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familyagrestefanblog · 3 years

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Ml Meta analysis: Adriens current absents, season 4 structure and theory on whats to come

Here I am back again with my endless rambling.

I'm just as worried for our cat son as everyone else (maybe even more) which is why I tried figuring out for my own sanity why he is so absent currently.

Upfront I wanna warn yall that I wrote this post in one rush this night and therefore had no time to do alot of editing. So things can probably get a bit more messy than usual but I tried to write it clearly, while writing 2 other ml essays as well. This is the one drawback of having so many episodes in such a short time, I have no time to write my posts x3 I had another theory planned for before Optigami airs but I don't think I can manage before tomorrow.

But let's not waste any more time. Grab a snack and here we go:

It's 2am right now but I think I just realized why Adrien/Chat Noir is being sidelined so much recently.

Sure, yes, it'll come into play in the very obviously set up Ladynoir drama later on but what I wanna talk about now is more the structure of how s4 is most likely written in terms of both Marinettes and Adriens side of the story. And then deep dive a little on why I think so.

You see season 4 is now reaping what has been built up from s1-s3, but this also includes that you have to take the time now to properly recreate the new possibilities out of the loose pieces of the broken status quo.

Seriously, season 4 has to handle and reinvent ALOT. The show got now officially announced to have 7 seasons, which is exactly the amount of seasons Astruc said they have story for. I couldnt find the official tweet from Thomas himself but I one from another source:

And now look take a look at the possible shows structure:

- s1-s3 was the first status quo and built up everything so now they can pay off after pay off while...

-... S4 is now the transitional season where the old status quo gets left behind as we work towards the new one.

-I have nothing to proof this of course, but in the same sense it would now make sense that s5-s7 where/are planned to play out under the final status quo. If I'm not wrong at first the show was under contract for 5 seasons, which would mean that after the transitional season 4 there was only 1 season of the final status quo for sure. Still, done right it could have been worth the wait. But this isn't where Miraculous will end. The show actually got the 7 seasons the creator wanted and THIS is how I think the long term plan makes the most sense. Nothing all too complicated but still hella effective in its execution.

But now back to our two main characters, because Marinettes and Adriens development are the two aspects that will raise the show to the intense heights of the s5-s7 status quo.

From s1-s3 Marinette was the active player but she was hardly involved with the actual PLOT of the show, since most of the plot and backstory of the show lies directly with the Agreste family. She only started to get her own plot when she literally created a new one by getting involved with the miraculous lore, because the closest Marinette got to the Agreste plot was "The collector".

Adrien in the other hand was always literally right in the middle of the plot but he wasn't enough of an active player to bring us further either.

Season 4 is now going to add the missing parts for both of them and as the very beginning of the season showed us: there are going to do it SEPERATLY.

This is why "Truth" and "Lies" have been structured the way they are (One Marinette-centric the other Adrien-centric). Yes, Marinette and Adrien are meant to end their story victoriously together, but they are simply not the people they have to be to become such a powerful team. Certain aspects of their journey they have to do... basically disconnected from the other one. The "Miracle Queen" endcard shows it quite nicely as well where they are heading now: away from each other.

Obviously the season started with Marinette growing into her new guardian status including everything miraculous related, since she is the main lead and because the new ways the episodes can now utilize everything Miraculous need to be established first before we deep dive into the messed up Agreste mystery.

So while I totally agree that it is annoying to get so little Adrien/Chat Noir content currently I also understand the practicality behind it. As I said, before s4 Marinette was the active main character who mostly didn't really have her own plot. So now adding her plot aspect and have her ACTIVELY figure everything needed out means that right now Marinette/Ladybug is the active focus main character who is solving a huge part of her s4 character arc. That simply drowns out Adrien as the currently still mostly-inactive secondary main character who, yes, may be right in the middle of the shows emotional + villain plot/lore/backstory, but that side of the story simply isn't in focus at the moment.

And I gotta say, I'm kinda glad they're doing it this way. Because I'm gonna be honest, when the season starts giving us Adrien/family Agreste episodes like "Lies" and "The collector" (in this case "Gabriel Agreste" for example) again, I don't want the narrative to be forced to spend time with something guardian lore based just because they didn't took their time to do it earlier.

So, as we see on the s4 episode raster "Gabriel Agreste" is episode 9. Honestly, I expect most of it (especially the ones near the beginning, so ep. 5 included) til that episode to be Marinette based the way everything else til now did (besides Lies obviously and Guilt trip didn't hardcore focus on Marinette/Ladybug either and that's because it's after "Gabriel Agreste") in the spirit of "Truth". It's just the needed set up from Marinettes side of the story and I can live with that.

Because we actually saw the change after "Gabriel Agreste" already in "Guilt trip".

I don't know why some people pretend like Chat almost cataclysming himself after hearing how guilt-eaten Nino is for Adriens sake isn't a huge indicator that the episodes afterwards will not only acknowledge but also DEAL with Adriens/Chats situation and problems. Remember, we are talking about CHAT NOIR here not Adrien Agreste. The show has always portrayed and acknowledged ADRIENS issues very straight forward and with the proper seriousness (especially when it comes to his family), whereas Chat Noir was often mostly used for comedic purposes with some exceptions of his problems being properly delt with (since Marinette/Ladybug was mostly oblivious to them, since Adrien keeps them hidden so well). But now in "Guilt trip" LADYBUG was confronted head-on with just how much negativity Chat has inside and how quickly and extremely he drowns in it.

Sure, correct, the episode also has his negativity "washed away" rather quickly by Ladybug opening up to him on how important he is to her

But this is in character for both of them as "Lies" very clearly showed us that the way BOTH OF THEM behave here is where the problem lies. There Ladybug was freaked out after Chat threw his life away once again but quickly accepted Chats very direct avoidance of the confrontation, since he seemed to be alright to her.

Something I also find noteworthy here is that Ladybugs dialog is "Seriously, you need to stop doing this to me!", which is.... a VERY Marinette-centric way of acknowledging the problem.

It completely shifts the issue away from Adriens extremely alarming self-harmful/suicidal tendencies and instead only calls out how it affects Marinette (whose feelings here are definitely valid, don't get me wrong!). It showcases perfectly how unaware Marinette still is of her partners inner tumult at that point and also parallels how Marinette called Adriens life "perfect" at the beginning of the episode (This is no shade towards Marinette, in general the entirety of "Lies" is about showing us just how harmful Adriens Chat Noir persona actually IS to him so these two moments of her being oblivious to Adriens and Chats immense problems very much fits into that episodes narrative and sets up what's about to come. I still have an entire essay in the making for "Lies" but, guys, it's just getting longer and longer. I suck xD).

So the fact that an episode after "Gabriel Agreste" brings this scenario back, just a little different but ALOT more revealing of Adriens immense problems to his partner, is VERY telling. Besides other things it tells us that this happens at the beginning of the arc that deals with (at least) Chats issues since Ladybug is still way too quickly too ready to accept her partner as "completely fine" again just because Chat makes it seem that way (while some negativity increasing guilt bubbles still to stick to him.).

And yet, others have already pointed it out that Ladybug IS noticing what Chat wanted to do and reacted accordingly...

she just didn't speak of it the way it is because it overwhelmed her, which calls back to Ladybugs "You have to stop doing this to me!" dialog.( For a great breakdown of her dialog HERE is a link to @flightfoot post)

In "Lies" Marinette was way too stressed by her new guardian role to even consider Chats side of it and therefore only spoke of her own, but in "Guilt trip" she's already past that stressful arc. So here she is immediately able to recognize Chats suicidal action for what it is, come to his (much needed) aid and lift her partners spirit the best she can by emotionally opening up to him (which is something we KNOW is incredibly hart for Marinette).

The difference between her reaction in "Lies" and in "Guilt trip" shows that Marinette has her guardian role already mostly handled and is now mentally able to be there for others again, so the extremely Marinette-centric "Truth"-like episodes are mostly passed. Now the episodes can bring Adrien/Chat Noir more into the game again and even shift to "Lies" - like episodes because MARINETTE can pay more attention to him again and isn't faced with something new, important and overwhelming Miraculous related every step she takes.

And THAT is extremely fair from a narrative standpoint.

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I really need to stop elaborating so much on these posts because I'm only NOW actually getting to the point of where Adriens journey will disconnect for a while from Ladybugs. Sorry guys.

Okay, to understand where I'm going with this I will have to quickly explain how I always saw Chat Noirs place in the Ladybug+Chat Noir vs Hawkmoth war ever since s1.

Because here is the thing: Adrien wasn't able to truly leave the battle field ONCE since the origins. Marinette was completely out of Hawkmoths and Gabriels reach once she detransformed, which balances out her basically being the personification of the good sides force. And Gabriel literally decided whenever or not the battle is even ACTIVE right now! Besides that he is in complete control of his own actions and environment, which gives him all the necessary time, safety and downtime he needs to act as the personification of the evil sides force.

Marinette and Gabriel always knew when they were safe and off the battle field, but ADRIEN never had that and it left him LITERALLY right in the middle of both Ladybugs and Hawkmoths sides.

You see, because before Adrien became Chat Noir he basically was part of Hawkmoths side just by default. He was born into this family, that's his father and lost mother and everything he knows. Adrien didn't/doesn't even have to KNOW that he is part of Hawkmoths side, he's his son at some level he just IS! And I'm not saying this as anything negative, Adrien coming from Hawkmoths side is literally the reason why he became Chat Noir!

Because whereas Gabriel is having the time of his damn life as evil terrorist, created out of tragic and sinister circumstances, ADRIEN on the other hand couldn't handle his families environment and very same circumstances anymore and accepted the role as Paris' hero to escape his heritage for a while.

Keywords being: a WHILE.

Something unique about Adrien I always loved is the fact that he is the villains abused, isolated and overworked SON, who becomes a hero to escape his depressing life and YET it was never Adriens intention to LEAVE IT. Adrien merely wanted to use his time as Chat Noir to let of some steam and breath freely while doing some hero work so he can go back into his civilian life and try to one day successfully ment his broken family. He couldn't handle the current situation anymore but he still always saw worth in his family/father. I have SO MUCH respect for that!

But him not intending to leave his family and instead regaining strength as Chat Noir to continue to hold onto it came with the downside of him not being able to fully become part of the good sides people/force either. Hence why Adriens/Chats place always felt so lost in comparison to Ladybugs and Hawkmoths clear positions. He's caught in between their extremes trying to balance out BOTH at the same time. What an impossible task!

So he couldn't put in the same focus as Ladybug into being the good sides force because he is literally burned out from his civilian life on Hawkmoths evil side. But he also couldn't be involved as an ACTIVE member of his fathers evil force, because he chose to find refuge in his friends and as a hero on Ladybugs side.

Adrien unknowingly is part of BOTH the shows two extreme moral sides of good and evil and this season we will see Adrien/Chat Noir grow into his own within BOTH sides as well.

Because he simply couldn't have done so right away in s1. Now after 3 seasons Chat Noir is more than solidly established as one of Paris Heros and his time with Ladybug, the other heros and his normal friends helped him greatly to find his place on the good side. "Lies" set this up as Chat Noirs arcs starting point that now he has to stop connecting "being heroic" strictly with following Ladybug (as Marinette is the STAND IN personification for the good side, she's still a flawed human being like everyone else and not the ultimate force of perfect and good. Big difference.) just as he has to start looking past his fathers sympathetic moments/qualities to see that Hawkmoth isn't a 100%, inhumane monster just because he is the stand-in personification of evil in their fight, but the man he calls Father and still needs to be taken down. (I talked about this in more detail on THIS post)

Adrien has to seperat himself from Ladybugs path and focus on his family and I believe it'll start with the much dreaded (but expected) Ladynoir fight.

Funnily enough, what I'm talking about was actually already set up in "Frozer" I just didn't remember that for a bit. In "Frozer" we saw Ladynoir having a fight which caused Chat Noir to go his own way in the episodes battle.

I always found it interesting that the episode didn't had Chats decision, to not follow Ladybugs lead here, turn out to be a huge mistake. Almost every other show would have done so but now I think I understand. This episode and s2 in general SET UP the s4 conflict, s3 LEAD UP to it and now s4 DELIVERS it.

So what happened in "Frozer" is a direct parallel to what about to go down:

Ladynoirs fight will cause Chat Noir to not simply follow Ladybugs side anymore the way he used to, but note, he DOESN'T leave the good side AND they make up again in the end after Chat saves Ladybug from the akuma. He just does things on his own because he isn't on great terms with her for a while. "Frozer" showed Chats decision to not only NOT be a mistake but also a necessary part of defeating the akuma, just the way it'll be in s4. Damn, Adrien breaking away from Ladybugs side, the way she (unintentionally tho) did at the beginning of the season, to focus more on himself and his family will be the game changing factor, when Adrien will have his completing arc where he goes from "not active character within the villain/backstory plot" to "ACTIVE character within the villain/backstory plot".

And we already saw with Marinette how many fast breakthroughs we get through these completing arcs. Which is also a reason for why Adriens/ Chats arc comes later in the season, because BUDDY. Once Adrien starts to actively uncover his families mystery and fathers secrets Gabriel is SCREWED! Adrien will gain the needed inside knowledge that complements Marinettes Miraculous power; and reunited they can take on whatever the hell kind of scale the Agrestes plan actually is.

So how to end this post? My biggest intention was to raise hope for everybody (myself included lol) who is right now very concerned and upset about how side-lined our boy is at the moment. But I prefer doing so in a way that actually works with canons context instead of sugarcoating what I don't like. And Adriens/Chats current position I definitely do NOT like but accepting it as realistic outcome from s1-s3 and set up for the escalation for both Ladynoir and his home situation gives it the proper purpose and pay off (narrative and character wise) that it SHOULD have.

Basically, the endcards of "Truth" and "Lies" show it perfectly.

It looks like ShadowMoth is turning a blind eye towards Adrien/Chat Noir because of Ladybugs new guardian status and "greater importance". But Gabriels tunnel vision on Ladybug will leave him vulnerable to his own sons secret actions against him and Gabriel won't see it coming until its already too late.

#Miraculous #Miraculous ladybug #ml theory #ml analysis #ml season 4 #ml show structure #Adrien Agreste #marinette dupain chang #Gabriel Agreste #Chat Noir #Ladybug #Hawkmoth #ml forshadowing

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kaypeace21 · 3 years

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Analyzing the 5 plays in this drama club poster .From the bts pics of stranger things 4.

So... some of ya’ll know I'm going through the st s4 films given to us by the official st twitter + the films reffed in the show itself or mentioned by the Duffers in interviews .

So I decided to look at the plays mentioned here. Because even if we don't see the monologues in the show directly - the Duffers wouldn't name drop anything unless it inspired them in some way. Similar to films name dropped in the show. Tw : for some dark themes .

This is just a quick little analysis I decided to do since we probably won't get any new st content today (3/22). Nothing too deep. Just mentioning things that caught my interest especially cause these plays have a lot of narrative connections to the st s4 movies I've been watching.

Invitation to a march (Authur laurents)

Reminds me of the stancy/jancy love triangle. "A young woman is having second thoughts about doing the right thing and marrying a respectable , rich, kind, young man with good prospects.By way of a prewedding diversion, this woman becomes interested in the passionate but poor and entirely unsuitable son of a local landlord.Basically, the plot concerns the efforts of Norma Brown to choose between a conventional fiance who "puts her to sleep" but is wealthy (like what her own mother did) or go for this new-poor guy. The play is principally interested in how this youthful love triangle affects the three mothers involved (whether the kids like it or not)

12th night (Shakespeare)

- viola (el) wrongly assumes a family member (hopper) is dead. She dresses up as a man named 'cesario'. A girl named Olivia falls for 'cesario' (violet dressed as a man). "Finally, when 'Cesario' and Sebastian (violet's twin brother: assumed to have drowned - Will) appear in the presence of Olivia there is more wonder and confusion at their physical similarity. Taking Sebastian for 'Cesario', Olivia asks him to marry her, and they are secretly married in a church. Cough if Olivia is 'straight' cause she fell for Viola (as a doppleganger dressed like her twin brother).Mike being into el who multiple characters in s1 said looked like a boy and specifically like Will is...suspish and a hint he's not straight lol. just like Olivia they're both into guys . plus, this play just has a butt load of love triangles (ugh i hated that aspect). There was also romantically coded letters (which was in the s4 films) . One character is also thrown into an insane asylum and framed as 'insane'.'Pretending that Malvolio is insane, they lock him up in a dark chamber. Feste visits him to mock his insanity'. We all know the psych hospital will be narratively important- talked about it more here.

The seagull (Anton Chekhov-russian)

similar to how I believed s4 will show m*#even already broken up since the months between s3-4 : act 3 (s3) ends with Nina begging for one last chance to be with Trigorin before he leaves/moves away. They kiss and make plans to meet again in Moscow.And in act 4 there's a timeskip where it shows they've been broken up for a long time between acts- and its established they never actually loved eachother. Do i even have to spell out why this parallels the m*#even ending in s3? There is also a play within the play (this is common in a lot of the st films- they have plays- or a story within a story- which illustrate certain themes or emotions of the characters within said film : blackswan, children of paradise, highschool musical, Rushmore, book of Henry, welcome to marwen, never ending story, romancing the stone, wet hot American summer, etc).The play is Konstantin's latest attempt at creating a dense symbolist work. There is also alot of love triangles in the seagull. TW!: for se#ual ab*se/su*cidal thoughts/ inc*st (here and in other play segments). The seagull motif reminds me a lot of Jonathan's rabbit story.Konstantin romantically into Nina shows up to give her a gull that he has shot. Nina is confused and horrified . Trigorin sees the gull that Konstantin has shot and muses to Nina on how he could use it as a subject for a short story: "The plot for the short story: a young girl lives all her life on the shore of a lake. She loves the lake, like a gull, and she's happy and free, like a gull. But a man arrives by chance, and when he sees her, he destroys her, out of sheer boredom. Like this gull." This immediately reminded me of jon's rabbit story and some of the movies on the s4 list . Like in forrest gump- Jenny (who is poor) was se*ually ab*sed as a very young girl by her father. As a child she runs away into a field-away from her alcoholic father yelling at her -there she prays that she can "be a bird so I can fly far far away" .

Jenny as an adult struggles with this unresolved trauma- being with ab*sive partners, doing dr*gs, and having su*cidal thoughts . She as an adult when contemplating su*icide, jokes 'you think i can fly like a bird ?' while looking down at a bridge.God-i'm worried about jonathan (Jenny was also a musician sort of like jon). In another s4 movie example ' mystic river ' :(in the 80s) a preteen baseball playing boy is r*ped by men in the woods. He later says he wishes he could become an undead monster to not feel the pain of that experience - cause quote " if I'm not human anymore maybe the pain will stop" (Will) . slightly off topic but he also has another personality, imagines a alternate word that dissappears when he turns his head. And as a less direct animal parallel to the play - the boy from the film also imagined his perpetrators as monsters and wolves to cope.In 'getout' the photographer character sees a dead deer in the woods and it represents a parent/his own childhood tra*ma relating to his past. similarly in 'prince of tides' the 2 siblings as kids were ra*ed by men. The older brother remembered it and the younger sibling developed DID (so didn't remember but she would draw wolves- as the perpetrators/villains in her picture stories she created . In the film they also had an ab*sive dad and were very poor. She also tried k*ling herself multiple times-but started to get better after remembering the source of her pain and trauma. There is also the theme of multiple attempted su*cides in the play- and the play ends with yet another attempt- and the audience is left unaware of the artist's fate at the end of the play.

The tempest (Shakespeare)

Prospereo - (the perceived antagonist) is a wizard with monstrous looks, storm powers , and ability to create monster-dogs

He wants revenge on a man who tried ra*ing his family member & revenge on his other family member who wronged him years ago. I mean... pretty much my did theory.But in the end.Prospero decides to show his enemies the mercy that they did not show him twelve years earlier. He tells Ariel to bring the men to him, he will restore their sanity and then renounce magic forever.Prospero breaks the spell that the men are under .

Diary of a scoundrel (Alexander Ostrovsky-Russian)

- I suppose this could loosely relate to Jonathan? Glumov, is a young man from an impoverished family lacking status seeking entrance into society's pampered class. A 19th-century Russian scoundrel must scheme his way out of his meager life in a small apartment -whatever it takes.He has a quick mind and some talent for seeing through the hypocrisies of people around him ( Jonathan does make a lot of social critiques about society). That gives him some advantages. A tale of one man's mission to finagle his way into upper-class society and find a cushy job. Set in 1874, this social comedy follows Glumov, a Russian youth who begins his ambitious ascent to social esteem. He progresses by wit, guile and rhetoric. Pitting one stupid person against another, he soon gains his ends. To reach these goals, Glumov will lie, flatter, and cater to the vanities of the wealthy. Unable to contain his disgust with his victims, Glumov decides to relieve his unvoiced satirical comments by recording his schemes in a diary. But he is tripped up by his uncle's wife, to whom he has made passionate love on his way to success. At the end of the play, his diary is stolen and his duplicity exposed, but he can nevertheless suceeds. The author is much more critical about the high society itself than about the main character, so the play keeps attracting generations of directors by opening possibilities for political criticism while also avoiding naming names of the current rulers.The play's aim was to overthrow bourgeois tradition and establish a class-conscious art called eccentricism giving a deliberately comic portrayal of reality.

I suppose I notice some possible commonalities- besides s3 critiquing the wealthy/capitalism in comedic ways . jonathan since s1 has worried about his family's finances / had some resentment toward the rich . In some of the s4 movies ‘orphan’ & ‘ girl interrupted’ someone reads their diary out loud to get at them (in girl interrupted the winona character’s diary even had critiques of her new friends). Alot of movies also have someone (usually a teen/young adult) making a documentary about their life -which could narratively replace said diary? A few movies have a poor guy adjusting to snobby rich social circles (or being poor and then getting money)- titanic, kingsmen, karate kid, the craft , godfather, wardogs,into the spiderverse,flashdance, and many others . And movies like wardogs has a poor-young-character do shady things to finacially support his family . There’s also that whole uncle’s wife thing- which makes me uncomfortable for obvious reasons (but I’m just thinking of Lonnie’s creepy gf who was into him). A few movies had the guy’s step mom innappropriately hit on him- orange county & you got mail. And him trying to avoid her advances. Or...not to mention ... it may be a problematic coincidence /trope. But in enter the void -the guy who needs to finacially support his sibling/ does dr*gs -hooks up with his dr*g dealing friend’s married mom (who would give him money). Or in gilbert grape- the poor teen-who has to finacially support his siblings/single mom-has his endgame relationship be a girl his own age. But before that he h*oked up with a married woman -who would give him money. Don’s plum -young film guy-propositioned by older female film director (for dream job). Not even mentioning the other films that have the guy hooking up with toxic older women (like ‘the graduate’). Or analyze this-where the therapist accuses him of having an Oedipus complex (not touching that one... but the guy in ‘enter the void’ a 100% had one). It’s possible those movies were just- inspo for s3? A coincidence? Or s3 was foreshadowing for this in s4- but unlike s3 it will accurately be played as wrong and a sign of Jonathan recreating past tra*ma caused by Lonnie (cough like the photos) /being desperate for money. And not played ‘comedically’ like how it mostly was in s3. But shown as self destructive (for Jon) and immoral on the Woman’s end. Like... Billy and Jon are character foils. Both are older siblings into rock music, with ab*sive dads who shoved them into walls. Both lose it (and beat steve to a pulp when Steve accidentally triggers their daddy issues). In s3 it’s established womanizer Billy has mommy issues, than he tries ho*king up with someone his mom’s age, and the characters ref ‘back to the future ‘ and Steve incorrectly says it’s about “alex p keaton trying to bang his mom.” This could illustrate his subconscious issues with parental figures/adults cause of Lonnie’s possible past se*ual ab*se . One film the friend even says to the guy “you don’t have friends!” guy b: i have friends! him: no you have acquaintances! ADMIT IT! YOU’RE AFRAID OF MEN!I mean-Jonathan liked Nancy- but he initially hooked up with her cause he wanted to prove he didn’t have ‘trust issues’ from his dad. Also it’s prob a bit of a reach (and maybe a coincidence)- but the fact Murray in the same breath compares Steve (Nancy’s then bf) and Lonnie ... uh... if you think too long about it ... it’s very sinister . Especially because in s3: muray tells Joyce that despite her wanting to be with a nice guy, she’s curious about “the brute” Hopper despite him reminding her of a past “bad relationship”(aka Lonnie). Like- yeah connect some dots. Quite a few films (other than forrest gump) also have the character who (as a kid) was r*ped by their dad/parent- begin to do dr*gs/be pr*miscuous as adults since they never learned to properly cope with their trauma (’girl with the dragon tattoo’, ‘black swan’, and ‘magnolia’). Unfortunately the whole relative doing such things to kid-relatives is in at least 30+ movies.

Personally, i would be MUCH happier if Jon had a age appropriate romance- and had not a single creepy adult near him. A few movies actually imply Lonnie gets yet another ‘new model’ replacing his gf in her 20s with a new gf- who is ‘barely l*gal” and just turned 18. so there’s that possibility as well- that she’s jonathan’s age.I just want Jonathan-happy &safe. GOD. IS THAT TOO MUCH TO ASK?

#byler #byeler #will byers #mike wheeler #Jonathan byers #nancy wheeler #joyce byers #jim hopper #murray bauman #stranger things #el hopper #s4 theory #stranger things theory

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safflowerseason · 4 years

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I’m eagerly anticipating your OC rewatch commentary on the end of S2 (particularly the entire Trey storyline) because 1. I just got done watching it myself and 2. I was struck by a lot of different things, mainly how the seriousness of marissa’s attack was swept under the rug and what a poor job they did exploring the aftermath of everything that happened in early S3

Whew, you sent this in weeks ago, and I finally got around to watching the last stretch of S2 and the first episode of S3. I was visiting home for a few weeks and didn’t have the time for serious critical television viewing of The OC (not exactly a show my parents would be into…we watched the second season of Succession instead. GOD, talk about a season finale.)

Anyway, the end of S2 for The OC.

Maybe it’s the general pandemic-related low-grade angst that's filtering everything right now, but honestly I just thought this whole storyline was so fucking sad. It was just so depressing to watch in 2020. All of it. Trey attempts to rape Marissa and it’s clearly a plot device the writers came up with to tell us more about Trey—it’s a sign that, unlike Ryan, he can’t fight off his violent demons and emotional instability and get his life together. He’s painted as this tragic figure that we, at the end of the day, are meant to sympathize with. He’s someone who could have been better than a guy who tries to rape his brother’s girlfriend, but he ultimately was not. He thought she was into him, after all—he just misread her signals. So Marissa just becomes the ultimate sign of his moral failing, an object in a bigger fight between brothers. Ryan tells Seth that even though he wanted to kill Trey, now that Trey has been shot, he still wants him around. He ends 3.01 mourning the loss of his brother in the arms of the woman that brother tried to rape. Honestly the whole thing just depressed the fuck out of me, that systemic sexual violence against women was (and is) still treated as easy dramatic plot fodder because that’s just how things are. I am not saying that Ryan couldn’t have complicated feelings about his brother’s place in his life once he learned what happened—or even that true redemption does not exist—but this show is so not equipped to wade into those morally complex waters.

I think the show did a decent job of showing Marissa’s personal trauma in the immediate aftermath--ugh, the scene where she and Ryan are kissing and she’s picturing Trey, so horrible and real--and it was heartbreaking to watch her struggle with the burden of keeping what happened to her a secret. But of course ultimately it’s still about Ryan, about how she can’t tell anyone because she knows he’ll try to kill Trey. And then once she shoots Trey, the attempted rape is nothing compared to that fact. Does Marissa even mention it? It only matters to the prosecutor as a potential motive for Ryan, whom he’s trying to pin the crime on because apparently it doesn’t look good to prosecute a rich white girl (I think??? The legal nonsense is already too much). The shooting is a much more defining experience for everyone involved. Julie is deeply concerned that Marissa’s future is ruined because she shot someone. What about the psychological damage from the time Ryan’s brother held her down against her will and tried to rape her? That kind of trauma can absolutely fuck up a person’s life if left unaddressed. Where is the insistence Marissa go to therapy now?! She should go even if she had only shot someone, and not been attacked! I can’t with any of it, and it was only the first episode of S3.

As for the other plot lines, Kelly Rowan turned in an incredible performance as Kirsten reaching a state of complete emotional collapse, and I can’t fucking believe she did not win any awards. Sandy came off as a patronizing asshole for a lot of that storyline? He was so morally hoity-toity about their communication issues and her drinking. I am very glad the comic-book storyline is over because it was truly dragging down S2 (sorry Zach, you were a very poor replacement for Luke Ward…although I did laugh at the line “I’m a water polo player! We’re always the bad guys!”) It’s supposed to be the lighter comedic storyline threading through these last few episodes, but it falls so flat, which is another reason S2 just feels so heavy and serious and basically no fun at all.

In general I continued to just be very unimpressed with the writing and narrative construction this season. Why was Caleb so invested in marrying Julie only to basically ignore her for the entire season and then dilly-dally over divorcing her? Julie decides to kill him, then…oh wait, she doesn’t! Then he dies! Apparently Ryan is the father of Theresa’s baby?! The Miami episode is just a weak retread of the Vegas episode in S1! Is no one going to tell Lindsay that her dad died? Side characters like Lance and Jess were so poorly conceived. They’re just narrative chaos agents designed to do whatever the plot needs, for no coherent reason, and it’s so infurating after the grounded storylines of S1 (truly, both of them act like psychopaths in order for the story to get where it needs to go...although maybe in Jess’s case she is supposed to an actual psychopath). What is this nonsensical plot construction. Ugh, I am sorry I am such a downer on this season, but…it’s kind of a downer of a season!

I do love the sailing/beach montage in 3.01. And the intervention scene is genuinely powerful.

#the oc season two #marissa cooper #ryan atwood #cw: rape #cw: attempted rape #the marissa discourse

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jess-the-vampire · 5 years

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What are your thoughts about tom and Star episode?

I kinda feel like the fandom is overreacting to this episode, cause honestly, i really actually enjoyed it.

As someone who doesn’t hide the fact i’m not a fan of the love plot and was going to be watching how they handled this arc VERY closely, i actually don’t mind how this episode brought up complaints I had about star’s relationship with tom to further work on.

And yes, i consider this episode the start of a star arc, i don’t believe it was meant to resolve anything, i believe it exists to bring star’s attention to how she’s been treating tom for years.

Because i’ve seen the fandom complain “They didn’t talk about it at all or resolve it!”, but i think that’s the point. I feel like the episode was meant to bring star’s behavior to her attention, and the season going forward we’ll see how she reacts to learning about how she’s been treating tom.

The episode does not just simply revolve around the kiss, it brings up the matter of star constantly putting marco over tom, and acknowledges that she doesn’t notice all the hard work tom has put into his relationship with her for years, which were things I certainly noticed and pointed out in s3. So i’m glad the crew also noticed it and brought it up here.

This episode, was here to show Star how she’s been treating him, and i’m honestly happy the show gave us an episode where star’s being called out for her actions….and it’s actually not nearly as malicious as i think some were expecting.

I think what matters going forward, is how star and her relationship with tom changes, whether star chooses to spend more time with tom (Which is how the episode ends), acknowledge his efforts, and stop keeping things from him.

For once, instead of Marco and Star changing Tom for the better, it’s the other way around. Star perhaps fixing the mistakes she made for Tom would be Tom helping HER change for the better.

And i like that tbh, it’s kinda impressive that Tom has arguably become the most mature out of these three lately.

And i think based on what we are told in this episode, i don’t mind how Tom handles it. Why? Because apparently Marco told Tom all the details of what exactly happened at some point. So according to Tom, he was told the whole thing was sorta a misunderstanding and a mistake, marco didn’t leave him wondering if star had kissed marco under different circumstances.

And Tom, out of ANYBODY in this show, should be the guy to understand when mistakes happen and forgive them. So since he believes it to have been an accident and a mistake, it makes sense why Star NOT telling him bothers him way more then the kiss, because regardless of it being a mistake, Star should’ve told him that this happened, not marco.

(it’s also good the show allows Tom to be hurt and knows Star is the one in the wrong here, that Tom should be understandably mad about this. So thanks for that show).

I was under the impression marco would not tell him all this, and i think under those circumstances, tom should be more visibly upset because he may feel like he had been betrayed. But the fact he knows the full situation they were under makes me alright with his actions in the episode.

Also i think it’s weird the fandom keeps saying star needs to accept she likes marco, as though we didn’t already have episodes around that. I think she’s fully aware she likes marco, i just think she also likes being with tom just fine.

Knowing she likes marco ≠ immediately dumping Tom.

I had a feeling they weren’t gonna break up in this episode, and i’m happy i was proven right because i wasn’t entirely sure. But i had a feeling the show wanted to do more with their relationship and well, tbh it was way too predictable for them to pull another jarco.

So i like them choosing to go another direction, while being aware of the issues star presented in their relationship.

People might be mad the show is keeping up the love plot, but honestly i really didn’t think the show would drop it so soon. Though i am glad it’s not the MAIN focus so far in the season, i think this is really the only episode that actually involves it at all. So it’s already an improvement over s3.

When i heard this was tom’s family lake house, i was really hoping his family would be in the episode with him, because his parents got an introduction and make me VERY curious, and i felt like they should come back in future episodes…even if it’s not very often.

So i was happy when the episode started and there was a giant demon queen in full view.

What i didn’t expect though, was that Tom’s parents were important to the episode’s PLOT. I kinda expected them to be side characters, but the plot of the episode is kicked off by, and revolves around, Tom’s mother, so i’m rather happy these characters got to be a bit explored here.

His parents are also really adorable and fun to watch.

I mean, it’s already hilariously bizarre enough these two are married, but i got a lot more humor and personality out of them in this episode.

Dave’s so unfazed by his demon lifestyle and family, and i kinda enjoy how normal this is to him. I guess when you live in the underworld this long your relatives coming out of walls and your son blowing up tables just get to be normal to you.

And Tom’s mom, the one who gets more attention between the two, is portrayed as a REALLY protective mom who really loves and adores her child. And it’s actually really cute.

Since tom’s family was originally going to be abusive it’s kinda delightful how much his reworked parents and family love and adore him. Even if that raises some questions about tom’s behavior in earlier episodes that had alluded to him being under abusive parents.

This episode also confirms some things about them:

Dave and Wrath both seem to share some anger issues, Wrath seems to be WAY more silent about her anger then her husband though, who really didn’t hide his anger in Club Snubbed. So whatever issues tom has, seems to come from both of them, not one or the other.

Wrath does speak only in demon, cause it was hard to tell if she was speaking in english and her voice made it sound weird or demon back in Club snubbed. Her sister knows English though and wrath understands English so i dunno if she just chooses to speak in demon tongue or can’t really speak it herself (Which might be the answer). I do think it’s cute her husband and son translate for her though.

Wrath was not the first in line for the throne, she was the little sister (Lol). The episode doesn’t make it clear why she overpassed her sister, but it seems maybe her older sister wasn’t nearly as into it XD

Also what the heck do tom’s demon grandparents look like if THESE are their daughters?

It doesn’t fully answer if Dave and Wrath being together is a problem to the underworld, though then again Tom’s great grandfather was seemingly screeching at Dave at one point so i dunno if that was meant to represent he doesn’t like him or tom’s great-grandpa just likes to yell at everyone. (Also i can’t believe he lives in the wall of this lake house and they all just LET him XD).

Also i know people are gonna blame tom for talking to his mother about the situation, but considering the only friends tom seems to have are MARCO and STAR. Tom’s a little limited if he wants to talk to anyone about how he feels on something like this.

So i don’t see there being an issue with him needing to talk to his mother about how he’s feeling, he probably just didn’t think his mom would take it to such an extreme (Although granted, i think her worrying star is going to hurt her son AGAIN after knowing about the kiss, is understandable given how much she cares about him).

And the fandom’s saying this is all a guilt trip and though i can see where it’s coming from. I also think it’s kinda important to show star how much she’s hurt tom and have her work on fixing it.

It wouldn’t exactly be a better option for star to be aware of how she’s hurt tom, and then continue to do the exact things she had been doing to hurt tom by the end of the episode, cause then it just makes it look like she doesn’t care or try to change from that.

And at least the event she had been leaving for was…making dinner, so it’s not something super important she would’ve missed out on.

I also like that this episode seems to confirm Star does genuinely like Tom, she’s not using him.

As far as nitpicks?

Well as much as i love seeing baby tom, his tail is not red and his eye markings are in his baby pics which now brings the whole “Are they makeup or not” argument back up. Unless tom’s tail changed colors as he got older or his makeup isn’t to do with his markings i’m a little confused there.

I do think wrath forgives star maybe a bit quickly despite how understandably upset with her she was. But then again star did save tom’s life and she was probably more upset that HER OWN anger put her son in danger to be mad at her.

Dave also doesn’t react to tom being in danger, which i get why because Wrath is the parent that’s focused on, i just think it’s weird he wasn’t given any reaction to his son being in danger.

I really wish star apologized to tom for this whole thing, or even marco for that matter. But we’ll see what happens later on.

Is star ever going to learn to stop running away from her issues? Because the fandom has tried to say over and over again she’s learned but it seems the show says no because she keeps on doing it.

Small touches i liked?

Tom mentioned the hypothetical scenario that he had kissed marco, and he’s entirely serious about it, it’s not played off as a joke.

Dave being animated to comfort wrath when she’s visibly upset.

The carriage being something Tom made by hand, i think that adds a little more to his actions in BMB knowing how much effort he went through to impress star and how sadly it didn’t go right.

The show remembered tom’s weird tattoo.

I think it’s weird how normal the tom-star-marco dynamic is in Swim Suit, but it does seem in this episode Tom had been waiting for star to speak up on the matter, and only spoke up now because he accepted she was still not going to say anything to him and probably wouldn’t have. So i can understand why tom’s so normal beforehand, he had most likely wanted to treat everything as normal, hoping star would talk to him about this, and it’s kinda sad she never did.

All in all, i honestly had fun.

I can understand the frustration with an episode like Booth Buddies because of what it did and that based on the rest of the season it really worried people about where it might go.

But this episode reassured me and i’m really interested in where the rest of the season goes tbh. I like that it subverted the expectations of the fans and i enjoy how it did, and i think this episode opens up the door for further growth for star, and her relationship with both tom and marco and i want to see that.

I had a good time, and even though it’s not flawless i think how good it is depends on what star does after it and being aware of her flaws from now on.

Really nice episode, i’m excited to see the episodes that will soon follow it.

#star vs the forces of evil #svstfoe #svtfoe #Tom the demon #tom lucitor #tomstar #star butterfly #Dave lucitor #queen lucitor #King Lucitor #Wrathmelior Lucitor #marco #marco diaz

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seddm · 5 years

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STARCO OVERVIEW - Season 2 (part 1)

SEASON 1

SEASON 2 (part 1) (part 2)

SEASON 3 (Incoming)

SEASON 4 (Incoming)

MY NEW WAND (2x01a)

Ignoring all the questions that naturally come with a season premiere opening on Star videochatting in the bathroom while Marco is taking a shower - questions that usually lead to “why the shit did they need four seasons to start smooching”, My New Wand finally introduces the idea that Star might feel something more than friendship for Marco. We aren’t told what she wrote in her diary (even if we know now, thanks to the Book of Spells, and it’s essentially a slightly more consciously skewed toward romance version of Marco’s “I felt like this since the beginning” in Here to Help),

but the structure of the scene and the “diary of a teenage girl which can’t be seen by her bestie” clearly directed the attention of the viewers in a very defined direction. One subtly highlighted by the super inconspicuous shape of the key (sure, lots of Star’s spells and elements are heart shaped or themed, but in this specific case having the concepts such as “heart” “key” “secret diary” and “crush” all in one shot is suspicious at the very least).

As usual, UNCONSCIOUS FEELINGS: Star was generically embarrassed about Marco reading her diary, because that’s something any teen girl would do. She wasn’t consciously crushing on Marco yet at this point, at most she sometimes felt things like “wow he’s cute” and stuff like that on top of an incredibly strong relationship. It’s akin to what Marco experiences in Blood Moon Ball, but since Star is more “aggressive” with her feelings, and since Marco is going to get serious with Jackie, she’s going to consciously include “romantic attraction” in the recipe of her friendship with Marco about half a season earlier than him.

Another important element in the episode is the introduction to dipping down, a proper version of what Star did in Storm the Castle. Long story short, as Moon tells Star, the key to dipping down are strong emotions.

Wanting to save Marco when Toffee kidnapped him, being embarrassed about him reading her diary here. I’m not saying that Marco is the only key to Star’s maturing, obviously - and later on she’s going to dip down even more for reasons not directly connected to him, but this early in the show he always is, one way or another, the focal point of her character arc, and Glossaryck knows it and uses him to teach his problematic student in unorthodox ways - it’s clear that he’s the one who closed Marco in the closet in this episode, and directed him toward Star’s diary, well knowing that it might have helped her get a first feeling of what dipping down is like. He literally says that finding Star’s secret is the way to have her reach the chunks, which is what he used with her as a metaphor for channeling magic through dipping down.

So strong emotions = dipping down --> Marco = source of very strong emotions for Star. Not the only source, but definitely the main one, especially in S1 and S2. This is an important point for Star’s whole character arc: it’s true that in S3 and S4 there are going to be less meaningful Star - Marco interactions, and that they’re both going to have many more moments of growth while interacting with other characters, but that’s the whole point of it. At the beginning of the series both dorks are walking disasters; by interacting together, by complementing each other and their shortcoming, they slowly mature into something better, individuals who are now ready to start stepping (slowly, very slowly, their journey won’t be complete until the end of the series) into the real world and take on it. So while I’m the first one who got frustrated and saddened by the relative lack of Starco moments in later seasons (relative is the keyword) it’s also important to keep in mind that it never meant that their relationship became less important and relevant, just that during their first months together they left a real and tangible effect on each other, leading to meaningful growth that allowed the writers to believably open up roads to different kind of interactions and “plot devices” for growth. This is what I mean when I say things like “meeting Marco is what allowed Star to defeat Toffee”. Obviously there are several degrees of separation, and several moments of growth / plot for Star that didn’t even involve Marco, but without their meeting she wouldn’t have matured as fast, she wouldn’t have had the opportunity to confront herself with a friend who was ready to help put some order in her super messed up life life. From the Book of Spells: “When we are together he sees the chaos in the world and sort of embraces it”. This is a direct quote from Star’s diary, something the writers of the show wanted to point out before S4 while referring to early S1 Star.

Marco has been, since the beginning, the first and most important key to Star’s development (even if not the only one), the “force” that first allowed her to start her journey toward maturity and become the kind of person who could go from being “a skimmer” to being proud of being “a dipper”. And in this S2 premiere we get a very direct taste of it, with Glossaryck using Marco as a bait to help Star learn.

Important bonus: the face Star makes for a handful of frames after having seen a naked Marco being YEETed across her room.

MR. CANDLE CARES (2x02a)

I wrote a lot about this episode in multiple posts, so I’m going to be extremely focused on the Star - Marco stuff only this time:

Marco smiles like that when he sees Star getting out from the office, and it endlessly warms my heart.

Both Star and Marco are clearly not thinking about each other in romantic terms in the slightest during this episode, the former harshly denying the possibility of any feeling for her bestie, the latter not being ashamed in the slightest about talking about creative making out techniques to trick Tom into revealing himself. And yet just two segments earlier Star didn’t want Marco to read a part of her diary where she might have said something crush-related. Unconscious feelings, Heart and Mind not agreeing on something, it’s always the same deal, the whole show is going to play with this idea of extreme disconnection between what one might feel and what one might consciously know they want (concept directly introduced in Sleepover) as a way to justify the ever growing emotional intimacy between Star and Marco while taking their sweet time to actually deliver any romance related developments. We all have to accept it, or it becomes frustrating and impossible to read some of the passages in the series, especially during S3 and early S4, because we’d get lost in trying to plot the trends of their feelings on a graph and that’s a fool’s errand. When the show wants to tell us “A CHARACTER FEELS SOMETHING STRONGLY AND THIS THING IS IMPORTANT” they’re not subtle about it, and that’s vastly more important than anything else.

Marco stops playing to dreamingly appreciate Star and state how endearing he finds a part of her personality which might be frustrating to most (and it is to Tom, despite him also being attracted to it at the same time).

Appreciating your partners’ quirks is Love Story Writing 101, and this is going to be particularly evident in Curse of the Blood Moon (”I like every single thing about you”) and Here to Help (Star chuckling at Marco’s clumsiness). In this specific case it’s obviously premature to talk about “love” and it’s mostly a delicious bonus that presents a comparison between Tom and Marco, evidencing both their points in common (they’re both fascinated by Star’s personality and individuality) and differences (Tom is frustrated by this part of Star’s personality as well, since it doesn’t mix well with his controlling nature, while Marco learned to embrace it).

The important part, my favorite example to show people why and how Marco had an incredibly important influence on Star’s growth, especially during the first part of the series: Star spends most of the day panicking over Mr. Candle and then her mom’s words, she feels trapped in a role she didn’t want, lacking any freedom and prospect in life beyond her role as a future queen (interestingly she feels stuck in life, just like Marco in the following episode, but not out of lack of direction, but excess of it!). Then Marco gets home, talks to her for twenty seconds, and he immediately manages not only to calm her down, but he also gives her a new perspective on her life, and on her possibilities as a princess (and we know that she is definitely going to use her authority in her own way during S3), all of this while always following the style outlined by Blood Moon Ball: not a teacher or someone who tells her what she should do, just a friend nudging her in the right direction, telling her what she needed to hear. A Version 1.0 of his speech about finding your own happiness from Beach Day, in a way - the theme of free will and self determination was present since the beginning, even if at the time there obviously seemed to be less freedom in Star’s life, since she was supposed to inherit the throne, eventually.

Bonus points for the Alphonse The Worthy’s portrait from Blood Moon Ball moving his eyes to look at the two hugging, and for the demon highlighting with “point Marco” that he ultimately won the day when it came to wanting to be at Star’s side. Minus point for Star still acting coy at Tom’s compliment showing that she still had unresolved attraction for him.

RED BELT (2x02b)

The events of the episode itself aren’t particularly related to Starco, but it formally introduces Marco’s own “coming of age” arc, by telling us that he’s scared about being stuck in life, left without a goal or a purpose and without any meaningful connection. Needless to say that the “squire arc” from Sophomore Slump to The Knight Shift is going to address this, and that Star (as a person, but also as a mean to step into a bigger world) is going to be fundamental for Marco’s growth. While talking about the series premiere I mentioned that Star’s main role in Marco’s life is helping him become a better version of himself, stepping out of his comfort zone and managing to find his own path toward fulfillment and happiness, and Star is not just going to be extremely important for this, in different ways during the many different arcs, but she’s eventually going to be identified as THE single most important element. In The Knight Shift Marco is going to realize that he wants a lot of things from his life, that he wants to make experiences and slowly decide what he wants to do in the future without being scared about having to figure out everything here and now, lest being left behind, but he’s also going to realize that Star’s presence is essential to his happiness, that their relationship is the one lifelong post he feels like he has to commit, despite being just a teen with all his life in front of him.

So Red Belt doesn’t really have any relevant Starco interactions, but it introduces a part of Marco’s journey as a character that’s going to be incredibly connected to Star’s presence in his life.

As for the nightmare itself, don’t ask. It uses a lot of generic dream-like imagery to make things confusing and symbolic, with some elements from the first half of the season (Mr. Candle, the colors green and purple, associated to the magic subplot, the suit from Bonbon The Birthday Clown...). Maybe the Blood Moon being there was on purpose, a symbol for “you’re worried about having no goal in life, but your friend can be the key for you to gain maturity and fulfillment!”, maybe it was just “red belt, red balloon, spooky imagery... let’s put in the Blood Moon!”. Lots of things in visual media are done just for “rules of cool” or to give the scene a particular kind of mood that can help focus the attention of the viewers.

STAR ON WHEELS (2x03a)

This episode, in its extreme weirdness, is like an a super condensed recap of the important parts of Star and Marco’s relationship - with focus on the Star’s side of things, but there’s also some for Marco:

Star she gets excited about Marco teaching her something about Earth culture - riding a bike, which at the same time is also something new that could be compared to her getting her wand;

She overdoes and she messes up / can’t properly handle the situation;

Marco gets overwhelmed by this, but then learns to embrace the weirdness of Mewni / magic for Star’s sake (more or less like what happened in the first episode, or at least during her first encounters with Star and her world);

and Star has to come to terms with the fact that she’s in another dimension now, embracing part of it just like Marco did, and growing from it, and Marco has a big role in convincing her about it;

And while it’s at it, the episode includes other important themes (central to Star as a person in general, but in this case highlighted through her interactions with Marco), such as Star’s stubbornness and hostility toward doing and learning stuff when just told what to do,

and the resulting moment of learning and growth when Marco, instead of just “ordering her” what to do, gives her some of the trust that she desperately needs, and with it the confidence to actually try and succeed on her own (this all connects to the larger arc of Glossaryck teaching Star stuff in unconventional ways).

And since it never hurts we get reminded one more time how much Star resents being lied to and how important trust is to her.

Obviously the whole episode is extremely silly, the whole situation requires a lot of suspension of disbelief to work and the “emotional moments” of the episode are extremely hammed up - we get a heartwarming “I trust you.” moment when the situation at hand involves learning to ride a bike! But it’s still a good way to have in a slick 11 minutes long package a super-cut of (part of) what Star and Marco brought into each other’s lives, and how that affected them and their way to interact with the world.

FETCH (2x03b)

Wow look in an episode that directly introduces the “stop running from your problems” arc for Star we get told by Sta herself that having your own Marco is important to give you the support you need to feel less overwhelmed by life - and thus less prone to ignore problems, it’s almost like he’s important to her in that way and that in Lint Catcher the dubbin vows when she makes him her squire further drive home the idea that he’s her ideal companion.

STAR VS ECHO CREEK (2x04a)

Another episode about “running away from problems”, in this case Star physically runs away from her problems and tries to avoid consequences. And sure, at the beginning of the episode Marco tries to tell her not to run away and we could argue once again about the positive influence and role Marco has on Star, but we know about it already. What’s REALLY important and huge is that by the end of the episode Star, the same person whose greatest fear in S1 was going to St. Olga and thus losing her freedom, gets convinced while talking with her own subconscious that going to prison (= facing problems and consequences instead of running away carefree) is a better alternative to never being able to see Marco again. This is the same concept I talked about at the beginning of the post: it’s not like Marco is the ONLY important person in Star’s life, she obviously loves her family as well and in later seasons she’s going to interact with other characters as well, but at this point of the story Marco is the person who she actively cares the most about, and the one who better understands her (this is going to be a constant throughout the series, obviously), so almost all big moments of learning and self reflection for Star are somehow related to him. And while saying that Marco is the most important person in the world to Star (and vice versa) might not have been entirely correct by this point of the series (mostly because we lacked proper perspective), it becomes absolutely true by the end of it, as their choices in Cleaved highlight.

So yes, sure, logically speaking, and going beyond the simple plot of this episode, Star would have missed a number of persons if she spent her life hiding just to run away from her problems, but as far as early S2 experiences and subconscious goes, it all relates back to Marco, one way to another. After all we know that they both had an intense and special relationship from the beginning, and it’s going to keep being something unique that they don’t share with anyone else throughout the whole show, even when they’re going to date other people, even when there aren’t going to be as many episodes featuring both of them together.

Bonus gratuitously adorable shot. Marco didn’t love-love Star from the beginning, we know that, but Gloss damnit, did he LOVE her from the beginning. I know that the series might not have had the best of pacing and some choices concerning shipping planted doubts and frustration in many fans, but no other two characters in the series come even remotely as close to Star and Marco when it comes to unabashedly caring about the other to incredibly extremes. THIS is what Marco means when he says that he felt like this from the beginning, and THIS is what Star means when she says (albeit in her diary in the Book of Spells) that she never connected with anyone else in the same way. This has never changed in intensity throughout the show (if anything it grew), even if it got the spotlight of an episode way less frequently.

WAND TO WAND (2x04b)

Yet another episode about Star learning not to avoid problems and responsibilities as much, and another episode that doubles down of how important Star’s feelings for Marco (I mean “feelings” in the broadest possible term, not as in “still unconscious crush” only) are for her magic. I already said this like five times, but I really want for the point to come across: I’m not saying that everything Star does, learns, or everything concerning her magic, has to relate to Marco, Starco, or to her growing crush on him, nor that Marco is the only one who ever helps Star grow. What I mean is that during all of S2 Marco is the single biggest source of feelings for Star, and this includes good stuff and negative stuff, such as all the emotional turmoil cased by Jarco. But this all plays into helping Star mature, culminating in Starcrushed. The S2 finale constitutes the climax to Star’s “stop running away from problems” arc, culminating in her accepting her role as a princess and going off to face Toffee, but this goes hand in hand with confessing her crush to Marco. Star finds the determination to grow and take The Plot™ head on, thus eventually saving Mewni (multiple times), and this part of her character arc is inextricably connected to her “learn to admit your own feelings for Marco” arc. THIS is what establishes their relationship as utterly special, and what allows me to claim that Marco had a fundamental role in Star’s coming of age story, well beyond the limits of what he personally and actively did with and for her.

When the series shows us that Marco is the key to Star tapping into her magic and better learning to use it it’s not because of some lore or plot related connection between the two, or between Starco and Magic - we have seen that’s not the case: magic is connected to emotions, and Marco happens to be the single biggest source of emotions for Star. That’s what it’s all about.

The episode ends with Star using brooms to fix her messes instead of magic, which is yet again a nice moment of “Star embracing part of Marco’s world”, but it’s not really that important in the big picture since it’s not like Earth’s ways are inherently better, it’s just important for Star at this point of her arc.

STARSTRUCK (2x05a)

Marco being right about Mina and still not rubbing it in Star’s face at the end is very cute and sets a difference between most of cartoon relationships and Starco, but it’s not that important, this is a solo-learning episode for Star.

CAMPING TRIP (2x05b)

This episode is like a fanfiction come to life, in a good way. The idea of Star’s crush on Marco is not going to be directly introduced until Sleepover, but in this episode she still acts differently, we are shown a side of Star that definitely leans closer to thinking of Marco as more than a friend - and this contributes to the main plot of the episode, where River is presented as a dad going through a middle age crisis, worried about losing her daughter to some boy who’s going to take her way from her home. AND YET NOTHING IS CONSCIOUS YET. THAT’S HOW THE SHOW DOES IT. During the episode Star is unmistakably closer to Marco usual, “happier” to spend time with him, but that doesn’t change anything in their relationship in further episodes and that still doesn’t help her be any more conscious about her feelings until Just Friends. There’s absolutely no contradiction here because it follows the inner rules the show adheres to.

I love this scene. Eden’s delivery of the line is incredible, conveying the eagerness in Star’s voice, a different kind than what we are used to and that immediately suggested (even at the time the episode aired, when we didn’t have the luxury of hindsight yet) that something was different. Not as in “something inside Star changed”, as I said we are still far away from any epiphany, just that the writers and boarders wanted to show a specific side of Star’s inner sphere in this episode.

And it’s even more interesting in hindsight, because comparing this scene with the dance in Curse of the Blood Moon, Mama Star, and Here to Help, shows us that Star and Marco (in this case it focuses exclusively on Star, Marco is denser after all) have always been very close to acting on their feelings - the entirety of them, and that they were usually just distracted by other things (other romantic interests, being stupid and dense, fear of change). When they have a moment to be alone, just the two of them, free from any other concern and focused just in each other, they immediately start to inch closer to embracing all of their relationship.

Let me clarify:

In Curse of the Blood Moon Star and Marco finally actually fall in Love for the first time after having danced together for a minute or so. Obviously the episode itself was a moment of high stress and tension, but once inside the Severing Stone they didn’t have to think about anything else for a moment. “We do this and everything will be fixed, we’ll be free of these obnoxious, unwanted feelings that get in the way!”, and by thinking that they let their guards down for a moment and enjoy each other’s presence, focusing on nothing more for the span of a dance, and that’s enough to lead them to understand that they do like it, a lot, and that they’d want to always be like that and that they had been running away from something beautiful all that time.

In Mama Star as soon as the Magic washes away all of Marco’s concerns and emotional blocks, he immediately confesses his love to Star, baring all of himself and revealing that what he desires the most is always being at her side.

Here to Help presented us once again with a context of stress and high tension, sure, but while in the barn Star and Marco could focus on themselves and nothing else for a moment, forgetting all about Mina and Mewni and anything else, and we know how that ended.

So I don’t mean that Star was about to confess her undying love for Marco in Camping Trip, just that the situation that was about to unfold (before River’s arrival) would have allowed for Star to focus less about “Marco is just a friend and you don’t feel weird things for your friends”, and more on “being with Marco makes me happy”. Which is the very essence of what “With or without magic we belong together” stands for.

“Let me just subtly remind you that Marco and Star have a positive influence on each other and that their meeting is the meeting of dimensions and cultures” - The Show

The whole “River thinks Marco is Star’s boyfriend and that he stole her affection from him” is clearly played for laughs, but we still get an external character validating Marco’s efforts in helping Star out, and he also essentially approves of Marco being Star’s boyfriend. Which means absolutely nothing (with the exception of Wrtahmelior in Lake House Fever parents never ever butt in their kids’ relationships in this show, so their opinions have never been considered relevant when shipping is involved), but it’s still nice.

Bonus: Star is specifically animated looking at Marco in several occasions throughout the episode, way more then usual, “stealing glances” even. External link to the GIFs because Tumblr sucks and they’d make the whole post too heavy to load.

STARSITTING (2x06a)

In case you weren’t persuaded the first eighteen times I said that Star and Marco complement and help each other grow and be the best version of themselves, here’s an episode explicitly telling the viewer that. With a side of “dorks acting like parents” and a generous helping of “one day they’ll also understand they love each other” because there’s no way they didn’t want to tease that as well with the way these sentences are constructed.

Bonus points for Star complimenting Marco for his skills with babies. DAD MATERIAL. ONE THOUSAND BABIES.

BY THE BOOK (2x07b)

This episode doesn’t really have any important Star - Marco interactions (even if it sure has cute ones, team work is the dream work. That’s how the saying goes, right?), but it reinforces the idea that Star learns things only in unconventional ways, something that often involves Marco during S2.

GAME OF FLAGS (2x08a)

Ignoring for a moment that Marco gets invited to what’s a family event, and that Star eagerly pairs up with him as Them Vs Her Families (ok I know that it makes full sense given the plot of the episode and it doesn’t mean there are any “Star and Marco as family” undertones here, but let me dream a bit ok?), the important stuff comes at the end: just like he did in Mewnipedence Day (albeit in a more direct way this time), Marco opens up Star’s eyes to the reality of the situation, snapping her out from a tradition she accepted without ever questioning it. And she doesn’t just back down, she tries to change things, she steals the flags, risking her own health, to claim the hill for all of them and change for good the nature of the event, just like she’s going to try and change Mewni. Once again the importance of Marco’s role in Star’s arc is evident, and once again he’s not a “teacher” who tells Star what to do, and even less a “savior” who has all the right answers for Mewni. He’s just a concerned friend who knows what kind of person Star really is, and who can give her a new perspective on things that helps her mature her own, personal, unique views. Views that are eventually going to forever change Mewni.

MEETING OF TWO INDIVIDUALS, MEETING OF TWO DIMENSIONS. The show begins with Star and Marco meeting it ends with their dimensions being cleaved together, they BOTH brought a new perspective on life to the other! It’s more apparent for Marco, since his advice pushed Star in a direction that has big effects on the plot itself, but Marco’s life was completely changed by Star as well, if in S3 he’s able to move to Mewni to have his “French Summer” and then in S4 he understands that importance of being true to what you want to commit to it’s only thanks to the crazy princess who helped him get out of his shell and make his first steps into real life. THIS is the very essence of what the show is, of Star and Marco being the tools to each other’s growth and happiness!

SLEEPOVER (2x09a)

One might expect a long section about this episode, but I’m going to keep it short: forget about all the “but how does the Cube work?” “who did lie?” and stuff like that. The important messages of the episode are crystal clear:

- Star Butterfly has a crush on Marco Diaz. No matter how conscious or unconscious it was at this point, the show told us directly, not just through undertones and themes anymore, that Star had specifically romantic feeling for Marco as well.

- Feelings are confusing. You Heart might feel like it wants something, but your Head doesn’t know that and it thinks you want something else. This is what the series bases everything related to relationships and romance on. This is why Star can be utterly convinced that she likes Oskar, at this point of the series, while actually having growing feelings for Marco. This is why Marco can move to Mewni, leaving Earth and his old life behind, while still not realizing the full extent of why he felt such a need to be with Star, and so on. The whole series plays with the idea that Star and Marco’s feelings for each other keep linearly growing throughout the show, but don’t always consciously influence their actions and thoughts in the same way.

And that’s why by the end of the episode the boarders can nudge our arms and go “Hey, hey, see that Star is sad when Marco ignores her because of Jackie? Hey, hey, that’s the seed of jealousy, that relates to love! Look at that!”, but then in Naysaya Star can be super happy for Marco scoring a date with Jackie. Dumb teens who don’t know what they want.

This line seemed so mature and deep at the little, little did we know the writers would have squeezed every last drop out of this concept as a way to justify things like Star and Marco completely ignoring their supposedly burning desire from Booth Buddies until Curse of the Blood Moon and then again until Mama Star. No, bad Seddm, no salt and negativity in these happy posts!

Let’s close this part here so that the core messages have more focus and remain more clear, but I wanted to point out that Star really loves involving Marco and having fun with him. Which is something we already knew but it always feels good pointing it out.

GIFT OF THE CARD (2x09b)

“Starco Teasing: The Episode”, also known as “How to have your main characters act like soulmates while still keeping everything in the episode frustratingly platonic only”.

From Star going [soft gasp] at how incredibly Marco looks in his ballet shoes

To the plot device of the episode being a gift for their anniversary... as friends, to everything else in the episode.

Ok this is clearly part of the gag but it’s also damn cute.

Star and Marco actually pour their hearts out with no recriminations here, and while it’s not something weird at all for this kind of scenes, where the characters think they’re going to die but the viewers are fully aware that it’s just the setup for a punchline, it’s still cute and a good example of the bases of their relationship.

The fact that this scene is not played for laugh, and that Star genuinely appreciates Marco saying it instead of going “OH SO YOU WERE JUST TRYING TO SAVE YOUR BUTT”, goes in the big pile of “Why do I like Starco more than any other fictional relationship?” pile.

Never mind how horribly frustrating Marco’s “let’s die in each other arms so people will know that we were friends, yep, just friends, that’s the first thing everyone would think!” is: this is an alpha version of Cleaved, Star and Marco think that they’re going to die and that there’s nothing more they can do, and their reaction is to hug and hold hands, just wanting to be together in their last moment. The whole episode doesn’t really have high stakes and it’s clearly a silly, over the top adventure, but the emotions the dorks show are very real, and exemplifying of how in love (used in the broadest possible meaning, not with a strictly romantic connotation) they were already at this time.

And this is what Star decides to get excited about, not having survived. Again, a gag, but it still fits well, it’s not played for laughs with malicious intents or to mock their friendship.

PIZZA THING (2x12b)

Nothing major nor new since it’s something we saw as early as in the second segment of the series already, but Star has learned to enjoy a “calmer” way of having fun compared to what she was used to on Mewni, thanks to Marco’s presence, being more than happy to watch TV on the couch instead of going partying around, sometimes. Also the whole concept of “Friendship Thursdays” is adorable.

NAYSAYA (2x13b)

“How can Star be this eager to help Marco out with Jackie and cheer for him when in Sleepover she was s-” HEART AND MIND DISAGREEING SHE DOESN’T KNOW WHAT SHE WANTS she genuinely likes helping Marco and making him happy and won’t fully realize until Just Friends that this just means pushing him in the arms of someone who is not her, shut up!

With this out of the way, this episode features The scene showing just how much Star helps Marco getting out of his comfort zone, taking risks that go well beyond kicking monsters and going into other dimensions and becoming a better version of himself, one who can achieve his own happiness (Jackie is a small part of this, this concept of “achieving happiness” is going to be much more relevant in S4 and Star’s role in it for Marco - and viceversa - is literally going to be the main attraction during the series finale).

Hey look, Marco’s biggest fear is being alone (as in, feeling alone as an individual, without meaningful connections, not being literally alone) and without a goal and a meaning in his life. And for a time he’s going to delude himself in thinking that Jackie and school can be that, but then in Sophomore Slump he has to slowly accept and realize that Star is the only one who can give him that!

Wowie it’s almost like they deeply changed and influence each other’s lives.

BONBON THE BIRTHDAY CLOWN (2x14)

I’m going to put this as a disclaimer at the beginning of this part so that I don’t have to explain later: during this episode Star clearly displays feelings and behaviors that can only be explained by having a crush on Marco and feeling an intense need to be with him. But the episode begins with Star cheering on Marco with Jackie, and is followed by several other episodes of Star being none the wiser about her feelings for it, and definitely not showing them. Why? How? Heart and Mind disagreeing; denial; being scared of change; blaming all her uneasiness from the night on having lost Glossaryck thus overwriting the other feelings until Just Friends; a combination of everything, you pick your poison.

This is a minor note, but both Star and Marco regret having forgotten about their already existing plan with the other for the prom, with Marco’s “Jackie High” lasting about half a second before he once again goes “Oh no Star, no hurt Star!”. It’s just a setup for the episode and doesn’t really play any role, but it’s a welcome breath of fresh air compared to the easy drama most shows from past decades would have immediately built up from this kind of situation.

Star is super happy to greet Jackie, right now her mind still hasn’t put 2 and 2 together, she still hasn't processed “If Marco is going to a promo with Jackie as her date, he can’t possibly be romantically involved with me”. It’s all still a very unconscious process now (she won’t properly think “I want to smooch him but I can’t” until Just Friends), but it’s a painfully clear case of “You don’t know what you truly wanted until you lose it”, as evidenced extremely clearly both visually and by the subtle as a hammer on your teeth song (this scene here, Just Friends, Lava Lake Beach, song get used as a way to highlight and give exposition to the characters’ feelings multiple times in the early days of Starco).

Darned if I knew That I'd find you In the last place I thought you would be What could I do 'Til I saw you waiting for me? Ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh And if I catch your eye It feels like I could fly Out from my lonely world into yours

Following that, Star spends most of the episode feeling weird: she looks at the picture on her phone and feels bad and tries to find a reason for that, something to blame for the new feelings she’s experiencing.

For a moment, when she uses the All Seeing Eye spell, she might have understood, or at least made a direct connection between Marco being on a date with Jackie, and her feeling like that. But the epiphany escapes her grasp after an instant, due to her magic going awry, and after that Ludo’s rat immediately gets there and she has other things to worry about.

Going back to Marco’s side of things for a moment, a quick consideration about what’s clearly a Jarco moment, a moment of connection between the two of them: we get a character external to the Star-Marco dynamic acknowledging Marco’s tenacity and perseverance, a quality that early Star lacked (”looks like I’m just a skimmer”) and that’s going to become an important part of her later on (”I am a dipper”, never giving up with the Monsters and Eclipsa in S3 and S4). One of the most clear examples of how Marco’s good influence helped Star change for the better, and this is the first time he gets outright praised for it.

After the kiss Marco sees the Blood Moon, and he’s immediately reminded of Star and goes to check on his phone, noticing the missed calls and getting worried. Was this part of the curse? Was the Moon trying to hinder Jackie and Marco’s relationship? Absolutely fucking not, as Marco said the curse is bullshit and was never a thing. In the context of this specific episode it’s symbolic, nothing more: Star is always in Marco’s thoughts, we know it and no one can deny it, the Blood Moon was merely a visual way to remind him of her, and to tell us viewers that even while kissing his long time crush, Marco still keeps part of his being focused on Star. He could have seen a little girl playing with a magic wand or hear someone say “the stars are beautiful tonight!” and it would have had the same effect. There’s nothing magical here, and if there’s it’s not important; it’s not even a good thing for Star, since Marco and Jackie’s arrival at the graveyard is actually what makes Star lose control of her magic, losing the fight.

Marco saving Star is a cool and sweet scene, and sets a clear parallel with Wand to Wand (and we even have confirmation from the storyboarder that it was on purpose, not that it wasn’t clear enough already) that neither of them would ever let the other go, but there’s not much to be said about it, their commitment to each other is pretty straightforward and it’s obviously to be expected in dangerous situations such as this.

Also, it’s not a full parallel: in this case the moment of danger doesn’t end with a hug, but with Marco going to check on Jackie (after having helped Star up obviously, he’s still and will always be worried about her after all).

And yet, despite this, by the end of the episode Star entirely blames her sadness on having lost the book and Glossaryck. She’s still clearly hurting over Jackie and Marco, but the situation at hand gives her an easy way out, an excuse to latch on to “cover” her feelings for her bestie with a thick layer of “no no it’s definitely just this” (wow just like in Curse of the Blood Moon!). And thus the epiphany that she almost had while spying on them is delayed until Just Friends.

Neither Star nor Marco are clearly aware about it obviously, but it’s hard not to see that “I’ve lost Glossaryck” line as “I’ve lost you” as well. Fun times.

To conclude, going back to something from the middle of the episode (didn’t want to digress earlier): this scene with Glossaryck asking Star if he can burn a page from the book and Star telling him to do whatever he wants is another side to the “you don’t know what you wanted until you lose it”: Star barely cares about the Book, symbol of her duties as a princess, but in a handful of minutes - and for future episodes - she’s going to be terribly hurting over having lost it. As I said multiple times the arcs of “Star learning to stop running away from her problems and accepting her responsibilities” and “Star recognizing and accepting her feelings for Marco” go hand in hand, and are both integral to her development and character arc. And, as we are going to see in the season finale, neither of them can truly reach its payoff without the other.

Bonus to make the whole episode a little less painful: while helping Star and Jackie up Marco might give Jackie more focus, but his tone of voice is way more kind and warm and delicate with Star, showing an incredible amount of care. Clearly this doesn’t entirely match Marco’s priorities in this moment, but it’s a welcome gift from Adam (and Daron I guess, since she’s always present during the recording sessions and certainly directed him to deliver the line in that specific way).

#star vs the forces of evil #star butterfly #svtfoe #starco #marco diaz #seddm ramblings

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fairestmusesismoving · 5 years

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Rumple

Welcome to my second TED Talk….hahaha sure to get me in trouble with so many people. This is even more loaded than Ruby.How I feel about this character?I mourn Rumple and all his potential because there was so much there. So many things that could have been done. All of it was wasted for what felt like a whispy teenager soap opera that had no real merit or consequence. Because deep down…I did like Rumplestiltskin. I hated his fans with a deep passion because they wanted to turn this interesting character into a defanged whimpering whisper of what Robert Carlyle actually gave us. Rumplestiltskin was this interesting “universal glue” who kept popping up everywhere to make everything work as the strangest deus ex machina storytelling device that worked… And he worked very well because he was established early on, established to have a certain set of powers, motive, and even a few limits. This was really great! We had some rules so we couldn’t go into the realm of the over powered mary sue! That was fantastic! Rumple was realistic as a powerful character and the fact his interests were aligning with certain groups at the time? Hey, we had a real neutral character!And then by S3 we had to jam on the breaks cause “Wow what do we do when we remove all drive for Rumplestiltskin since he has Belle and we killed Neal?””I dunno! No idea!”It was infuriating because had all of this been drawn out and everyone focused on different aspects of Rumplestiltskin rather than mashing him and Belle together like that scene in Space Balls , we could have had something that was worthwhile and not like some drastic whiplash from S1 that really doesn’t make sense considering the trauma of Neverland and Oz then….pretty much everything else. There’s trauma and then just using a character because you’re bound to pay that person since they’re still under contract and “well the viewers love them and we want money”.Rumplestiltskin is a victim of “too much, too soon”, and fans who tried to demand too much and realized way too late that maybe Rumple needed slower reveals.All the people I ship romantically with this character:By default I have to say Belle, even though I hated what Rumbelle became in the final seasons. It needed work. Both Rumple and Belle felt like they were hurting each other in ways that made no sense given the previous seasons. I’d detail in depth, but that’s not the point of these little evaluations, is it? Also I’d need to make an entire blog to contain every single moment evaluated to show each action and which character does what. It’s a lot.In the end I still have to give it to Rumbelle even though I wanted a lot more for it.I ship no one else romantically with this character. I especially do not ship Milah with Rumple. Sorry if that rustles jimmies. I am disabled. The behavior Milah displays around Rumple is abusive. Despite what some people may tell you on tumblr, ableism is offensive and acting in this way towards a person is abusive.You really can’t escape abuse in OUAT which boggles the hell out of me. When Milah engages in her acts of spousal abuse and ableism, it’s enough to make me go grab my inhaler because it really is how disturbing just how close and realistic her microaggressions are and how much they build up. There’s another scene in OUAT that sends me into this state, but Milah is in the second place position. Bolded because if you’re angry about my thoughts on Milah, maybe go read up on disability, ableism, and how couples treat disabled spouses after they’ve become disabled. It’s a huge topic and one that people don’t talk about. Considering I’m most likely to be abused by a loved one and that person will always be my spouse, it’s a healthy fear to have. Milah is that walking boogeyman.My non-romantic OTP for this character:I love Archie’s interactions with Gold. I love Henry’s interactions with Gold, especially in the “deleted” scene where Henry seeks Gold out to talk about Regina’s isolating him after Robin’s death. Honestly, Rumple needed to have more casual scenes with other characters because Robert Carlyle plays very well with other actors.Shots fired? Because Robert Carlyle acts in circles around Lana Parrilla, it often left her scenes seeming very childish and immature. It made the forced romance (it was Regina sexually assaulting Gold because he didn’t consent unless he was trying to get something form her but okay) even more uncomfortable due to her inability to stop yelling in an uncontrolled manner. Where Carlyle can channel and keep himself calm (or hell, any of the cast because I’d be redundant), it made pairing him with Lana a very poor choice very often.Why wasn’t Gold/Rumple utilized with other characters more? He was paired with the one-offs or guest characters fairly often, but never with anyone but Regina. This really did make the scenes look awkward. I’m saying that as an actor who has been trained to know what to look for. I noticed. It looks bad on the writer and director.My unpopular opinion about this character:I hate this strange Rumplestiltskin that people try to promote that’s weirdly romantic and mushy. I remember when there was an app on Facebook for Once Upon a Time and the Dearies RIOTED because Rumple wrote a letter to Belle shortly after the flashback events of Skin Deep. it was raw and very in character. He hated her but he loved her and knew that if he lost his powers, he couldn’t protect people he cared about. It was a good letter.The “Dearies” rioted until Adam and Eddy apologized and changed the app to have a letter that included instructions on “How to Use a Toaster”.Toaster Rumple is a Rumple I don’t want to exist and anyone who prefers Toaster Rumple? Butter my toast.One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon:I want to fix everything about Rumple. From S2 and onward. Finding Neal so soon/intertwining Baelfire’s plot with Emma’s/giving Regina a happy ending ruined Rumplestiltskin as a character. That’s VERY shots fired. I’m going to get unfollowed immediately for that and I don’t know if I should be happy about that or what…Baelfire needed to remain independent. The key to Emma and the Charmings was how Rumple manipulated the curse caster to get to A Land Without Magic and was counting on Emma to break the curse. That’s where it stops for the big involvement. Baelfire should have remained as Rumple’s own plot and for something to keep driving himself that he could eventually invite people into as he slowly became comfortable with others.But the worst of it truly is Regina. Rumple often warned Regina about her own morality and while that seemed hypocritical of her, he wasn’t wrong. As the series went along, she never actually changed her ways and we were introduced to a growing body count to her name that complimented S1′s rape, child abuse, various instances of inflicting bodily harm (some with the intent to murder), and so much I’ve lost track of. Having this person being handed a crown while Rumple gets a death so he can be “united with Belle” but he gets a kiss from the woman he was never interested in but continued her incredibly predatory advances?Yeah no. But Regina can’t have that ending unless you get rid of the one reminding her “All Magic Comes with a Price.” I guess that price was getting rid of the person saying that magic might cost your morality. A Mary Sue Palooza!

#anti regina mills #rumplestiltskin #ask meme #mun on fire #Anonymous

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rhodanum · 5 years

Text

One of the greatest challenges in writing anything multi-chapter for TDP is that it would involve me having to reconstruct the political systems of Katolis & the Pentarchy from scratch, so that everyone aside for Viren (and even he has his moment of impressive bungling) doesn't end up being an imbecile in terms of statecraft.

A quick recapitulation, starting with the dysfunctional mess that is the High Council of Katolis. And particularly That One Idiot who said, I quote: "Xadia sent assassins and they took the King's life. There hasn't been the slightest skirmish since then. Maybe that was it. They've had their revenge and everything will just... settle down now."

It's a good thing I didn't try to livetweet S2, because that would've caused a whole storm of "who the hell put this numbskull on the council? He isn't fit to look after a chicken-coop, much less a nation!" Seriously, that's the sort of opinion that a baker or a farmer or a cobbler or any other regular citizen is expected to give, the standard 'keep your head down and hope it all blows over by itself.' Not someone who is part of what is supposed to be a national ruling body.

The murder of a sovereign (no matter how morally justified on the side of the people doing the murdering) is, by definition, an act of war. You really don't want to be the first to strike? Fine, then. But at least mobilize the militias / the standing army and take precautions. But we don't see even the most basic self-defense measures being instituted.

Which links to the second glaring issue: not only is the council as a political body both unable and unwilling to act, it is paralyzed by Katolis seeming having no proper redundancy systems in case of murderized sovereign with an heir who is well under the age of adulthood. Standard procedure is instituting a regency (Viren wasn't wrong at all here, even if his goal involved Ezran never touching the throne) so the bloody kingdom doesn't end up in gridlock. It doesn't matter if the regency lasts a week, a month, a year or more. The goal of any ruling body is ensuring the continued political and economic functioning of the kingdom and the well-being of the people. Which cannot be done if decision-making is tied to the King's seal and said seal cannot be used by anyone other than the King's heir, who is missing and who has an entirely uncertain Estimated Time of Return. But instead of acting and picking up the regency for how long it takes for Ezran to be back, the high-rollers of Katolis sit & wait.

This is what drives me bonkers about Opeli, incidentally. She spends her time being an obstructionist force with no actual constructive and politically functional ideas behind said obstructionism. She doesn't pick up the regency or do anything to resolve the gridlock. Amaya, at the least, has the excuse that she's an essential component of the Breach's defense, through her command of the Standing Battalion. But even she takes a dunk in the 'Lawful Stupid / Stupid Good' fountain, when she justifies her refusal to accept the regency not through the importance of her military command right at the border with Xadia, but through 'Ezran is the rightful ruler.' Ma'am, 'rightful ruler' isn't going to matter a jot if you end up with anything from economic instability all the way to possibly getting invaded.

And then there's Harrow, whose inability to deal with his own burdened conscience and crushing sense of guilt when it came to the people he lost resulted in him effectively deciding to dump his people's well-being on the shoulders of a ten year old. It's not fair to Ezran and Callum (who effectively lost a third parent in a row) but, far more importantly, it's not fair to everyone else who has to pick up the pieces, because a ten year old cannot be expected to rule much of anything. (I'm looking forward to S3, but definitely not to the 'and he was a far wiser ruler, for he had the Innocence of Childhood' nonsense that will probably be going on with Ezran's plot-line. The only way his rule would make sense to me is if the council make him a figurehead and handle actual rule themselves. But I don't have much hope for that, because said council, as pointed out above, doesn't have a good track-record when it comes to actually decent statecraft).

The rest of the Pentarchy suffer from the same flaws as the rulership of Katolis. The same 'head in the sand / hope the storm passes if we ignore it' malarkey. The same waiting for others to act before committing to anything. Queen Aanya of Duren says noble, nice-sounding things in refusing to commit to preparations for war. I'd find them less of an irritating manner of writing if the show ever presents neutrality in a state of war as being absolutely no guarantee of safety. (I was talking with @ma_ya_mo_ri about this. I find neutrality a cheap cop-out in terms of writing military conflict because the both of us, as Eastern Europeans, know from our history that it did jack-shit when it came to keeping our countries from getting the shit conquered out of them). While we're at it, Aanya's platitudes, coupled with her essentially waving the Divine Right of Kings in Viren's face is, as far as I'm concerned, another notch in the 'this is why you don't let children anywhere near political power' post. (That scene is extremely telling and it says a lot about issues of class within the Pentarchy -- it means that you can study as much as you like, become as much of an accomplished specialist in your field as you like, sacrifice until your very body is crumbling and falling apart... but you'll still be shot down by a random kid with a crown on their head, whose only real achievement was winning the lottery of birth).

Mind you, all of the above doesn't mean I think Viren didn't make mistakes either. His most egregious was the plan concerning the Princes, because he should have known that Soren and Claudia wouldn't have ultimately been able to go through with it. Two (relatively untested) teenagers, who have been life-long friends with the targets? It was always doomed to fail. I can sort of see why he did it, if I squint -- he needed two people that he could place his utmost trust in, on very short notice. It was still a stupid choice, likely one motivated by desperation and lack of any other immediate option.

What should he have done instead? Well, for one, Viren should have given very serious consideration to bringing Ezran back alive and using his position as his father's best friend / unofficial uncle to teach the kid and mold him into the sort of King he thought was necessary for Katolis and the rest of the Pentarchy. It's apparent why he didn't do it and went with the nuclear-option instead. If war is on the horizon, you don't have enough time to forge the young King you need, while also being in a state of constant war with the rest of the council for influence over said King.

If the kill-option was the only viable alternative in his mind, he should have ensured it was entrusted to someone who could go through with it. A stone-cold, trained killer-for-hire, instead of his kids. Regicide isn’t a course of action where you can afford either half-measures or mistakes. Even better, while we're at 'should have done's': have a small team of wetwork specialists trained in secret, taught to be utterly loyal and employ them for highly sensitive operations, where any sort of mistake or bungle can spell disaster. But he didn't have such a team trained (just as, for example, he didn't cultivate loyalty toward himself within the Crownguard, thus ensuring the rest of the Council couldn't use this fighting-force against him) because he never actually planned to take head-of-state powers within his own hands, before the disaster with Harrow.

The actions we see from S1EP4 onward aren't those of a man who always planned to overthrow his best friend and stage a coup, but rather someone who acted rashly, saved Harrow's soul against his will... and then was stuck in an impossible situation, with a kingdom without a ruler and paralyzed into complete inaction, along with the loss of humanity's greatest asset against Xadia (the Dragon Prince egg). No wonder he looks as if he's flying by the seat of his pants, juggling seventeen things all at once and actually failing at the basics of a proper coup (such as ensuring the support of the armed forces).

Viren's fault, that trips him up again and again, is (hilariously and ironically enough) the fact he isn't actually ruthless enough for the position he's currently in! He's an idealist at heart and genuinely believes that people can be persuaded to make the rational choices, with the right arguments. This is what leads to his fall-from-political-grace and arrest at the end of S2. He takes an enormous risk in using the King's seal and lying about his status as Regent in front of the other rulers of the Pentarchy, effectively putting all his eggs in the one basked titled 'surely they'll see sense and act', if the danger is presented to them in a clear and concise manner.' But that's not what happens and his enormous gamble backfires, in that his lie becomes known to the rest of the council and results in Opeli's efforts to have him arrested. His idealism in thinking reason could sway the rest of the Pentarchy bites him right in the arse.

#the dragon prince #tdp #viren #lord viren #meta #fandom meta

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violetrance · 6 years

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Idk where this sudden burst of confidence came from but i am seeing people who were doubtful are now so sure of klance endgame. Yes Jeremy said something will happen but I am still doubtful and I could beat myself up for it but he could be talking about any one not just klance. Sorry but I have been in a fandom where people were so sure of this pairing becoming canon and it had so much evidence as well but it didnt happen. I was confused and heartbroken and Im scared to be diappointed again.

Lemme say this first, if Klance doesn’t become canon it’s not a big deal okay? I know a lot of ppl will be disappointed, but don’t let this rule over your life. And you can still ship them even if they aren’t canon, cuz tbh a lot of fanon has made this ship more enjoyable rather than canon :)

But on a side note, I’m going to summarize some really solid proof and evidence that Klance has a very good chance at becoming canon:

1. Jeremy emphasising that something might happen between two characters in terms of the LGBTQ rep in the show

(Let me also say that Keith and Lance will obvs not be the only LGBTQ rep in the show, but in terms of Jeremy’s wording they have a very good chance at being apart of this rep as a same sex couple)

- Lance will have an end game romance (his romance will bring him in a different place than where he first started in the series, they will be someone he needs instead of someone he wants, Jeremy also mentioning that eventually you’ll find that one person instead of kind of going all over the place) - In terms of this, when did we REALLY start to see Lance mature and branch off into his arc, s3 with Keith. Not to mention their last interaction was with Keith reassuring Lance about his position on the team, this obviously helped him bcuz look at him now

(- Also Lance needs someone who is self assured - Keith is off on his own arc too and he’s come across his mother. His mother is the main reason why Keith isn’t self assured and afraid of rejection. Him meeting her again will definitely help improve his character as a whole)

- Lance parallels Blaytz, the original Blue paladin, like to the point where it’s not even a coincidence (Blaytz was shown flirting with a male) - adding onto this, the amount of bi flag symbolism portrayed around Lance and even some of his moments with Keith isn’t coincidental, but very purposeful. Lance making similar expressions towards Keith as he has Allura?? Allura and Keith paralleling each other?? These are also not coincidences. Lauren’s art with Lance holding the LGBTQ sign a long with Shiro, someone he’s looked up to and will most likely be an aid to him through this? Just like Hunk was to Keith for his Galra reveal, and Allura was to Pidge during her Gender reveal (Shiro is most likely LGBTQ too, just like how Allura is a female in terms of gender, and Hunk is Samoan in terms of race)

- That being said since Keith literally fits the characteristics of Lance’s end game and he is NOT straight, but also Lance will most likely fit into the LGBTQ category as well based on that evidence, they both have an extremely good possibility of being an end game couple

- Since s1 Keith has shown interest in Lance, ever since their romantically coded bonding moment (that moment parallels Hunk and Shay who are romantically coded, and A LOT of their other moments parallel Lotura who are ALSO romantically coded, this is not a coincidence) - But like I’ve emphasised, their romance is slow burn, once they start something between each other it NEVER finishes because they are dragging it out to a certain point

- Jeremy’s smile every time someone mentions Klance? How hyped he always is for them? And now revealing that something will happen between two characters? It’s not a coincidence. But if Keith and Lance just end this all off as an amazing team and good friends, I wouldn’t even be complaining, but all of this just fits too well for that. Jeremy has also said they become better friends in the future, so that’s also important to note too

- Also Lauren mentioning that the characters need to stand on their own before getting involved in romance? That is literally the main purpose of Keith and Lance’s separate arcs right now. I have no doubt in my mind that the heart grows fonder with distance trope is in play right now

2. Lauren and Joaquim deflecting Klance

- These two emphasised that Klance was never supposed to be intentional, meanwhile they literally BLATANTLY parallel two romantically coded pairs and they have offered up a ship name called Laith that literally means LION, Lance being Keith’s stability? Is someone really going to try and tell me that this was “accidental?”

- Also, they deflect so much huge plot points in the show just for the purpose that nothing will be spoiled, they did this with Pidge being a boy, they did this with Allura not being paladin material, they did this when saying romance won’t be a huge focus in the show and then literally romantically coding Lotura in the next season…

- So the fact that they’re doing it with Klance is rlly not a coincidence. Ppl always pull out that card with them saying they can’t go back and make Keith and Lance in love cuz they’re ahead of the storyline. Ever thought that’s because they’re already in love and that’s how the storyline’s already written out? Ever thought that it’s cuz they can’t make them in love right off the bat since their relationship is slow burn? You know, cuz they’re not trying to cater to shippers. Nowhere in that interview did they flat out say Keith and Lance have no possiblity of falling in love or that they weren’t canon. Cuz they CAN’T. Also I wouldn’t even be surprised if that was deflecting too, considering they’ve said that Korrasami were only gal pals and look where they are now…

3. Them saving Shiro

- A theory has already been written about this and I was thinking about it for a long time too, but Keith and Lance will most likely be the ones to save Shiro from the astral plane or whatever virtual mindscape he’s in LOOL

- I’m not going to go too deep into this bcuz it’ll be hella long, but think about what could happen between them considering this is a STRONG possibility:

- They will definitely grow closer bcuz of this (considering Keith has been the only one Lance has gone to about his issues in the first place, love is about being vulnerable after all, which is literally what HE wrote in his guide to falling in love)

- Considering the show is not yet over, this will give them very good development in their relationship (the bedroom scene and bonding moment parallel each other, where they both started to see each other in a different light, but before anything could become of it they were cut off from each other) - Lance rejected Keith claiming that they bonded and grew closer bcuz he wasn’t fond of him in s1 and also his character was not at the point where it is now. Please imagine the Lance from right now being told about their bonding moment, he’d be so much more open to it. Keith leaving the team (coincidentally right after he grew closer to Lance too) bcuz he was afraid of rejection so he broke apart from them first, now he’s come across his mother and she will help him improve himself. Once he returns from this, he will let his family in more and Lance too trust me. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that both of these plot points in which they could have gotten closer and fallen in love could be easily fixed by the seperate arcs that are occuring right now

- Lance and Keith’s storylines are so interwined as well like (don’t follow in his footsteps? How their lions parallel their actual characters in terms of each other? We literally see Keith through Lance’s eyes the first moment they meet and they are set up as a pair immediately. And there is SO much more)

They actually have proper development between the other for it to build into a relationship in the future. Jeremy saying that there’s prob gonna be an end game between two same sex characters further proves that. And if it doesn’t happen, again, it isn’t the end of the world, but after writing all of this, it just makes the most sense rn.

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baddyxangel · 3 years

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i feel like stiles isn’t appreciated enough throughout the show. like when he was trying to help scott with his first transition scott kept bowling him off and then would come back wanting his help, or when he had to be the one to give scott and allison’s messages and run across the school all day. especially with the beastiary where no one even lydia didn’t believe him that it was a real thing, or with matt where he thought it was him and no one gave him a second thought about his suspicions. in season 5 where if anyone gave him a chance on his suspicions on theo they wouldn’t have gone through a lot of that. also why did scott changes sides so fast when theo told him about donovan. scott is supposed to to be the best friend of stiles and he didn’t even try to talk to stiles before taking theos side.

I think in general it’s implied that Scott is just over trusting and that Stiles is under trusting. I think of the scene where Scott says “you don’t trust anyone!!!” and Stiles replies “yeah because you trust everyone!!”. Scott immediately accepts Theo into the pack, and Theo seems to know Stiles is too difficult to convince, so he instead works on getting everyone else to like him and kicking Stiles out of the pack instead of trying to get him to like him. Less work. i think you've got it. at this point, stiles is suspicious of anyting unusual and suspects everything is evil. He's usually right. Yeah, I never thought about that it just seems so clear now 😂

Stiles simply doesn’t trust anyone. And he has an excellent detector for bad guys (remember Matt?). He says he remembers Theo and ‘that’s not Theo’ which is a great plot thread they never followed up on. So it could be that it’s actually not Theo. Of that he’s so changed that he’s fundamentally changed. And no. I don’t care for Theo. He’s a classic narcissistic sociopath with a surface charm and not nearly as smart as he thinks. He is pretty though. Remember when Theo went home to his fake parents and threatened to break their fingers with a hammer if they didn't practice their fake signatures more? Boy, sure would have been nice if they ever properly explained that. Or even just showed us those two people ever again lol, what the fuck even happened to them? Theo probably killed them while practicing his villain 101 monologue.

I think Stiles has pretty good intuition, and can just tell if someone has evil intentions...like they give a vibe you don't feel good about, Matt being an example However because he's awkward and clumsy with words, he can't really put it into words why he has these feelings and his reasoning will thus sound ridiculous...Again Matt being an example

Stiles has great intuition and is usually right about those things. I can't remember exactly but I'm pretty sure he even suspected a teacher could be involved when the sacrifices were happening. Plus he realized he was being possessed by the nagitsune way before anyone else did, but no one listened.

I would have like a scene towards the end of the series where Stiles says 'Man that guy looks sus' and the pack just attack the dude because Stiles is always right about those things.

Stiles is an excellent detective. He is able to detect which person is evil very easily, remember in Season 2 how he thought the Kanima's Master was Matt? Exactly. Stiles also says that he remembers Theo quite well, and that the Theo we know isn't the Theo he remembers. That plot line was, unfortunately, never expanded on so we don't really know if it was Theo or not. Scott seems to trust people right of the bat. Stiles doesn't. That is another reason. Theo was a mastermind villain and one of the smartest in the whole show. He was able to break Scott and Stiles' friendship whilst tricking everyone else within the Pack. He nearly took Sebastian's powers. He was a great villain, but a very bad character. He doesn't deserve the come back he had in Seaon 6a and B. He killed Scott for crying out loud.

There were also the early plot hints that Stiles was in some way 'magic' (which again were never followed up on). He certainly had spot-on assessments of the majority of the bad guys ( there's a lovely little moment after the birds invade the classroom in S3 where he leans over to pick a feather out of Ms Blake's hair and she actually flinches away). Also remember Stiles was always convinced that Lydia was not the Kanima (he joked about it but he knew it wasn't her). He also subconsciously knew he had been possessed before the Nogitsune even showed itself. It all just makes Scott's lack of trust in him all the more baffling, and it especially pisses me off when he calls Stiles on it in Season 5 (I've giving a lot of benefit to a lot of people) because actually Stiles was right every time. That scene broke my heart, especially bc Scott trusted Theo (who jumped out of nowhere) and not his lifetime best friend, like how?! but yeah I think Stiles was always right when It comes to trust people And Liam, who has been Scott's beta for like 5 minutes, totally trusted Stiles judgement (I love when they meet Theo in the woods in the same episode and Liam stands in front of Stiles to protect him).

stiles automatically didn’t trust him because of what he remembers of him before, he also doesn’t really trust a lot of people because scott trusts everyone and someone can’t just auto trust everyone too. stiles is there to like make sure that nothing really bad happens. stiles also looked at his dads handwriting and it was different and there is a clip of theo hitting his “dad’s” hand as punishment since it’s not the same.

Because Stiles is extremely perceptive and empathetic and understands a lot of unspoken things that are communicated through body language and motives (unlike Scott, who has no clue on what’s going on most of the time and is incapable of reading other people’s emotions, heartbeats, and chemosignals despite being a werewolf with supernatural senses.) Also, as Peter and Theo have pointed out, Stiles is “the clever one”, “smarter than everyone else” and “smart enough not to trust me [Theo]” I don’t think Scott fell for Theo’s bullshit so easily because he trusts everyone though. It’s more that Scott trusts others only when there’s something in it for him or if it’s convenient. He’s more worried about the possibility of Theo, or Liam (or another supernatural creature) stealing his true alpha status than about the fact that a stranger he knew next to nothing about could hurt his friends, and he only considered Theo an enemy after he tried to kill Scott and steal Stiles and his pack away from him. Never before. And that’s because, at that point, Theo becomes a direct threat to him. Stiles has warned Scott about Theo multiple times, but Scott brushed Stiles’ concerns off and chose to ignore every single proof of Theo’s shady behavior – Theo’s FAKE parents’ FAKE signature, Theo’s heartbeat/chemosignals, Theo creeping in his girlfriend’s bedroom to record her sleeping without her consent, etc. But Scott didn’t care, because up until that point Theo’s actions didn’t affect him directly. I kinda feel like In the end, Scott didn't care about any of the villains unless it was directly effecting him lol Also I think Scott was a bit naive, all the things he had done were successful bc he worked with the others otherwise I don't know how things would have turned out (just to mention when he bites Liam and had to kidnap him bc he panicked lol)

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sol1056 · 6 years

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story structure and how doing it wrong can mess things up

This post, I’ll talk about story structure in general, with some examples. The follow--up post will talk about VLD S3/S4 story structure specifically.

I’ve mentioned the MICE quotient before (milieu, idea, character, element), but to recap: it’s a way to categorize the type of conflict or complication added to a story, so a writer can mentally track what questions the story is raising, and where/when to answer those.

A story fundamentally is a series of questions: “who are these people? why are they doing that? what will happen next?” If the writer doesn’t bother to answer to the reader’s satisfaction, the resolution will feel incomplete.

Broadly speaking, you can braid elements, or nest them. Braided elements are going to show up almost immediately in a story, often drive the entire plot, and should be wrapped up in the final resolution. In VLD, there seem to be two core and somewhat related elements: “can we become a team” and “can we defeat Zarkon”.

Note: these two questions are also co-throughlines, as the backbone of the story. A throughline is the one question or conflict that runs through the entire story, and when it’s resolved, the story ends. A throughline is not always obvious. For S1/S2, "defeat zarkon” is a consistent throughline, and every adventure in some way pushes forwards on that. If Zarkon died at end of S2, but Haggar or Lotor took over, we’d realize the actual throughline was probably more like “can we bring down the evil empire”, of which Zarkon was only one facet. So, the story continues. If Zarkon is defeated but the story continues, either we’re dealing with a sequel, or the longest epilogue ever.

Here’s a bit from a lecture by Mary Robinette Kowal, about nesting elements. She’s speaking of short stories here, so the duration is a scene or so. In a longer work, a nested element can last anywhere from a scene to almost the entire story.

Nesting is when you introduce one of these [elements] for only a scene or two. If I have a character going on a quest -- an event -- then you get to the cave where they pass a challenge... for that one challenge, we do the idea, we resolve it, and we move on. That's nesting, but you do have to resolve it, at some point, or that's going to be a nagging thing in the back of the audience's head, if it's sufficiently interesting.

Sometimes you can get away with it, and it's just, why is that watermelon there? People who've seen Buckaroo Banzai, we're still wondering about that watermelon... there's one scene where they're walking through a big area and one character asks, 'why is that watermelon there?' and the other character says, 'I'll tell you later'. And they never do.

Behind the cut, I’ll go into more detail about what story structure looks like in terms of nested elements, how to deal with watermelons, why elements should be closed in the reverse order they were opened, and the problem with elements that are too obvious/easy to resolve.

weaving & nesting elements together

I mentioned in an earlier post that “there must be a path towards answering the idea [element] before the story can progress”. In episodic stories (think old-school sitcoms), MICE elements are open-and-close, much like the ‘pass this challenge’ example.

When every nested element is neatly closed off, you have a very static kind of story, one that’ll end up feeling like it’s just running in place, at best. Ask a question, get an answer; ask another question, get the next answer. The beauty of nested elements -- and where it can lend a dynamic element even to purely character-driven, quieter, stories -- is that the answer to one question is a new question.

That’s a serial approach to elements: the closing of one opens the next. Nesting, though, leaves the first question open, and creates a new one within it (ie, to resolve the quest, one must answer this challenge). You can’t resolve the first without addressing the next, and so on, and so on.

In VLD, S1E2 through about S1E6 are roughly episodic, and open/close on a variety of ideas: can they defeat this robeast, can they defeat this general, etc. For the story to ‘hang’ together, each of those sub-elements must conclude with something that pushes the story forward. At the same time, each must support the two main elements (”defeat the bad guy” and ”be a team”).

Here’s the sticky part in considering story-structure like this: if you do not resolve an element, then consider all succeeding elements as nested, and secondary to that open element. (It really is like html code; gotta close your tags in order of opening them.) By ‘resolve’ I mean, ‘answer all questions in the reverse order in which they were raised, within the course of that element’.

Frex, S2E3, a classic Idea episode: ‘who helped Shiro escape?’. We go to a new location (milieu), raise questions (idea), meet Ulaz (event). Then we have an idea, where the characters ask questions and get direct answers, open/close. Next, an event: fight the bad guy. In rapid succession we work backwards: bad guy element is closed in parallel with closing ‘meet Ulaz’, a short argument to close the ‘raise questions’ element, and departure. The resolution mostly answers ‘who helped’ -- we know some of the how and who, but not really the full why -- and that ‘why’ lingers for later development.

So that’s an example of how a minor detail raised in an open/close nested segment becomes the thread of following story elements. Now Shiro isn’t chasing after ‘how did I escape’ or ‘who helped me’ but ‘who is this organization and why did they get involved’.

On a small scale (like within a single scene), you can smash the closing points together. Strictly speaking, it should be ‘bad guy defeated’ and then ‘lose Ulaz’ but actual practice, it was more like ‘lose Ulaz’ leads to ‘bad guy defeated’. Two elements resolved each other, as it were.

The same is true of the BoM episode. We go to a new location (milieu), start dialogue with Blades (event), travel to second location (milieu), offer alliance (event), demand Keith’s knife (idea), put Keith through trials (character), end trials, resolve knife, agree to alliance, return, confirm dialogue, and depart.

But in the middle of that, the questions raised in the trial (and in the resolution of the knife) are bloody HUGE. It’s a watermelon times a hundred.

dealing with watermelons

The temptation is to do exactly what the writers have done: to just leave that question over there, unaddressed, for chapters (or episodes) on end.

Don’t do this. It’s supremely annoying to readers.

Readers want their questions answered, and if one is left hanging for too long, they’ll grow cranky and shut the book (or stop watching). They’re going to conclude that either you can’t (or won’t) answer the question, or they’re going to assume you didn’t even realize you needed to answer the question. If they decide the second, you might as well hang it up. It’s damn hard to come back from that.

It’s not hard to fix. Just give the readers an answer. Any answer. It doesn’t have to even be the right answer. Think of any good mystery, where details unravel and what looks one way changes shape from a different perspective. It’s okay to tell the readers, “oh, Shiro probably escaped on his own” and later tell them, “wait! actually, he had help, he just didn’t remember that because he was still fuzzy from whatever the scientists gave him!”

Since I did bring up the BoM episode, that makes a good case for where you can lampshade the hell out of things, as a way to quasi-resolve. Basically, you’re telling the reader, ehhh, that question isn’t really all that much of a bombshell, don’t worry about it. Jut skip the exposition, and just have another character raise the question. It doesn’t take a lot, and you slide right through the emotional beat, too:

*Keith and Shiro return with Kolivan and Antok* Kolivan: Princess Allura, it's good to see that the rumors are true. You're still alive after all these years. Allura: So is Zarkon. Can we consider you our ally in the fight against him? Kolivan: The blade of Marmora is with you, but-- Pidge: Keith, where did you get that sword? Keith: It's...It's my knife. Hunk: No, I'm pretty sure that's a lot bigger than a knife. Keith: Uh, yeah. It's... because apparently I'm... part-Galra. *everyone stares* Pidge: But I thought the Galra had never made it as far as Earth. Antok: Do you think all Galra were happy under Zarkon's reign? Over the decafeebs, some fought, and some were forced to flee, including our brethren. Pidge: But-- Kolivan: That discussion can wait. Princess, I've received word from our spy inside the Galran hierarchy. They have become aware of our presence, so the timetable for our plan has been moved up. Shiro: How soon do we need to begin? Kolivan: Now.

See, the hanging question was: how can Keith be part-Galra and have a Marmora blade, given he grew up on Earth? Don’t ignore that. Answer it: provide something reasonable, maybe a little pat. “Earth was a safe place to go for Galra who hated Zarkon, and sometimes that included a Blade, and by the way, it’s been 10,000 years,” implying that Keith’s blade could be hundreds of years old.

And then, to make sure you don’t give a chance for someone to poke further (like Pidge), you have a damn good reason for setting the conversation aside. Kolivan’s news about the spy does work; Kolivan’s not going to see it as a shocker that Keith has Galra ancestry, so it’s in-character for him to brush aside everyone’s shock. The watermelon is (supposedly) resolved, but it’s still there to revisit later.

close in the order you opened

In the continuation I’ll get into showing how ignoring this rule can really mess things up, but here I’ll just use one of my favorites:

boy fish meets girl fish boy fish loses girl fish girl fish dies going over hydraulic dam

Oh, wait, no, let’s do Wizard of Oz, instead, ‘cause it’s actually a beautifully nested story where each element leads into the next. It goes something roughly like this:

I hate this town -- character oh no tornado -- event how do I get home? -- idea I must go to Oz -- milieu how do I help these new friends -- idea the wizard gives me a challenge -- event I kill the witch /event the grateful wizard helps my friends /idea I return to where I started /milieu I learn my shoes take me home /idea I find my family is alright /event I realize home is best /character

As MRK likes to say, if Dorothy had arrived in Oz, and Glenda had said, “oh just put on these shoes and click your heels together!” we would’ve had a short story, not an entire book. Instead, Dorothy is told she has to see the wizard, which leads to meeting new friends, which helps her get to Oz, and so on.

Now, to thoroughly butcher the structure, let’s say that Dorothy kills the wicked witch, and spontaneously knows how to help her friends have a heart, brain, and courage, and how to get home. We’ve just resolved several nested elements... and the unclosed elements are now going to feel superfluous. Like, why even go back to the wizard, when she already has the answers she sought?

But the story spends chapters (alternately, easily half the movie) making a huge production out of ‘we have to see the wizard’. There’s even a song about and everything. Pages upon pages to build this up, including the arrival in Oz and the overwhelming experience of meeting an angry wizard. Resolving Dorothy’s questions several steps earlier would leave that entire build-up just hanging there, but addressing it is going to be a boring read. Yeah, okay, wizard, whatever, we could cover that in a paragraph. Why not just say goodbye to friends, click the heels, and be done?

throw out the easy elements

Let’s change out Dorothy’s shoes for something like, say, a map. She doesn’t open it. She just asks someone else, “how do I get home?” She goes through all those adventures, comes back to the start, and is told, “oh, you could just open that paper up, it’s a map to get home.”

If at least nine out of ten of you wouldn’t DNF right there after most of a book of Dorothy never even asking, gee, what does this map show?, I’ll eat my hat. It’s one thing to have the element-resolution lie in the very last thing the character tried, or (common in some genres) the character trying the one thing they’d been told through the entire story not to do (”don’t cross the streams”). But if it’s something that obvious, that instinctive -- “I wonder what the book says” -- that’s hinging a lot on the character being stupid.

There has to be a really good reason for a character to be unable to resolve an element on their own. It’s not just a matter of the element not having scale enough to drive a character into action (ie the tornado), but it also can’t be something the character could’ve just waited out. If the character acts because they think they’re about to be fired, you need to give them a really good reason they don’t, can’t or won’t just find another job. Readers are going to tell that you’re contriving an element (a “must save my job” idea) to push the story forward, and you created a plot hole at the same time.

Because nested elements each hinge upon the previous, if a precipitating element is in fact a plot hole, everything hanging from that element will fall right into that hole. Swallowed up in irrelevance, because the reader’s going to be saying: “they could’ve skipped all this by just posting their resume on LinkedIn.”

On top of that, it guts the story’s stakes -- why should readers care about a character who’s effectively making a mountain (the story) out of a molehill (the easily resolved element)?

#storytelling #writing #story structure #voltron legendary defender #analysis #sol thinks about stuff

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therussohousehold · 6 years

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S3 Sucks Big Time And I’m Tired Of It.

Hi y’all. Next chapter’s well underway! In the meantime, there’s something I need to get off my chest, and this platform seems like the perfect place to do it.

SVTFOE season 3 has been the worst possible direction that the show could have taken. Out of all possible scenarios, the only way it could possibly get any worse is if all the problems that have been created in the past dozen episodes were, from here on out, totally ignored as the show tries to backpedal its way out of this conundrum.

The season’s complete trainwreck of petty drama, plot regression, character devolvement, and tonal problems is so complex and varied that it’s almost impressive, because of all the parts that seem like mistakes, the most glaring issues seem to be deliberate choices by the writers.

This starts at the beginning of S3 with the Battle for Mewni, and continues on through the season, to the point that there isn’t an episode in which it’s not present. Let me go ahead and dive in here, and just explain some of the myriad of things that are wrong with what’s been produced thus far.

Tone - mistakes and choices.

Right from the beginning of the Battle of Mewni, all of the show’s tonal problems are thrown up into your face, over and over again.

The purpose of story tone is to help the story retain focus, both in the direction you’re heading, and in helping your viewers know what to expect from the show. It informs the actions of the characters, and helps you to understand how to feel about certain things that happen. There are a lot of great examples of how this works in modern cartoons.

Most appropriately, Avatar: The Last Airbender, Teen Titans, and Gravity Falls are all very obvious examples of this. Each series’ tone is constant and lets you know what to expect from every episode, and more relevantly, features a mix of serious, character-driven narrative progression, while also allowing room for each series to tell jokes, show off the lighthearted interactions between characters, and have those personal moments of heart and meaning that mean everything when forging a bond between yourself and the characters you’re watching.

SVTFOE has always had problems with tone, from the introduction of Toffee onwards. Toffee himself is a perfect reflection of what the problem with the show always has been. He’s a character that wants to be serious, with real meaning and consequence, but the show itself is very goofy and lighthearted, and only in his presence is there any sort of continuity for the first two seasons.

This problem is thrown into overdrive with Battle For Mewni, which creates a world-shattering conflict that the show just isn’t prepared to handle in any capacity. The conflict itself is world-ending stakes, with Toffee’s plans finally coming to fruition - not only is the kingdom of Mewni in shambles, but he’s draining all the magic from the multiverse.

Despite this, though, the show’s goofy tone and ridiculous antics sabotage this more serious, tension-filled plot, over and over again. This continues until the parts that actually have tension, like Star drowning in the magic dimension, Toffee’s return and death, Ludo’s transformation into a horrible dictator, are not only undermined, but actually feel completely out of place in the context of the show.

One minute the show is telling you how funny and ridiculous it is, like with the parts that show River trying to run the kingdom, or anything involving the dungeons or Marco’s “vigilante pranks,” and the next minute, it’s demanding you sit up and watch, because world-ending consequence is crashing down in a manner completely unprecedented.

This problem continues into the season, long after Toffee’s death, with the conflict between the goofy elements of the show, and the more serious angle of princess that Star obviously wants to become.

First, it should be noted that the writers did at this point FINALLY make a conscious choice about the tone of the season/series - they did it when Marco arrived on Mewni in “Lint Catcher.” It happens in the most jarring way possible.

The series until this point has been all about lighthearted choices and fun adventures, so you’re led to believe that when he gets there, you’re going to see an emotional reunion, a return to the status quo, and a setup for next week’s fun antics. The setup feels as though the show is saying “okay, we’re going to do what we did before, but on Mewni now.”

Instead, it’s apparent immediately that Marco’s made a huge mistake. He burns the bridges he has left on Earth. Meanwhile on Mewni, Star’s not so much excited or even happy to see him, as she immediately seems as interested as possible in making sure he isn’t around for reasons that are never actually directly stated.

This is the tone that the series sticks to for nearly the rest of the season - Star being selfish and emotionally distant while Marco acts as a third wheel - and as far as a conscious choice for tone goes...

WHY???

This is the first issue because it’s really the underlying problem behind why I don’t enjoy S3 at all. It’s not written to be enjoyable. The tone of the show is “mistakes which have no resolution,” or perhaps “actions have consequences,” but unlike, say, Adventure Time, which shares this theme BUT is drowning in interesting side-plots and settings to draw focus (since “adventure” is also a primary theme of the series), that tone is taken and crammed down your throat at every opportunity.

That’s not to say it’s consistent, though. The show attempts to break through this tone on multiple occasions, with the immediately following episodes, Trial By Squire, Princess Turdina, and Starfari attempting to show that no, this is not the way things will go.

Despite this, though, the tone is so present in Star’s more serious attitude, in her dynamic with Marco, and in his own actions (and continuing, progressively worse series of mistakes) that I’m left wondering “what the heck am I supposed to be feeling right now?” Trial By Squire, like the other Quest Buy episodes, is excellent, but in no way am I prepared to invest myself back into Marco and Star’s relationship when they themselves have turned it on its head in ways we aren’t even seeing yet. The theme of the season is “consequence” but nothing actually seems to have consequence. You just feel bad after watching, because somehow you’re more aware of what the characters should be going through than the characters themselves.

Plot - how to story.

Like with tone, SVTFOE has always struggled with plot. One minute you’re getting a lore-packed episode like St. Olga’s, or a compelling character narrative like in the episodes preceding The Battle For Mewni, and the next you’re getting completely disconnected adventures like the Quest Buy episodes, Interdimensional Field Trip, etc. etc.

Up until now, though, the show has always done a pretty good job on both ends. Some of the filler episodes are annoying (Fetch/Star on Wheels will forever remain “the block that should never have been produced”) and some of the plot-driven episodes don’t always land (Baby is great, but also the most out-of-place episode in S2, IMO) but generally speaking, things have always tied together in the end. If not that, then it’s at least fun to watch.

So then S3 starts out by killing the antagonist and central conflict before we even see them emerge, and then continues onwards as if it still has a reason to do so. Then it introduces a theme that is like nails on a chalkboard for trying to build something to be around and watch. Talk about shooting yourself in the feet!

Throughout S3 so far, we’re given a bunch of characters that are changing radically, but no reason for their change, and no motivation to get them to show that development. Star is trying to change into a more down-to-earth, serious princess, but it’s not until Starfari, nearly a third of the way into the season, that we’re even given a glimpse of a conflict which suits this mindset.

Meanwhile, Marco’s trying to come to terms with who he wants to be in life, but whether he was on Earth or on Mewni, post Sophomore Slump, the series itself would not have been affected at all. It’s like he’s totally isolated from everything that’s going on around him, and any time he tries to have an impact or take control, things blow up in his face.

Eclipsa is introduced as a full character to show off a moral grey area and try to influence Star into her “do what you want” lifestyle, but there’s no catalyst to show this change at all, and as a result she, too, could be completely cut from the season to literally no effect.

This is not how you do plot. It’s not how you do a story, and it lends itself to the theme of the show, because now in addition to “mistakes without resolution,” and “actions have consequence,” (via Star’s attitude), the entire season thus far has had a running theme of “pointlessness.” The only conflicts which you’re driven to care about at all are those between characters, but even those are so poorly managed and difficult to understand that you just want the series to tell you what it’s trying to do, already.

Killing off Toffee was, in my opinion, the biggest waste of a character that I can think of in recent memory. It’d be like if Aang defeated the fire lord at the end of book 2, or Bill Cipher showing up and being beaten halfway through Gravity Falls.

I expected the show would at least provide a reason for the defeat so we could move on - like a “now that he’s gone, we can do this other thing that we really want to show” approach, but that just hasn’t happened. These characters still have so much growth to go through, the story still has so much to tell, but we’re just missing any driving force behind the plot, and as a result, the only really interesting bits of the series (the relationships like what are shown in Lava Lake Beach and the story development like in Deep Dive and Monster Bash) fall extremely flat while you wait for a reason for their existence.

Characters - unjustifiable and unlikable

Okay, so we’re seeing a running theme: inconsistency. The show likes to jump around with plot. It likes to have a few different themes. And up until now it’s liked to jump around with characters, too.

But this season actually introduced some consistent characterization for Star and Marco, with Star being the more selfish and serious version of herself, and Marco being a walking pile of bad life choices and personality shortcomings.

So, again, we’ve got a conscious choice by the writers that makes NO SENSE.

That is to say, we’ve now got consistent characters and they’re awful.

The biggest thing that you need from a character in any show is a WHY and a HOW.

The WHY is the reasoning behind their existence and character from an out-of-show perspective. It creates a relateable backdrop/canvas for the character to act on. Zuko’s struggles with honor, family, and his own duality are is WHY. We understand who he is and WHY he acts the way he does, and as a result, despite him making some terrible choices and being full of angsty late-teen drama (”nobody understands me mom! I mean, uncle!”) we still sympathize and know where he’s coming from.

Then there’s the HOW, which is the reasoning behind their actions WITHIN the show. Zuko’s driving force is to capture the Avatar, which is HOW that out-of-show WHY backdrop manifests. All of his problems come to a head and he’s created a simple narrative solution: if he can just capture the avatar, things will get better. Despite his antagonism, we understand him and appreciate who he is, even if we don’t want him to succeed. The problem with S3 is that it creates a problem that the series never really had before. The characters were never particularly consistent or driven, and when they are (like Star in Storm the Castle) the motivation was adequate. Star wants to get her best friend back. As soon as the stakes are raised from a character perspective - as soon as Star and Marco become consistent and show signs of a progression path - the show falls apart, because we’re not given any justification for it at all. The WHY and HOW behind Star’s actions in S3 is a total enigma, because the show never actually tells us her line of reasoning. The best I can come up with is that she feels the need to be more responsible following the problems her previous actions caused, but there’s been nothing in the season that requires that attitude at all. The actual stakes behind what’s going on in the series as a whole are actually lower than they’ve ever been, so why is she now choosing to be serious? She has no WHY because we don’t know WHY she’s acting that way, and she has no HOW because we don’t know HOW that new backdrop is guiding her actions. The result is this character that’s just designed to be unlikable. Star in S3 has treated her friends like crap, has been emotionally distant, difficult to understand, selfish, and irresponsible, all of which is now superimposed on a character we don’t understand. She was most of those things when she was bubbly and goofy, too, but we understood it! She just didn’t understand responsibility, and more importantly, she learned after her mistakes. Most importantly, the show did not ever demand us analyze her actions. S1 and 2 are stuffed full of apologies, emotional connections, trials and triumphs, and problems with solutions as she comes to terms with the idea. We don’t have any of that now, though, we’ve just got all the problems with none of the solutions. Likewise with Marco. You can understand his motivations a little bit better despite them never really being said at all (the WHY is that dude’s seriously misguided on what he wants out of life), but the HOW is still totally missing. He just stumbles about, not really learning anything or trying to understand why his life’s so messed up at all, and as a result, I just feel sorry for him. By the time his surprise party blows up in his face in the holiday special, I just want to reach into the show and tell him to stop trying. He doesn’t seem to be aware of what he’s doing, most of the time, and completely ignores the consequences of his actions. We understand WHY he’s so misguided, but we don’t understand HOW he’s continuing to act that way. So here we are. We’ve got a season with unlikable characters, no central conflict, and a depressing, scattered theme. This brings me to my final point.

Bullshit Drama - conflict vs. adolescence

In the absence of the villain, we’re left with the ultimate in adolescent, petty drama, as all these characters without understandable motivations or conquests scurry about, trying to find a way to make the show compelling while also maintaining the awful tone that this season’s chosen.

So we’ve got petty drama. Character dynamics without weight. Arguments with no meaning. A bunch of relationships which are built around a poorly-constructed love-triangle which is both completely unwarranted (this coming DESPITE me being a fan of Tom, this season) and unprecedented in the series as a whole.

The writers’ apparent obsessive need to use this BS “Dramabox” mechanic in place of any real plot or direction informs the entire season. Everything is building up to further defining the completely fucked-up relationship that Star and Marco now have, to creating conflicts between characters that could be solved with some half-decent communication, to backpedaling character growth (poor Tom, he’s tried so hard) in the interest of producing something that you can gossip about in a schoolyard.

The thing is, you can do drama without resulting to this. It’s one of the reasons you have an antagonist. As the plot drives the characters together into new situations, they won’t be comfortable with it, or with themselves as they’re tested. They’ll chafe as they adjust, and ultimately, come out as better people in the end. The subtle conflicts between Dipper and Robbie, or Grunkle Stan, the disagreements between Toph and Katara, Starfire’s bubbly surface or Beast Boy’s nonsensical nature compared to Raven’s dark, down-to-earth personality... these are all examples of well written character drama. Two informed characters trying to adjust to one another as they’re pushed forward by circumstance.

But instead we’re left with pointless adolescent bullshit. The kind that gets nowhere, it’s just something to talk about. “Did you see how annoyed Star was with Marco?” or “God, look at how bad a friend X is to friend Y, they’re just awful...” It’s schoolyard gossip and it completely disgusts me.

The most frustrating thing is, Eclipsa’s still a character in this show. She is the person to tell Star to get her shit together. Like, oh, maybe instead of running away and buying your feelings for your friend, you should confront them? Maybe there should be a balance between having fun and being serious? These are both things that a real person, particularly a mentor, would say in a real conversation, especially around the circumstances of S3. But that would be too easy, and kill the only motivation that the show has left to crawl forward!

So instead we’re gonna sit here and watch Marco fight with Tom over Star, for some contrived, bullshit reason. Because there’s nothing better for them to do.

Overall, this show has just about run its course for me. It reminds me of my short stint with the Walking Dead, where over time I gradually just... stopped caring. I’ve told myself I’ll see through another few episodes, and I’m going to continue writing my story regardless, but there’s a point where I just can’t be bothered anymore, and I think it’s approaching fast.

#svtfoe #star vs the forces of evil #analysis #s3

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mychakk · 7 years

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From a Joke to the End Game - The Evolution of Molly Hooper: Introduction to the Series Meta

One of the reasons I joined Tumblr is that I wanted a place to share my thoughts on Molly Hooper: the evolution of her character through the whole series, the progress of her relationship with Sherlock and with all other characters, the reason why she’s the character that we know now. Basically, the road from a one time, silly, background character in the pilot to THE end game she became in s4.

I’m an analytical mind, and I can’t help but formulating all the meta 😊. I’ve a background in text analysis and to me a TV show is a form of a text, so I’ll be applying mostly those methods while writing this. I take texts (and thus the show as well) under analysis in their final form. This mean I won’t be going much into what Moftiss might have originally intended while they plotted said scene.

The aired episodes we’ve been given are a sum of Moftiss’ initial ideas, their screenplay, the director’s interpretation, the actors’ portrayal, music composers’ creations AND the editing crew’s choices. All of that created the show as we know now. And it got Moftiss' final approval to be aired as something they wanted to share with us. This final result, the aired version, is the basis for this analysis. This is actually quite important, so please keep it in mind.

I won’t be taking any creators’, directors’ or actors’ quotes as an argument supporting my hypothesis. The exception being only how Molly came to be as a character in the first place, that I’ll address later on in this post.

Lastly, the idea behind this meta had started forming in my mind even before TAB came out. I remember reading a quote from Loo she gave around s3 about Sherlolly being this kind of a sweet joke that had turned out into something serious out of the blue and no one in the casting crew was laughing about it anymore. I realized that it's the perfect description of Molly and her development in the show as well. Originally this meta was supposed to answer a question: why Molly Hooper will be the end game? But RL intervened and I never wrote it down. Then TAB came out and only reinforced my initial thought process and finally this year S4 confirmed it. I was wondering if it's still worth being typed, but in the end I decided to share it all with the fandom, answering now the question: HOW Molly Hooper became the endgame?

This meta and the following parts are mostly focusing on Molly Hooper, but since her interactions are always with Sherlock, it will be highly interspersed with Sherlolly too. Of course I am a hardcore Sherlolly shipper, and while I try to stay neutral, I’ll definitely fall into my shipping side ;)

Enjoy!😊

Please note I’m not a native English speaker and I type this mostly using the app while commuting to work. All mistakes are on me.

Introduction: The creation of Molly Hooper’s character

Learning how a character came to be in the first place can be only done from the creators’ quotes. Here is the only time I’ll be basing my analysis on them but it’s obviously a necessity. 😊

It’s a known fact that Moftiss tried to stay as true to ACD canon as possible, and for them this meant no new, original characters in the core group of characters for the show. So how come Molly ended up there?

Molly Hooper was created simply as a means to ended: the way to introduce Sherlock Holmes. To show some of his eccentric characteristics Moftiss needed another minor role to fill in. So why not create a Bart’s worker, preferably in the morgue? And if they are a female with a crush on SH the better - so many things to show about our genius boy in that very first scene! Molly came to be out of a necessity because of her usefulness. She was a hm, character device [is that even a thing?]. A means to an end.

A one-time means to an end.

So what has happened???

The answer is simple: Loo Brealey happened.

It was Loo’s interpretation and portrayal of a Molly in that pilot that has turned the character into the Molly. Her natural chemistry with Ben also added to the allure of her potential. Plus, how can you not love Loo? 😉 Apparently you can’t, as we know Moftiss were unable to resist her charms 😝 and needed to include her over and over again.

I think it’s not a newsflash that Molly Hooper in her current form exists thanks to Loo. But there is one more thing that essentially set up Molly as something more than what the original intent of the creators made her out to be. And it's the one thing that from the very beginning gave her the potential to be something more than she was originally supposed to be: She was introduced in the very same scene as the main protagonist.

While not intentionally, this, nevertheless, adds importance to her - the new character. First impressions are crucial, and having her appear right next to and what’s more alone with Sherlock in that very first scene we see him, naturally draws also attention to her. Just like it did with Mike Stamford for his first appearance with John and his role in the making of the bromance of the show. But while Mike’s initial impression of importance waned as the show progressed for the lack of his recurring appearances, Molly’s only grew more and more precisely for the opposite. She reappears, episode after episode with one meaningful scene after another, becoming more and more important character.

Loo’s performance and her natural chemistry with Ben inadvertently made Moftiss adjust their plans for Molly turning her from a one shot little thing into a recurring character. We should have immediately realized she’s something different for achieving such a feat in the first place. Breaking the iron rule set by Moftiss on staying faithful to canon.

Alas there is another thing about the creation and introduction of Molly Hooper - a character who was supposed to be only in that one scene in pilot - that is worth addressing. @writingwife-83 has posted a comment explaining why John’s doesn’t see Molly’s importance to Sherlock even as far as in s4 – her explanation is brilliant in its simplicity: John isn’t a witness to most of Sherlock and Molly’s profound interactions. Even in the very first scene they are introduced being alone, by themselves, no witnesses. Just us, the audience. This sets up a precedence for their interactions through the whole show.

Aaaand surprisingly, fits into ACD canon. How? Simple: almost everything we know about Holmes is from Watson’s storytelling. But John doesn’t know everything. And Molly, here, falls precisely into that unrevealed part of SH's life in ACD canon. She’s something John doesn’t know of, so he doesn’t tell about her in his stories. Moftiss admitted they see their BBC Sherlock as a highly budgeted, done with aplomb and cheekiness, form of FANFICTION. And as any fanfiction tends to do, it usually fill-in the gaps. Moftiss wanted to fill in gaps, and unintentionally, they started it right here with the creation of Molly Hooper.

Moftiss saw the potential in Molly’s character and in Sherlock’s interactions with her. The potential was too great to pass up. And thus, Molly-a-One-Time-Thing became Molly-the-Useful-to-the-Storytelling-Tool. She’s beneficial for various reasons and Moftiss explore her in those regards especially in the earlier part of the whole show.

Being a writing tool is Molly’s initial role in s1, and yet, unintentionally, she’s so much more. That’s because writers initial idea and the final edit of s1 are two different things as we’ll see in the following parts of this meta. The thing is, Moftiss approved of said edit and of the character's growth Molly did. They enjoyed her and her interactions with Sherlock and wanted us to share this with us, too.

Did Moftiss see all the Sherlolly potential in those early episodes? I don’t think so. I do think, however, it was fandom’s analysis years ago when the first two series were coming out, that might have opened their (or people’s involved enough with the show to have some kind of saying in it) eyes to the possible interpretations of Sherlock and Molly in the early episodes and consequently to something more between them in the second part of the show. Moftiss definitely didn’t plan Sherlolly from the beginning (Molly wasn’t even supposed to be in the show beyond the pilot) but when they realized the potential, they seized the opportunity and went with it, creating the Sherlolly goodness we got in the end.

Why they changed their mind, and why they really didn’t need to explain/correct/repair any of Sherlock and Molly interactions form the earlier episodes, because the groundwork for something more has already been there in the first place, will be explained in the following parts of this huge meta, starting with ‘A Study in Pink’ that I should post within a week.

As I work on this meta as a whole, I realize that we can categorize Molly in in each season/series into a different role:

Season one has Molly the (writing) Tool

Season two - Molly the Comparison (or the Contrast)

Season three - Molly the Potential or the Wild Card

TAB interlude - The Metamorphosis

Season Four - Molly the End Game

I’ll divide this Meta into those five subgroups to which each episode will be posted as a separate post. With the next part we’ll start the analysis of Season One: Molly the (writing) Tool.

Thanks for reading. See ya next week!

#molly hooper #sherlock holmes #my meta #the meta #the meta: introduction #bbc sherlock

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