite black rose episode? actually how do you feel about the black rose arc in GENERAL

black rose arc, black rose arc, oh black rose arc!!! by you adding how do i feel about the arc in general you are unleashed me to make a long post giving my very disorganized thoughts about this arc.

a couple of people call it a filler arc? i guess technically it is because it does not directly contribute to the main storyline and it wasn't in the manga and also the ending of the arc sort of makes it so the whole arc kind of didn't happen???

but also i think if a person labeled it as a filler arc they are kind of missing the point?? even if it doesn't contribute to the main plot (which it absolutely DOES but i'll get to that) it adds so much nuance to the characters of utena.

you get to see side characters and how they tick!! some of which like kozue and shiori become very important later as they become miki and ruka's rose brides in the akio arc! (side note : what was up with ruka he just kind of showed up and disappeared lmaooo)

also, it adds to akio! (tw warning for only the next paragraph, i'm talking about akio so you can except me talking about grooming and abuse)

not only is this where akio is introduced, but he is always so omnipresent. it was ... honestly really terrifying to see how chill he acts with utena here. of course the real grooming begins in the akio arc but you can see how he starts here. how he kind of builds himself as anthy's cool older brother that utena can trust and ask for advice for... but we the audience know that he CANNOT be trusted as even know we see him being shady af in the background. i really feel like if we skipped straight from the first arc to akio arc a lot of the creepiness of akio would not have been realized because of ... just how NORMAL he akio acts to utena. he's charming, he's smart, and he overall is somebody utena SHOULD be able to trust bc we should all be able to trust an immediate family member of a best friend , but of course the world doesn't really work that way. anyway akio tangent over because BOOOOOO akio (he honestly terrifies me so much because of how many predators like that exist and you can meet without realizing their intentions)

BACK TO BLACK ROSE ARC

one of the main reasons i feel like this isn't a filler arc, at least not in the traditional sense of the phrase, is because it builds a lot character relationships. something that i didn't like when i first watched revolutionary girl utena but now is one of my FAVORITE things is that for a while we don't really get a straight forward utena/anthy episode. because their relationship doesn't need to build in an episode, it just slowly builds over time. we just see these two causally existing and they just start to trust each other.

in the akio arc we get to see just how close utena/anthy have gotten over the series because of their late night conversations. like how if the black rose arc didn't exist akio wouldn't have been as impactful, if the black rose arc didn't exist it would feel more sudden how close utena/anthy have grown imo.

this arc adds a lot to the world as well. as long as the students stay inside of school they will not grow. dead people wander the halls thinking that they are still alive. these two facts contribute a lot to utena theorizing and analysis (mainly, the ideas that ohtori exists within a plain of frozen time literally because of anthy's magic and metaphorically because the cast is very cozy in their coffin) and i could not thank this arc for that enough. not only are these very cool ideas that may or may not have inspired elements in my own story (i can neither confirm or deny that one of my oc story is heavily inspired by utena) but they just add so many layers!

this arc also felt necessary because of the new duelists??? if we went straight from the first arc to the akio arc then it would've kinda gotten very tiring to see the student council constantly duel and lose to utena (with the exception of touga's sole victory to utena in the first arc before she duels him again and wins) but these new duelists possessed by the black rose are very interesting!

if i did have to make a compliant about this arc, though, i will say that at times the stories felt very disconnected to each other. while it was very funny for utena to not even know who keiko was when she dueled her, it would've been nice if sometimes the arc of the black rose duelist intertwined more with utena. as the arc goes on, the student council is on alert and is trying to figure out where the black rose is coming from, but they never really try to ask utena about it and utena never really tries to get involved? she just is chill until she gets the note to go to the duel arena to fight the black rose duelist. i don't really have a solution on how to fix this? maybe have the student council member that the black rose duelist takes the sword from be more involved? idk.

the villain of this arc mikage also really fascinates me??? i... really like him??? but not even as a villain ... i just really pity him. the realization he has in his duel with utena that everything he has been doing is for nothing because mamiya is already dead .. that always really hit me? the horror in his voice when he starts to recall the truth in his false memories.... for some reason, this is one of the most terrifying parts of the show for me. the realization that something you were doing, something you were doing that might've been awful but you were doing it because of somebody you care about deeply and love, it was all for nought. how much time he has wasted...

even before his duel with utena, there's this moment when after he got punched by utena he says something like "if she hadn't seen my duelist ring and challenged me to a duel, she could've killed me" or something like that, he's just so pathetic and i feel very bad for him but at the same time am too disconnected to him to truly feel empathy for him... that's some TOP TIER shit

overall, this part of the show is one of my favorites. the only part i like more is the last few episodes because it makes me very emotional.

NOW FOR THE SPECIFICS

favorite black rose duelist: honestly? wakaba. the girl deserves it this is stress relief for her. not only is this duel very emotional as i don't think we've ever seen utena refuse to duel somebody (at least not in the way that she does in this episode) but just the SHEER emotion.

i'm a real sucker for fighting the person you care about the most which is why the dark signer arc in yugioh 5ds is the best yugioh arc and this just really takes the cake in this arc. utena always shows concern for the black rose duelist because they are clearly people in pain who were not able to properly duel with their grief which let mikage manipulate them, but it's taken to a new level here.

the way that after the duel is completed, wakaba comes home to her empty dorm where saionji used to be but now isn't always gets me. she's just such a lonely girl and that's never really resolved for her. a lot of the other duelists have a optimist note to end on (kozue asking miki for a milkshake, shiori and juri saying hello to each other as they walk past, keiko being friends with nanami again, etc.) which is why the fact that wakaba is more alone now then she is ever... it is a feeling i can relate to an almost embarrassing amount.

favorite episode: COWBELL OF HAPPINESS, NANAMI TURNS INTO A COW-

ANTHY YOU GLORIOUS TROLL-

favorite episode that isn't cowbell of happiness: i'm very torn between the landscape scaped by kozue and thorns of death. shiori and kozue are both very interesting characters that i like a lot. but i'm going to go with thorns of death for now, as while i really like the landscape scaped by kozue, i think my preferred miki/kozue episode is their episode in the akio arc. meanwhile i like thorns of death way more than i liked whispers in the arc (mostly because i just do not really care that much for ruka, but azure paler than the sky was a banger and he was in that?) i just loved the feeling of seeing shiori the girl juri loves so much and juri's reaction to seeing her. the way my heart was wrenched when black rose shiori mocks juri... it really did hit different. but the hopeful ending did make me feel a lot better. i do like the way that juri out of all the student council members is the one closest to self actualization and this really sets that up even if there is still a bumpy road until then.

honorary mention: the boys of the black rose and kanae as a black rose duelist are both really great. i feel like if this wasn't the arc opener it would've had more room to stretch its legs and show how horrific it could've been. kanae is a girl i feel really bad about and similar to wakaba, i don't really think her episode was a very optimistic ending for her especially since akio probably killed her later in the show?

honestly the minute akip appeared on screen, engaged to a girl who HASN'T EVEN GRADUATED and is also emotionally manipulating her so much and having his little sister manipulate her too... throw the whole man away

tl;dr - the black rose arc is very good and i like it a lot, the ending of the arc really fucks me up, somebody give mikage & all the black rose duelists therapy, throw akio in the garbage, and this show probably exists in some sort of time loop / frozen time space as a metaphor for the whole coffin thing but you can probbaly find people smarter than me talking about that.

oh and go rewatch cowbell of happiness it's great

#this is what i do at 4 am #i started writing this at like 3 45 am and it is now 4 25 am :)#worth it #hope you like my shitty analysis and thoughts !!! i enjoyed writing it thoruugly #revolutionary girl utena #asks

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