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Goran Višnjić as Nicholae Schiller in Red Widow (2013)

#a treasure trove bless you OP #many vibes going on here and all of them great #red widow

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Goran Visnjic as Nicholae Schiller | Red Widow 1.04 

#[mean voice] he's so fun in this #red widow

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listen. the damien moreau vibes are very fun, nicholae schiller is very cute, but I want to talk about how much he cares about his father.

how laszlo schiller will turn the television back on to keep watching sports while nicholae's taking an important call and nicholae just gives him a look about it that speaks of exasperation and nothing more. how nicholae takes advice from his father, with a grain of salt, yes, but internalises it all the same, which I didn't really see until darkfinch pointed it out. how we don't see any true cruelty or resentment in this relationship at all, which compared with the absolutely toxic petrov patriarch situation is kind of stunning all by itself.

(nicholae makes a "when will he die" type comment once to his second in command/secretary, who offers to take care of it without any real weight to it - like he knows it's not a real wish, like it's the kind of petty comment that won't leave that room, that stays between friends.)

and then nicholae's dad gets rushed to hospital with a heart attack. and immediately, desperately, nicholae's priority is to be by his side, because his father can't stand hospitals, because he needs to see that nicholae's there. when laszlo does wake, back at home hooked up to beeping machines with someone in scrubs in the background, nicholae sends the medical person away immediately to get water (maybe just to leave laszlo's line of sight) and just… reassures him. stays there for him.

...…do you ever watch something in a story that feels so private it feels wrong to comment on it? because by this point we've seen the numbers tattooed on laszlo's arm several times. by this point we've seen someone call nicholae romani as an insult. and we've seen laszlo worried about his son, about his new business associate, about whether she's working against him, and we see laszlo here now scared and trying to warn him about it -

and when it's clear to nicholae that his father is jumping at shadows (at the horrors in his past that are all too real) he takes a moment to visibly collect himself then is just so kind about it. so gentle. switches to english like it's easier to lie that way and reassures his father that he'll see to it, that it's okay. and he does. and it is.

(always, inescapably, this is a character who murders, who works with monsters, who sells guns and hard drugs, who isn't above coercing someone into working for him. I know this post might get read by people who haven't seen the show; I don't want to mislead them.)

when I say I love this character I mean (among other things, admittedly) that there is so much humanity to him. and this relationship is such a surprising and real example of that.

#red widow #red widow tv series #nicholae schiller #laszlo schiller #orig #that feeling when you check a character tag and realise no-one's posted in it yet. why do I do this to myself #this is an assessment of the relationship skewed towards nicholae I think and there are disability-adjacent bits I haven't really dug into #but I think can maybe fall under the umbrella of #''when you're a crime boss and your dad lives with you and you take of him and he has opinions on your business there's gonna be friction'' #I'm going to go look at photos of goran being cute now send help this show can fit so much in it. just. so much. muchness.

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Goran Visnjic as Nicholae Schiller Red Widow - The Contact (Part one)

I know you can't wait for part two; Kickboxing and Biceps 😂

#elevator scene my beloved <3 #if you look closely you'll notice she almost misses the doors and he gives her a look for it‚ it's cute #he's such a fun villain in this it's SO good. #red widow #nicholae's laughing at a joke he just made about torture :) don't worry about it

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damien moreau is terrible because we see him from leverage's and especially eliot's point of view, we're shown several different ways he's almost comically villainous, and the first time we see him he almost drowns a character we know and love.

nicholae schiller is a fucking delight because we see him drinking tiny cups of coffee and lurking in elevators and boxing for fun and genuinely laughing, and the bad stuff he does is kind of at a remove. he really cares about his dad. he spends an inordinate amount of time just trying to locate his stolen property. he lets the protagonist get away with a lot more than he ought to.

it's really NOT a good show. many of the writing choices are frustrating, some of the really key characters are kinda flat and some are just awful to watch, the most obvious ship is tainted to my mind by my deep desire for one of them to actually be sensible and consistent, and all of this is from someone who cheerfully played stardew valley through the non-nicholae bits, which is to say most of it. but if you're watching it for bonus moreau vibes and goran višnjić being very cute, you're in for a treat.

fair warning for...

crime

violence

drug use

overuse of the word "housewife" and general misogyny

children who see some shit and a teenager who goes through some shit

a brief and tasteless reference to prison rape

brief anti-Romani sentiment from shitty characters

brief references to the Holocaust

nicholae being the most interesting character present, honest to goodness, I expected to love him but did not expect to want him to win, he has such a place in my heart now and I just have to reckon with that. he NEEDS to get a higher desk.

my thanks to @darkfinch for recommending and enabling, I am not the same person I was yesterday 👍

I had the strangest dream last night. I dreamt that I watched the entirety of red widow in one day, quickly started rooting for the goran višnjić crime boss character more than anyone else, and collected far too many screenshots and gifsets about it.

…ah.

#now if you'll excuse me I've gotta go sort through these gifsets for queueing <3 #orig #red widow #goran visnjic #goran višnjić #there is a youtube playlist of all the nicholae scenes but it's distressingly low quality #and I haven't even mentioned my friend luther who is guard dog coded and very sweet </3 #normal media experiences happening here!! I'm gonna rewatch and make a note of the nikolae timestamps for future time-saving purposes.

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I had the strangest dream last night. I dreamt that I watched the entirety of red widow in one day, quickly started rooting for the goran višnjić crime boss character more than anyone else, and collected far too many screenshots and gifsets about it.

…ah.

#falderal speaks #more in a RB I didn't want to put a frank review on the main tag

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so uhhh that trailer huh :)

#THEM <3 <3 <3 #art #parker #hardison #eliot

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leverage is a good show

#hi I love this a normal amount #eliot #art

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“that’s no way to treat an old friend!” (redraw of the iconic pool scene in leverage’s the big bang job)

#found while looking up chapman to verify hair colour and oshit this is a very fun art style #the big bang job #chapman #eliot #leverage #art

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that sequence in the Gone Fishin' Job where Hardison and Eliot get taken hostage is Really Something because like. Eliot's looking around and he's counting. and he's deciding whether he can risk a fight. and then he looks over at Hardison. at the guns aimed at Hardison. and he goes without a fight. cause he can take a bullet, he can take the risk, but Hardison can't. that ain't ever an option.

#fuck #leverage angst #the gone fishin job #oh that hurts #because it kind of is an option by the end. because hardison chooses it because hardison insisted #because suddenly eliot's having to treat hardison like an (inexperienced) brother-in-arms and accept the risk that he'll get hurt #doing the right thing #thanks OP - I rewatched this one recently and couldn't quite figure eliot out at this point. this helps. #eliot #hardison

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do you ever think about how/why despite all the times he gets grappled or thrown or jumped from the back I don't think anyone ever grabs Eliot by his ponytail. which seems so spectacularly grabbable. the answer is probably that it would harsh the untouchable coolguy vibe that the writers want for him so bad but what a missed bit of choreography

friend I absolutely cackled at "spectacularly grabbable" but this is very much not your fault or something I'm dwelling on <3

you're RIGHT though! damn, that could've been fun to see. I definitely see it as a doylistic choice too, but it would be so so good to see him taking someone down with extreme prejudice because they thought they could win that way - not even sure how he'd handle it, either.

(also because I'm me I'm choosing to think quinn resorts to this experimentally while sparring and eliot gives him THE most betrayed aggravated look you've ever seen.)

#orig #eliot #punchy lads #I have a normal amount of thoughts about fictional characters' hair #I actually reread bits of my unshareable longfic recently - started before this blog‚ even - and it's funny to realise #that I wrote quinn as a dirty fighter then too. even while sparring. #I feel like he and parker would have similar approaches and would be best sicced on each other tbh

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#well shit!! #leverage angst #the studio job

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Eliot: I stay close to protect Hardison and Parker. I suppose I’m third wheeling but if that’s what it takes to keep them safe then so be it

Hardison: Eliot is our boyfriend. We take him on dates all the time

Parker: he hasn’t figured it out yet

Hardison: I suggested we tell him

Parker: but this is more fun

Hardison: yeah it is

#ot3 #very fond of this

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literally so embarrassing to have someone go "i don't go here" or "what's this from?" on my art and it's a rarepair/crackship that is in no way representative of the source material... and i have to be like. well you see, the rest of the restaurant's menu is not like this. i'm doing my own thing eating black olives right out of the can in the back-of-house. whether or not you want me to throw you a can, you have to understand that's not what they serve out front

#I was going to reblog this anyway and didn't even register the sheer MASTERY of ''the rest of the aurant''

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My favorite thing about Eliot Spencer is how invested he gets in whatever job/role he’s doing for the con. He has to play a caterer? He will give you a gourmet menu and poach some pears for dessert. He has to play a minor league baseball player? He will hit a home run and he will be excited when the local deli names a sandwich after him. He has to play a police officer? He will make Hardison respond to a call that’s nearby because there might be kids in that house. Eliot commits.

#meta coming for my heart all over again #hardison #eliot #long post

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we see in the series that eliot tends to herd people/check in physically after something goes wrong, so hc that as time goes by this eventually evolves into like. latching on for a while. after the end of a risky con the closest person is getting held in an iron grip for at least half an hour. hardison starts trying to be the closest so he has an excuse to get spooned and do nothing but play his switch for a bit

#ohhhhh #formative headcanon honestly #an eliot who's physically clingy once he feels safe enough to let himself be #eliot

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Eliot being gruffer than usual around a middle-aged client with dark eyes and curly hair and not telling anyone why. Eliot being flirted with by a pretty woman with dimples and freckles while they help out a struggling law firm, and she gives him more space when he only gives token responses, but the others can't help but notice. Eliot keeping his distance from a kid with a wide mouth and a laugh like a donkey and letting the others trade off keeping an eye on them instead. Eliot being just a little cool in an interview for a promising new linecook - a college student, short and soft, sharp-eyed and careful and good with knives - and getting pulled aside afterwards to explain what's up.

He could lie, could find any kind of excuse, but he's trying to be more open about these things. Hardison and Parker have made it clear they accept him, awful past and all. So he looks back up and meets their eyes, one then the other, and admits out loud for the first time: They just remind me of someone I-

#reminded myself of this and [mean voice] I'm still very fond of it #self reblog #eliot who doesn't get to forget and doesn't get to turn his brain off and- these days- doesn't get to turn away from what he's done either #at least he's loved