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phoenixkaptain · 6 months

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A story like Thousand Autumns is very subtle in its romance.

Shen Qiao has only ever known his sect. He knows it very well, because of this fact. He knows the people, he knows the rules, he knows the daily doings and who is doing them. He knows every blade of grass and every stone. He’s like a lonely mountain flower, on the highest peak, unseen by any but a few birds and unknowing that there’s more it might never know.

When he finds himself away from his sect for the first time, he’s confused. At most, he’s gone to the base of the mountain, maybe the fields surrounding that, but no further. The flower was plucked and tossed aside.

For a man stumbling blindly in the world, literally and figuratively, there really isn’t a better guide than one that knows just about everything. And that’s, without a doubt, Yan Wushi.

Yan Wushi has lived longer than Shen Qiao, has been more places than Shen Qiao, and has fought more battles than Shen Qiao. Yan Wushi is the perfect example of something out of reach even for someone out of reach. He’s the only one who could answer any questions asked of him, but especially the questions that Shen Qiao would want to ask him.

And there’s no question in my mind that Yan Wushi doesn’t fall for Shen Qiao at first sight, but he’s certainly attracted to him. Not in an overtly sexual or emotional way, but Yan Wushi, the way his character is set up? It’s impossible for him not to be fascinated by Shen Qiao.

He knows Shen Qiao is the very picture of a peerless immortal. He’s well aware that Shen Qiao is considered untouchable by even the people closest to Shen Qiao. He’s most aware that Shen Qiao is Qi Fengge’s (coughhndisputedcough) favourite disciple, and honestly that’s enough for him to overwhemingly want to mess with Shen Qiao.

There are a lot of reasons for Yan Wushi to fall for Shen Qiao. Most of the people in the novel fall for Shen Qiao, after all, there is a precedent.

But the one I’ve seen questioned is Shen Qiao’s affection for Yan Wushi. Where does it come from? When did it start? Does Shen Qiao even fucking like that asshole?

The easy answer is: yes, he does. The novel tells us that. Shen Qiao, despite everything, does fall for Yan Wushi’s, um, “charms” in the end. This is made clear.

But why? A thousand voices cry out. Why the fuck would any reasonable person like Yan goddamn Wushi in any capacity?

Well, there’s your first mistake. Shen Qiao is not a reasonable person.

Shen Qiao as a character is absolutely terrifying. He could absolutely destroy the world given half the inclination, but he just doesn’t want to. He’s already considered unmatched before he’s pushed unceremoniously off of a mountain, and his journey only increases his strength. He isn’t quite equal to Yan Wushi, but he’s the only person Yan Wushi ever sees as equal to himself.

Shen Qiao’s best and worst trait is his patience. He’s unwavering. He really just embodies taoism, especially as it’s presented in the novels. He is the picture of a river that doesn’t stray from its path.

Which is why it’s hard for him to reconcile his own attraction to Yan Wushi, but let’s all be clear here. Yan Wushi absolutely starts seducing Shen Qiao on day fucking one. If he could’ve (if Qi Fengge hadn’t been there) he would’ve tried to eat that cabbage when it was just a little sprout. Shen Qiao is unpracticed in most social interactions, to be frank, but he’s especially unused to romance and Yan Wushi really is his first introduction to being hit on.

Yan Wushi is far from good, at really any point, to anybody but especially to Shen Qiao. But that doesn’t particularly matter because Shen Qiao chooses to forgive him, again and again. And I really think, after giving Shen Qiao to a confirmed terrible, awful person who has already promised to do terrible thing to Shen Qiao, that Shen Qiao himself wouldn’t forgive literally anyone else for doing that. And he shouldn’t, because it was really fucked up, but that still doesn’t matter because Shen Qiao ultimately DOES forgive Yan Wushi.

What am I saying? I’m saying that Shen Qiao fell for Yan Wushi first. It is the only way the story makes any sense. Shen Qiao is annoyed at him, he’s furious at him, he’s so fucking pissed he could kill that man, but he likes him. He likes Yan Wushi’s company. He likes that Yan Wushi gives him a challenge. He’s exasperated, but he likes it.

Shen Qiao forgives Yan Wushi SO MANY TIMES. Yan Wushi humiliates him and mocks him and is the absolute worst, but Shen Qiao forgives him and more than that, Shen Qiao always is waiting for Yan Wushi to come back to bother him more.

Is there more to Shen Qiao’s attraction? Probably. Is it a daddy kink? It could be. But I honestly can’t help but read it as Shen Qiao falling for the absolute pits of a man that is Yan Wushi. Shen Qiao likes that old bastard and decides to spend the rest of his life with the fucker and he is just too much of a block of ice to show it.

#thousand autumns #qian qiu #shen qiao #yan wushi #yanshen #long post #it’s been a while so #extra long post #the inane ramblings of a madman #listen i realize that this is an unpopular reading #but the story just makes more sense #if you read it as shen qiao coming to terms with his own terrible taste in men #there are so many other who shen qiao could have with just a thought #but he has the worst taste in men known to man #and qi fengge KNEW #and that’s whY QI FENGGE ENCOURAGED HIM TO STAY ON THE MOUNTAIN #IT’S ALL CONNECTED #look i promise it’s all connected i promise #just look at my corkboard and you’ll see it-#xiao qiao er asked qi fengge who that handsome guy was #and qi fengge immediately planned how to make it so his precious baby would never ever leave #qi fengge has suffered for so long without us knowing #but i uncovered it #🫡 you’re welcome #how much sleep did you get last night kacie?#about fifteen

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megamindsupremacy · 1 year

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I think it would be really funny if C.C and Marilyn Batson were minor legends in the archeological community. Like, dying in a suspicious archeology accident? People would go nuts for that. And also they just in general made huge contributions to the archeology community in their time. Obviously nobody outside of this very niche community knows anything about the Batsons at ALL but other archeologists respect their legacies greatly.

What I’m getting at here is Cassie’s mom told her all sorts of stories about her work and would reference the Batsons in every other new find and has showed her pictures every so often of the couple. Then the first time Cassie meets Captain Marvel she’s like C.C. BATSON?? MY MOM IS OBSESSED WITH YOU and Billy has precisely zero idea how to respond to this

#mads posts #billy batson #captain marvel #Shazam #c.c. batson #Marilyn batson #cassie sandsmark #dc #this is related to that fanart where tim identifies Cap as CC on sight #and that AU where Cassie and Tim’s moms get together bc of their shared archeology passion #it’s all connected

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fairypowerful · 11 months

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The Ship That Was Endgame Since the Beginning (confirmed)

Narratively, Michaela and Zeke were always meant to find each other and be together.

Narratively, Jared and Mick were not meant to be.

From the very beginning – S01E01.

(Edit: The show’s creator, Jeff Rake, said this was always the ending, “just tightened up along the way.” You got that? Zekaela were planned since long before Matt Long got the role as Zeke – Matt said that his first phone call with Jeff in 2018 after getting the role was himself being told that Zekaela were soulmates! LMAO 😂 I didn’t need this double confirmation in order to know that, because in hindsight, the clues were there from the way everything led to them and when looking at their first two episodes together.)

The offscreen event that led to Mick being in a bad place mentally/emotionally (her BFF Evie’s death) had also led to her hesitation of Jared’s proposal, which led to her getting on Flight 828 because she didn’t wanna have to deal with that and her family pressuring her to accept. (“It’s not just about you. This family needs something to celebrate” / “And I know you love Jared” / “Why are you fighting this when all it’s gonna do is make you happy?”)

It was a domino effect. The plane disappearing led to Jared marrying Mick’s other BFF, Lourdes, four years later, and the plane reappeared a year after that.

Mick became the other woman in that marriage, which she deeply regretted; and she not only destroyed her now-ex BFF’s marriage, but also lost another lifelong friendship on top of being too wrought with guilt over Evie (which she forgives herself for in the final season). Jared didn’t really show any remorse, but Mick now had all of that weighing her down and didn’t want to continue with him. And Jared certainly didn’t make it easy on her.

Really, these two were not right for each other. Not to mention, Jared unnecessarily stirred up trouble and a lot of stress for Mick due to his possessiveness over her, and his immediate jealousy and rather extreme hostility towards Zeke upon first meeting. Very toxic. Just gross. Not right.

~~~

I think it’s important to remember, too, the original series order was 13 episodes – the “find her” Calling was in the tenth episode, Zeke appears in the twelfth episode, and the thirteenth ended with him and Mick in front of the petroglyph of two stick figures holding hands, outside under the stars.

Those episodes would’ve been written in cohesion with the preceding storylines, especially considering the nature of the show and its mythology needing to be mapped out instead of written on the spot – meaning that Zekaela was not shoehorned into the show. Keyword, “cohesion.”

Those episodes and the character would’ve been written long before the actor was even cast into the role. It was always planned.

🤭 It’s also confirmed.

Their soulmatism was sprinkled all over their story, starting in their first two episodes together.

“It’s all connected,” didn’t you know? 😉

The show’s been consistent about that.

Look at the acting choices in Season 1 from before Zeke’s introduction. In multiple scenes, Jared told Mick they were supposed to be together and she’d shake her head ‘no.’ Like her heart knew, but she consciously didn’t yet. When Jared told her she’s his soulmate, Mick said, “No, I’m not.”

Narratively, her heart always belonged elsewhere. After she met Zeke, she always chose him over Jared from that point onward. Everything that happened led her to him, including her conscious choices post-Pilot and pre-Vanishing Point, which basically worked in tandem with the universe. The cheating/ruining BFF’s marriage/losing her BFF was a major deciding factor for her in not getting back with Jared anytime soon … and then she finally meets Zeke whom the universe had also brought forward in time.

~~~

So, I want to put my thoughts to some of the things I’ve read by antis…

“The only thing Zeke and Mick had in common were the Callings”

That’s not true. You had to have watched the show with your eyes closed to come up with that.

A Calling brought them together, sure, but it didn’t make them connect and fall in love, or be happier around one another. A Calling isn’t a love potion or a magic spell.

Zekaela was a pretty peaceful relationship in a sea of turmoil (the government, the X-ers, the hatred and violence against 828ers), whereas Jachaela was an angsty teen drama amidst the external turmoil. 😶

I’m going to quote a character from a different story who chose his wife over someone else he had feelings with, because I think it applies very much with Mick choosing Zeke over and over again every single time. “Passion is … it’s fire. And fire is great, man. But we’re made of water. Water is how we keep living. Water is what we need to survive. My family was my water. I picked water. I’ll pick water every time.” And I’ll add another quote from the same character talking about his wife and what it was like in meeting her, replacing the name with Mick’s because it is very much in alignment with Zekaela’s story. “But when I met [Mick], it was something different altogether. She just … made the world make sense to me. She even made me like myself more. And there was a calmness to her that … nobody else had. It felt like when I was with her, I knew everything would be fine. It was like I was following the North Star.”

Mick being Zeke’s North Star is literally canon, by the way.

(S01E13 and S04E18).

~~~

“The only reason why Zeke and Mick got together was due to the time travel and the Callings”

Yeah, that’s how storytelling works.

Crying about this is like complaining that the only reason the Doctor regenerates is because he’s an alien from Gallifrey and the Doctor Who writers in 1966 came up with a way to replace the leading actor without getting rid of the main character. Or rather, it’s like complaining that the only reason Mary Margaret and David fell in love despite the Dark Curse amnesia is because they were Snow White and Charming in the Enchanted Forest.

Trying to belittle Mick and Zeke’s love by attacking the narrative, that’s pathetic.

“But it’s forced”

No, it’s not. The little things the writers added years later, like Afterlife!Zeke telling Mick about them having moments in their lives where they almost met, is not forced, because the audience (who don’t have blinders on during their story) already knew they were soulmates and it’s literally how storytelling works.

Heaven forbid TV writers foreshadow, expand, and give callbacks to scenes from previous seasons ever again! Heaven forbid we ever get flashbacks in later seasons! Heaven forbid you ever watch another TV show with more than 1 season because “they added this years later, so it’s forced”!

“But Mick and Jared knew each other the longest”

So? That doesn’t matter. Do you actually believe length is an indicator of whether or not someone is the love of your life? Just…wow! Heaven forbid anybody not get back together with an ex simply because they knew them longer. Heaven forbid anybody leave behind a former or current longterm relationship without getting told, “But it’s been years, so you belong with him forever/were meant to be with him.”

Mick wanted Zeke. She chose Zeke. I think that’s a good indicator of whom the love of her life is.

In S01E13, Mick tells him that she wished she could redo her re-entry into 2018 but wasn’t sure what she would’ve done to change the way her situation at home turned out.

In S02E01, Zeke tells Mick he wished he’d met her some other way in some other time. (Edit: With Jeff implicitly saying he always knew how he wanted the story to end, and explicitly confirming that Zekaela was always the plan from the very beginning, along with Matt implicitly saying they were written as soulmates since before he got the role, Zeke’s line is now major foreshadowing).

In S04E19, Mick tells Ben she doesn’t regret taking a later flight because it led her to Zeke.

It’s very telling. Ben’s heart belongs with Grace, and Mick’s heart belongs with Zeke.

“She would’ve married Jared if Flight 828 landed in its proper timeline in the Pilot episode”

There’d be no show to watch if the plane landed in 2013, for one thing.

Those 5 years gave Mick an experience where she learned what and whom she really wanted, without the enormous pressure of immediately accepting a proposal, and she also got the opportunity to meet her real soulmate. It’s okay to not want the same thing you wanted a few years ago. It’s called growth.

~~~

“Mick only stayed married to Zeke, after he survived his Death Date, out of pity and duty (because he survived, and she expected him to die)”

I remember seeing a remark like this, and you must dislike or hate Mick if you think she’s like that. Even as a joke, that’s just cruel.

Mick was so happy and relieved when Zeke survived his Death Date. She loves Zeke, or did you just close your eyes to their whole love story?

She told him she’d continue to choose him even if he had one day left, or ten thousand left. And with or without empath powers, Zeke knew she loved him too.

“But she still had feelings for Jared”

Okay, and? Even if the situation were reverse, she’d also still have feelings for Zeke. It works both ways.

And as Mick told him, she chose him instead of Jared. Sure, she loved Jared, but as Zeke told Mick in S04E02, her huge heart has room enough for anyone who’s lucky to be loved by her. Loving Zeke doesn’t mean she has to stop loving anyone else in her life. Love isn’t limited.

It’s canon that the only way she could choose Jared is if Zeke is dead. He didn’t look happy at all when he saw Zeke survived.

Just because you love someone doesn’t mean they’re the one for you. She chose Zeke.

~~~

“The writers only made Drea pregnant to put her and Jared together”

Do I need to be petty and remind y’all that pregnancy happens when two people regularly have sex, and protection isn’t always a 100% guarantee? 😶

Jared and Drea match really well, that was quite clear when they first got together. Their relationship grew organically. Just take off your blinders. Even Mick could see that Drea is perfect for him.

It helped Mick to see that Jared was compromising his happiness by being with her. She didn’t want children, and she was confronted with the fact that they could never have a full life together, not without compromising her vision for her own life.

By the way, that breakup post-reset was made before she remembered Zeke telling her about one of their almost-meetups where he was a cab driver at the airport on the night Flight 828 was supposed to land. So, it was fully her choice to end things with Jared going forward and starting anew; Zeke didn’t even need to be alive for her to choose that for herself. But she was so happy when she remembered. If you truly like the character, her choice makes complete sense narratively and character-wise.

~~~

“But Jared and Mick have more chemistry”

If arguing and fighting is chemistry, then yeah. Don’t get me wrong, I do think JR and Melissa have chemistry outside of angst and volatile tension, but if you think “more chemistry” is a reason why a fictional couple should be endgame, you have a juvenile view of an adult romance. This ain’t a teen drama. So, congrats, what a way to reveal you don’t care about the story or a cohesive narrative! 👀

Zekaela have a calmer romantic chemistry, and their sweet love story is so much better than Jachaela’s constant tension-filled drama where Jared put on tantrums when she wouldn’t give in to him. Their story up until Season 4 was volatile in a bad way, which only went away when Jared stopped chasing after her and let her live peacefully married to Zeke. I’m glad his character got better, thank goodness!

And don’t even get me started with “We won in real-life because JR (Jared) and Melissa (Mick) are together,” because we’re here for the TV show, not real-life. It’s entertainment, so chill out.

~~~

I think that 2013-Jared calling off his proposal to Mick, because it was for the wrong reason (“to help you get past [Evie’s death]”), isn’t forced/lazy writing.

Consider for a minute that, in 2013, he’s not the character you were introduced to in Season 1 (the now-former 2018 timeline). He’s not unhealthily obsessed with her like the Joker is with Batman, or Eobard Thawne is with The Flash. And he never got the trauma from losing someone in a perceived airplane accident. As for his breakup, he got time to think, and ultimately he didn’t want to take advantage of her in a vulnerable state.

And consider for a moment, at the time, 2013-Mick was grieving and didn’t believe she deserved happiness – and it’s been a year since Evie’s death. I don’t imagine there were many smiles and laughter for the past year in their relationship, meaning it was dying. So, Jared not being heartbroken over 2024-Mick’s breakup kinda makes sense.

To him, Mick broke up with him because she wasn’t gonna heal any time soon, and wanted him to move on with someone who can give him what she can’t.

But to her, Mick grew in those 5 years since getting on Flight 828 the first time, and the life she thought she wanted back then isn’t the same anymore (and that’s okay, we’re not the same person we were half a decade ago) and she got to meet the real love of her life whom she can be with now. Zeke.

I don’t believe love is a choice, because you can’t force yourself to love or not to love someone. But I believe happiness is a choice, you can choose to walk towards it or away from it. Mick walked towards happiness by choosing Zeke. It’s really beautiful.

~~~

Credit for most of the Manifest screenshots and tweets go to @gracestone

#manifest #zekaela #soulmates #michaela and zeke #narratively mick and zeke were always meant to be together #series finale #manifest spoilers #jared vasquez #michaela stone #zeke landon #written in the stars #true love #it’s all connected #manifest s4 #manifest finale

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fbks1105 · 5 months

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The Unofficial Official Timeline of the Hatchetfeild Universe

Ok so I’m not sure if this is the EXACT way it’s supposed to go, but this is how I think one is meant to watch the Hatchet-verse:

1.) Nerdy Prudes Must Die

2.) The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals

3.) Nightmare Time season 1

4.) Black Friday

5.) Nightmare Time season 2

I won’t bore you with the specifics as to why I think this is how it’s supposed to play out, but know that there is a reason. (DM or comment if you really want to know)

#starkid #funny #teamstarkid #tgwdlm #team starkid #hatchetfield #nerdy prudes must die #lords in black #black and white #blackfriday #annual rewatch #nightmare time season 2 #nightmare #nightmare time #timeline #timeline theory #it’s all connected #it’s all coming together #the web they weave is inevitable

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3llen · 5 months

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Seablings first finding each other through Lizzies birthday party, Lizzie going red after her failed party attempts and then breaking the canary curse, Jimmy wanting to throw a party because he wasn’t the first to die but then being the second to die…oohhhh I am thinking so many thoughts right now…

#secret life #trafficblr #empires smp #ldshadowlady #jimmy solidarity #it’s all connected

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a-mayan-joy-has-nuts · 2 months

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Local clown spotted on holy ground as he tries at an ill fated attempt to live out his youth fully aware that something can snap at any moment turn bend tear pull jump pebble sneeze fall downies . When asked to comment “bAll iS LiFeH” was all the dim witted dolt could muster to say as he was confronted with all the facts. 🎤🤡🏀🤤🌳🔥💨

#420 nerd #420 #me #420 thoughts #selfie #ball is life #chicago #wake and bake #got some work in #wrist brace helped sooo much #knee rehabbing #face full o scars an butt full o farts #I’m high on basketball #and weed #maybe mOr high on weed cuz basketball got me wore out #it’s all connected #latinx

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jdsquared · 6 days

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On all other Passovers, we do not drop even one album. On this Passover, we drop an album plus 15 bonus songs.

🫶

#HackyPassover #judaism #jumblr #passover #pesach #chag sameach #taylor swift #swifties #the tortured poets department #it’s all connected

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joshsindigostreak · 1 month

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Not normally a white wine person but who can resist Josh?

#the filtered water #that I use to feed #Breada Van Fleet #peaking from the left #it’s all connected #in the great circle of wine #or whatever mufasa says

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takeme-totheworld · 5 months

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How could somebody as clever as you me be so stupid?

(cw: religious indoctrination, conversion therapy, CPTSD)

When I was sixteen years old I voluntarily sought out and joined an online youth support group for an ex-gay “ministry” and spent the next three years trying to pray the queerness out of myself and investing a lot of my social and emotional energy in a group of people dedicated to the same goal.

I cannot possibly overemphasize how much nobody forced me to do this. Because nobody had to. My religious programming had so completely taken hold at that point that it was basically running itself.

I left both the ex-gays and The Church (i.e. institutional Christianity in general) altogether, only after my mental health was completely unraveled by three years of deep investment in a cult-like group that thrived on the members’ self-hatred. I had to have a total nervous breakdown before I couldn’t do it anymore.

I left my childhood faith only when I had no other choice because staying was destroying me.

Moving across the country to live with the part of my family that wasn’t batshit religious helped. I completely removed myself from the sphere of influence of my old church and the ex-gays and I distanced myself as much as I could justify to myself from my religious family.

And then I spent years struggling to accept the losses. The loss of my faith, which shattered my entire worldview. The loss of my identity as a member of that faith. The loss of my church community. The loss of any closeness I’d had with the religious side of my family. The loss of my basic sense of trust in other people, because if the community I’d loved and trusted above all else had spent my whole life teaching me to believe in harmful myths and propaganda, how could I ever trust anyone ever again?

And the loss of trust in my own mind, because how could I have been stupid enough to believe it all?

While I was struggling with all of that, the religious indoctrination I’d absorbed my entire life was still alive and well in my head and I was struggling with that, too. Some of it was the kind of stuff you’d expect, nightmares about Hell and Armageddon and a long and painful process of reevaluating my politics (because my church was politically opinionated too, oh yes).

But there was also a particular voice on a loop incessantly in my mind for literal years, trying anything and everything to rationalize going back to church again because it still hadn’t fully let go.

At first the voice said You’re a failure, you failed God and the church because you didn’t try hard enough to cure yourself. You could have become what God and the church expected you to be if you’d just done more.

But later on it became You’re a selfish coward for running away. How are things ever going to get better in the church if people like you just leave instead of staying and trying to make a difference from the inside? What about the other people like you who are still trapped in their indoctrination? You can’t just abandon them.

Later still it became You should find a progressive church to join. How short-sighted, to write off the entire faith. It isn’t going anywhere, so it’s your duty to lend your support to the progressive wing of the church, so your part to make sure they win this culture war.

On and on and on. My mind spent over a decade going through every possible form of bargaining, inventing new and increasingly flimsy reasons why I somehow owed it to The Church to go back to them. Trying some way to make the loss less total, less permanent. Because I had loved my church growing up, been devoted to it in a way that defined my entire childhood and adolescence. And part of me kept desperately trying to find a way to stay connected to it.

I would tentatively check out churches in my new city, hoping to find something that gave me what I missed from my childhood faith without also hurting me. I was stuck in a weird cycle where I would briefly become involved with some new church or other faith based group and then get triggered, panic, and quickly leave again. I was basically trauma-bonded to the entire institution of Christianity, and it was only a few years ago when I finally had some serious therapy that I was able to completely sever the bond and fully accept that for me, faith and the church were dead and I was never ever going back.

But I still have CPTSD, the kind you develop when the curtain is pulled back on something in your life that you’d grown up thinking was good and you realize that it was deeply dysfunctional and was slowly and insidiously poisoning you for the first 19 years of your life, actually.

And I still look back and struggle to forgive myself, because as much as I’ve kept the focus of this story on how my indoctrination harmed me, it’s also true that teenage me could be an insufferable little shit, going around parroting off all kinds of bigoted, messed-up things I’d been taught in church. Some of the kids I went to school with probably hated me and I can’t blame them, tbh.

I started this blog mainly to brain dump about Good Omens and connect with other fans but I can’t really delve deeply into my perspectives on the story without delving into some of this stuff. So…consider this the first of an undetermined number of posts about my personal religious history, that I will probably link to in the future when writing metas (or at least that are helping me organize my thoughts to write metas).

#religious trauma #religious indoctrination #religious deconstruction #exvangelical #ex gay #ex ex gay #conversion therapy #cptsd #this is going to mostly be a nerdy things blog I swear #but I have some shit to get off my chest too #it’s all connected

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