If your goal is to normalize gender-nonconformity you’re gonna have to accept that some people will fuck with gender as hard as they can while still being unequivocally, 100% cis and that is okay. There’s no egg to crack or callout to write. This is a good thing actually.

apparently i’m a millennial woman

I mean, yeah, valid! but but but I also want to add on the fact that lotr AGGRESSIVELY rejects the “grimdark” and “gritty” settings that is so prevalent in fantasy (and also in general) right now, because I physically can not shut up about it

It is hope and love and compassion that saves each character individually, and because of that, the world. Frodo fails in the end, but his acts of compassion from earlier in the story save the day. And even as the world is saved, it is acknowledged that Frodo failed—without judgement, without blame. He fails, and he is still loved.

And like what can happen in the real world, he is still irrevocably changed by his trauma. But there is still hope—he has to leave, but he leaves with the promise of healing, and the promise that his ever-faithful Sam will follow.

Aragorn, Boromir, Frodo, Sam; each and every one of the characters are driven by their love of the people around them and their hope for the future. They cling to that love and hope throughout their trials, and that bears them through.

Of course people are watching it for comfort!!!! Lotr is eternally consistent in its promise, which Sam articulates so clearly in The Two Towers: “Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines, it’ll shine out the clearer.”

Things are dark and awful and terrible, but it will not be that way forever. That is the promise of LOTR. A promise of hope, and the reminder that it is love and compassion—for our friends, for our families, for the strangers we’ve never even met—that will save us in the end.

LOTR was the last time anyone in Hollywood was blisteringly, truly genuine. The good guys were good and kind and noble and the movie creators understood that this didn’t make them boring, it made them bonkers-ass compelling and wonderful. No one winked at the camera at any point.

Being a sex-positive personally-sex-repulsed ace is weird cuz like reading about sex? Awesome. Writing about sex? Not much more intolerable than writing about anything else. Sex is good. Sex is normal. Sex is only as important as you let/want it to be. Kinks are natural expressions of sexuality. Sexual purity is a scam. Bodies are nothing to be ashamed of. Sex work is no more exploitative than any other kind of labor. If you touch me I will throw up on you.

Reblogging for pride month

I think that Star Trek is basically unique in that it’s impossible to tell a good parody of it from a good instance of the thing itself, like

Writer: “I’m going to comically exaggerate all of these tropes!”

Trekkies: “FINALLY! Someone has distilled Star Trek down to its essentials!”

Like, the things you play up in a parody are very much the same things that make it popular in the first place.

Been thinking very hard about Charly's sacrifice and how that relates to Bury Your Gays. I want to preface everything with YMMV and it's completely valid if you're upset. In my opinion, Charly's death worked.

BYG is a set of tropes: when a characters's death is for shock value with little to no long term impact. Usually their death isn't about them and they have no agency in it, it's purpose is to inflict pain on their love interest (a main character) or to motivate another character, often for only a few episodes, often a straight man. There is also the element of creator bias, when they are aware how much that character/that relationship means to the audience and either ignorantly or maliciously choose to inflict the pain of killing them anyway. Arrow, The 100, Person of Interest, ST: Discovery, Supernatural and Killing Eve are the ones I'm most familiar with, but there are hundreds of others. Charly's death fits none of those criteria.

Charly had agency in her sacrifice. It wasn't a stray bullet, it wasn't pointless; she saved the galaxy and prevented genocide. Her decision was a reflection of her devotion to the ideals of the Union, even if she felt conflicted. The belief that all life has value, that even if it's your enemy and you have every reason to hate them, *genocide is always wrong*. That's what Charly decided. That was her story and her choice, no one else's. Consequently her actions have changed the course of the entire central storyline for the show. Her sacrifice *mattered*.

Contrast that with the Orville's Thursday counterpart, Strange New Worlds, which also killed a minority character in episode 9. It was pointless and he had no agency in it. A shock value death after the stakes of the episode had already resolved. It added nothing to the episode or the overall narrative. He wasn't even mentioned in the subsequent finale; he was disposable. In a lackluster and rushed funeral scene he got a short by the numbers speech about how he helped Uhura find herself, because his death wasn't about him.

Or go back a few years to another Trek when Discovery killed Hugh at the height of BYGs. Another pointless, shock value death that accomplished nothing except making Paul miserable.

The Orville has built up to this moment for three seasons. The episode was a culmination of every major storyline for the show, and the paradigm of the story has permanently changed because of Charly's actions. It's a tricky business killing any character in your story. It has to feel both too soon and inevitable, and making sure it matters to the narrative is something the majority of shows fail to do. This counts ten fold for queer characters. The Orville is a rare example that has met that threshold for me. To write off Charly's sacrifice as BYG is to imply that it didn't matter, and it did.

please watch the orville. please watch thoughtful takes on gender and neurodivergence and race and politics and religion that still make space for humour and fun and cameos of star trek legends and dolly parton. trans families. non humanoid shaped crewmates. robot and monster fuckers. autism analogies. finding love even when its difficult. working to maintain love as life throws horrific changes at you. ptsd recovery. bisexual captains. best friend divorcees. concerts. battles. cool space ships. time travel. alternate universes. elvis costumes.

please watch the orville.

i dont think we truly appreciate how unhinged gansey is. like, he has the benefit of being friends with ronan and adam, who work overtime to make him appear like the grounded one, but its a lie

ronan lynch with knuckle tats that say ADAM (professionally done on his left hand bc that’s the one adam always holds) and BLUE (shitty stick and poke on his right hand bc he and blue got ridiculously drunk one time and thought it would be funny)

this is amazing and also canon now

adam *leaving*: “ok cool.”

gansey: “hey, be safe!”

adam: “i will”

ronan & blue *mocking*: “bE sAfE”

henry: “i’ll be soooo safe”

gansey: “guys stop.”

ronan: “yeah sToP”

gansey: “i am going to kill you.”

blue: “but how would that keep us sAfE???”

there are some autistic “traits” that people find really annoying but that are inherently kind

like overexplaining. a lot of autistic people didn’t have certain things explained to them because “everyone knows that.” so when an autistic person overexplains something it’s not because they think you’re stupid it’s because they know how it feels for someone to assume you know something you don’t and just not ever explain how or why. it’s a kindness. autistic people aren’t annoying or stupid for this. they’re kind.

i’m pretty sure ronan lynch described his feelings for adam parrish as an oil spill. and gansey said that loving blue sargent was like breathing. and adam parrish said that making ronan lynch smile was as charged as making a bargain with a magical forest. and ronan lynch said he would rather die than hurt adam parrish. and gansey said he would do anything just to make adam parrish smile. and ronan lynch gave blue sargent his flashlight so she wouldn’t be in the dark. and gansey and ronan lynch ran to adam parrish’s trial. and ronan lynch dreamt a sun and handcream and a car. and gansey could sleep after talking to blue sargent. and adam parrish came to get ronan lynch when he was drowning in his own mind. and ronan lynch wrote remembered over and over and over for noah czerny. and gansey and ronan lynch went and got orange juice. and adam parrish never wanted to fight with gansey again because he was his best friend. and ronan lynch worshiped adam parrish. and gansey wanted the old ronan lynch back but really just wanted any ronan lynch he could have. and they were all in love with one another.

tamquam-

-alter idem

and noah czerny said if he was alive he’d ask her out and blue sargent said if he were alive she’d say okay. and noah czerny accompanied her to the college advisor meeting and the time she went off on her own to the dittley house. and adam parish was cabeswater reaching out. and he never trusted anyone but he trusted blue sargent and noah czerny to pull him out if he scyred too far. and gansey went alone to find the raven king because he didn’t want anyone else to get hurt even more. and then they all came to find and go with him. and henry cheng asked blue sargent to go to venezuela with him. and he trusted gansey with all his secrets in the hopes of finding a friend. and henry cheng inspired all of them when they thought all hope was lost. and ronan lynch gave blue sargent a car that ran without an engine or gas for her 18th birthday. and gansey who never wanted to be the kind of person his full name implied repeatedly did just that to try and carry ronan lynch through high school and get a diploma just in case he’d want it later. and-

The funniest thing about LOTR is Aragorn constantly overstepping the Elves’ personal boundaries. They come from a race where touching your heart is one of the highest signs of affection and he’s over here pulling them into bear hugs and slapping shoulders like a brawny middle-aged dad

LMAO wasn't Aragorn raised by Elves? He knows what he's doing

True, but the momentary panic in Haldir’s eyes here is hilarious

Okay but what this potentially says about Elrond and the rest of the elves he was raised by is absolutely heartwarming. Because IRL humans need a certain amount of touch and affection and hugs and stuff. It’s particularly important for things like brain development and while it varies from person to person it’s still more than what elf kids need

And it honestly looks like Aragorn is not only comfortable with this kind of physical affection, he’s used to it. 

Which makes me think that instead of looking at young Aragorn, and asking him to be more like an elf to fit in with those around them. Elrond looked at this kid and and thought to himself “how can I be more like what this child needs to thrive” 

Aragorn has been raised by Elves since he was only 2 years old. So if we’re going by Piaget’s theories of child development, that puts Aragorn, (who would have been called Estel at the time) in the pre-operational stage. Or somewhere thereabouts. So Elrond is raising this kid when he’s learning to talk. When he’s constantly asking “why?” about everything. 

Young Estel would have grown up surrounded by elves and elf children and just by virtue of not being an elf, he probably would have had to deal with feeling less capable than those around him. He wouldn’t have been able to do things like run across snow, and didn’t have the ability to see as far as they did with their “elf eyes” and I am imagining all manner of bruises and skinned knees as he tries to keep up anyway. 

And it would take some getting used to his new surrounding, but  I can’t stop picturing the first time tiny little Estel runs full tilt across the room and hugs Elrond’s leg. 

And instead of scolding him or asking him to be more like an elf to fit in, Elrond consciously sets aside his own discomfort in the face of what this child needs to thrive. And if what Estel needs is hugs, then hugs he shall have. 

Elrond picking up itty bitty Aragorn in a great big hug, and being just as uncomfortable about it, but hiding it well because this child was entrusted to his care and he will not let the boy grow up feeling unwanted or unloved.

And so Aragorn grew up surrounded by elves, but he grew up to be someone who naturally and unselfconsciously displays affection. 

I think that speaks volumes about Elrond. 

He raised this kid from age 2 to age 20 (so the majority of his formative years and well through his teens) and it was around then that Elrond’s own daughter gets back form visiting her grandmother Galadriel and meets this boy for the first time.

So I have NO IDEA what the various stages of child development would be for an elf, but I doubt their exactly the same.

Sure, Elrond might seem distant now, but there is no way Aragorn became the guy who is constantly overstepping elves personal boundaries to display affection without Elrond choosing to sacrifice his personal boundaries for the sake of a child’s well being.

This is the best possible addition to this post

Here’s a christmas gift I made for my partner cause eeaao is their favourite movie

ok some days being visibly homo is the most wonderful thing in the world. an old woman walking her dog stopped to say hello to me and I asked if i could say hi to her dog. she seemed really excited and told me "his name is rupert brooke. i named him after a gay poet from the era of the first world war. he had red hair just like my dogs fur". then she leans in and whispers like she's divulging some great secret and says "i don't usually tell people about the gay part"

Ke Huy Quan wins the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for Everything Everywhere All at Once 

everyone is deleting the caption to this but this work is called “perfect lovers” by the gay artist felix gonzalez-torres. the piece is about the illness and death of his HIV-positive partner ross laycock:

“Don’t be afraid of the clocks, they are our time, time has been so generous to us. We imprinted time with the sweet taste of victory. We conquered fate by meeting at a certain time in a certain space. We are a product of the time, therefore we give back credit where it is due: time. We are synchronized, now and forever. I love you.” (Gonzalez-Torres, 1988)

Hey look! I made a burger people thing! Page 1-5 outta who knows how many

Just thinking about Jack looking around at the mounted monster busts again after learning he can be forced to transform, realizing he could very well end up as another trophy on the wall. Immortalized as the monster, not the man.

"Just kill me as I am."

Okay, big spoilers for Werewolf By Night. But I need to talk about the scene where Elsa touches Jack’s face. And he recognizes her, or some part of him does, through the barriers his mind creates when he changes. There is some communication between him and the werewolf, even though he thinks there’s not.

And I also need to talk about the fact that he doesn’t go after Elsa, when he changes. All the hunters are sure he will, which is why they have trapped him in the cage with her. Elsa is sure he’s going to kill her, too. Even Jack himself is sure he will. But instead, he escapes and takes out the other hunters.

Jack doesn’t have access to who he becomes when he changes. He doesn’t really know who he is then. And so he bases his self-identity on how other people have treated him. He sees himself through their eyes. All he knows is that others have hunted him. And so he thinks he’s just an unhinged monster who kills indiscriminately. But he’s actually not. And uhhhh. I just have so many emotions about that.