“Dean…” Castiel looked at his hunter with a look that screamed be okay. Just please, please be all right. Dean was lying on their stiff bed in their crappy hotel room; curled around himself, hugging his knees, Dean hid his face from Castiel. He hadn’t moved in days.
“Dean, you’re withering away. I – I know you miss him. I do too, but…” he walked over and sat at the edge of the bed, still unable to see Dean’s face. “But you can’t just… you can’t just stop living. There are things to kill, demons to hunt, people to save. You know he would have wanted you to keep going.” “Well, he’s not here, Cas. He doesn’t want anything,” Dean whispered in a gravelled voice; he did not move even his eyes from the same spot on the wall that he had been staring at for the past week. Cas tried to reach over and put his hand on Dean’s shoulder. He wanted to do something- he needed to. He couldn’t stand to watch Dean slowly kill himself. He wished that his hunter would look at him like he did before – like he could never get happier than when he was with him, like nothing would ever go wrong: he wanted to be able to bring Sam back. But he couldn’t. He just wished he was enough. “Dean,” he started. “No, Cas,” Dean shot back, sitting up to face Castiel. “I can’t just ‘keep going.’ There’s nothing to keep me going anymore. I don’t have anything to live for. I can’t do it, Cas! I can’t do it without Sammy.” Cas was surprised. Dean didn’t ever yell. Not at him. He raised his voice, maybe. Never did he yell. And Cas didn’t yell back. Dean took a deep breath and looked down at his hands. Castiel saw a tear fall and he moved to wrap Dean in his arms. “I really can’t do this without him, Cas.” Dean sobbed into his angel’s shoulder as he shook, trying to catch his breath. “I don’t know how I could.” Castiel wanted to get angry – didn’t Dean know that he was here for him? That he has to keep going because without Dean, Cas wouldn’t be anything. Cas missed Sam, too. Didn’t Dean see that? He wanted to yell at Dean for being selfish. He wanted to scream and throw things to get Dean to see that he was here for him. But he never did. He just held Dean while he sobbed and blamed himself for Sammy’s death. Cas shushed him, lightly drew circles on his back, assured him that it wasn't his fault. He did everything that he could do, but it was just his time to go. Dean ignored him because if he had just gotten to Sam sooner or hadn't let Sammy go on his own or even if he had suggested another case, then maybe, just maybe, Sammy would still be alive. Eventually, Dean had stopped blaming himself and was just crying into Cas’s chest, still in the same position they were in when Cas first embraced Dean. Neither of them could tell how long they stayed like that, but Dean had fallen asleep against Castiel, and Cas had laid them both down on the bed and fallen asleep holding Dean, his tear-stained shirt sticking to him as he drifted off. * * * Dean woke up, eyes achy and the back of his throat dry from crying all night. He reached out but quickly discovered that he was alone. Panicked, he shot up and called out loud enough for the whole floor to hear him. “Cas!” His voice was scratchy and needy, but he didn’t care. He couldn’t see anyone. Had last night been a dream? Was Castiel gone, too? Did he leave because Dean said he wasn’t something to live for? Had he scared away the only thing he had left? “Castiel!” Cas rushed out of the bathroom. “I’m here, I’m here,” he called, running to hold Dean. Without hesitation, Dean stood up and embraced Castiel. “I thought you were gone, too,” Dean sighed into Castiel’s neck. “No, I will never leave you. Don’t you ever worry about that.”
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You know, I was going to write this whole thing about how women are funny and how it's a crime that they are just getting recognized as so, but the problem with that is I shouldn't have to do that. People don't need to be told that women are funny - they can see it. They've been funny just as long as men have; some might even argue they're funnier.
But the problem is when people don't see it. When people are still asking Amy and Tina and Mindy "what's it like to be a woman in comedy?" and are never thinking to ask "What do you enjoy more, acting or stand-up? Or something else entirely?" or "Do you have a particular comedic style, if you will? Any specific influences?" (both of which are actual questions asked to the comedian Brian Ferrell). It's gotten to the point where Poehler just laughs and Fey refuses to answer. It's an unnecessary question to ask. Women are funny. Men are funny. Sometimes they are not, and those people aren't comedians. There's no point in asking "what's it like to be a woman in comedy" because it's the same - or at least, should be the same - as being a man in comedy: you're a comedian, you're funny, you're making people laugh. I totally get Poehler's reaction to the dreaded question: it's ridiculous to think people are still so stuck in the twentieth century to even see all the different kinds of funny people in the world. Let's talk about Orphan Black.
Not only is the show this amazing mess of sci-fi and action and comedy, but the main actress - Tatiana Maslany - is hot and plays eight different characters, all clones of each other (but she hasn't won a single Golden Globe or and Emmy - neither the HFPA nor the academy have any taste). This show is about a woman, Sarah Manning, who sees her doppelganger commit suicide; she searches for answers and finds out she is a part of an illegal cloning experiment. The first season follows Sarah and three other clones in their quest for their purpose - who cloned them and why. Maslany plays a total of eight clones - Sarah Manning, Alison Hendrix, Cosima Niehaus, Helena, Rachel Duncan, Elizabeth Childs, Katja Obinger, and Jennifer Fitzsimmons. Each copy has her own characteristics, her own occupation, her own little quirks and hand motions and specific way of talking. It's really a crime that Maslany hasn't won an Academy Award because if you didn't know Tatiana was the only girl in her family, you would think she was an octuplet. Orphan Black is also one of the best shows representation-wise: one clone is a lesbian (with a smokin' hot girlfriend), the foster brother of another clone is gay, all of the women are complex and have different ways of being strong (they're all the same shape, however, but that's because, well, they're all the same person) - everyone's flaws are evident and their strengths are flawed: no one is a trope or an archetype. It's amazing. And I love this show even more because it's funny without being campy and serious without being dreadful: it's a perfect combination of witty banter, chase scenes, sci-fi experiments, and hot ladies. If you're not watching it, you should probably re-evaluate your life and your choices. In my previous post, I wrote a love poem to How I Met Your Mother called Enjoy the Ride talking about how much I loved the show and how much I appreciated it and all of the character development and how much it meant to me. I take it all back. There was so much wrong with the finale that I've been yelling and seething since I watched it. I didn't sleep Monday night because all I was thinking about was how Carter Bays and Craig Thomas fucked up so hard. Don't see what went wrong? I'll go through every character and their storyline of the finale in relation with the rest of the show and show you how they messed up the lives of the characters just for a shocking ending. MARSHALL ERIKSEN Okay, so actually Marshall's storyline wasn't too messed up if you look at him by himself: he came back from italy and after a reasonable amount of time working at a crappy corporate law office, he became a judge and then a Supreme Court judge . That's so good and so beautiful and I am so proud of him, I really am. At least Carter Bays and Craig Thomas didn't mess up his life. LILY ALDRIN When the finale first ended I thought, "well, at least they didn't screw up Marshall and Lily's lives"; but with another glance I realize that is just not true. The thing about this finale is that nothing really happened to Lily and Marshall - at least we know where Marshall is heading, but we have no idea what the heck is going in with Lily. The two of them go to Rome and then they come back. They have another baby (boy, girl, who knows). And that's all we know about Lily. What I really want to know is how her art career is going - is she pursuing her own art career or is she still with the Captain? Did she she go back to teaching or is she doing something completely different, like maybe an art curator at a museum? I don't know. No one knows. I don't even thing Bays and Thomas know, or else they would have mentioned something, anything to soothe the Lily-lovers. BARNEY STINSON Oh, Barney. My sweet, wonderful Barney. They killed you, they really did. Or, at least, might as well have. They killed who you had become, they killed the character they spent nine years developing from a self-absorbed sociopathic sex-addict to a loving, devoted fiance who no longer needed to fill the void in his soul with a different girl every night. You had become this amazing thing over the course of the series, making grand gestures to show your feelings to the ones you cared about, and then they just threw that away when things got a little too hard. What makes me really angry is that giving up is not something Barney Stinson does - if a girl rejected him, he would go back and tell her he was his own twin; when Quin would not date him, he convinced her; when Ted got in a car accident, Barney ran to the hospital to see him, even though they were not bros at the time. Barney Stinson is not someone who gives up, and is especially not someone who gives up people he loves. And he loved Robin. He will always love Robin. Also, what the fuck was that perfect month shit? That's disgusting, even for Barney. A Barney who, by the way, had changed into someone who did not find his player life fulfilling and who needed something more than that. But you know, just disregard nine years of character development. That's totally okay. ROBIN SCHERBATSKY From the very beginning up until this last episode, Robin was my favorite character. She was smart, independant, hot, funny, and I like to imagine that, if the show were not on CBS, she would swear like a fucking sailor. But this last episode - she was the villain, she was the bad guy who wrecked everything. She took Barney on the road with her and didn't want to settle down in one place because he job was too important to her - Barney definitely knew that and understood that before they got together. From the very beginning, Robin has been someone who would not give up anything for anybody very easily; and Barney has seen that side of her for nine years. But in addition to this being Barney's fault - not taking into account this intense work ethic his wife has - it's also Robin's. She has changed over the past nine years; she has given up things for people she cared about. Remember Don? She turned down a job to be with him - now, that did not turn out the way she expected, but it showed a lot of growth that the writers just ignored. Her and Barney did not even talk about their situation - Barney wanting to settle down and Robin enjoying her job: they just gave up. That's not how a marriage works. On top of all this, Robin does not love Ted. She did at one point. Twenty-three years before Ted is telling this story to his kids. She has said on several occasions that she does not love Ted, even when he thinks he loves her. First of all, the reason they break up waaayy back in 2007 is because they want different things: Ted wants to get married and have kids, and Robin wants to work and travel. In 2012, Ted tells Robin he loves her, and, when prompted, she says she does not love him. No means no, Ted. I'm surprised Robin was smiling when Ted showed up at her apartment. I would have been pissed. TED MOSBY Jesus Christ, Ted. You know, I never really liked Ted, but this was just horrendous. This love for Robin - this obsession that has lasted 25 years and survived break-ups and rejections and other marriages - completely illegitimizes Ted's love for the mother. He spent all those years married to Tracey, always with Robin in the back of his mind because she's not married anymore so he has a chance with her. Something is seriously wrong with this kid when after everything with him and Robin he still expects it to work out. What??? No, Ted. Wrong. Robin doesn't love you. Ted's entire thing was that he believed in faith and destiny and 'the one'. Well, he found his one in the mother. Robin is not his 'one'. Ted and Robin are toxic together, and I'm surprised the writers even considered this ending. They're basically saying "Hey, guys! If you love a woman, pursue her for eight years and even after both of you get married to other people, you should still go for it 23 years later, and she'll still be so into you! Good luck, dudes!" That's not the message you should be sending, guys. We spent nine years listening to this guy talk about how in-love Lily and Marshall are, how intense Robin is, and how much of a sociopath Barney is. Looking back on the previous seasons with what we know now, I'm not so sure Barney was all that bad. I mean, he totally could have been and I loved his character up until he just gave up on his marriage, but does our narrator not lose all of his credence the moment we find out this whole story was just his way of asking his kids for permission to date Robin? I'm sure, in his mind, they are more likely to tell him to go for it if he makes it sound like the other option is a horrible, disgusting player who doesn't give two shits about the women he dates. He played up to Barney's worst attributes to makes him seem like and angel in comparison. What the fuck, Ted. TRACY McCONNELL You had so much potential. I liked you a whole lot more than I liked Ted - although, that's not really saying much because I usually hate Ted. But you were perfect for him and then you were just killed off right when we found out your name. How fucked up is that? I think Thomas and Bays just get off on emotionally traumatizing their viewers, because killing you off was just one of the many things they have written to make me cry. But here's my real beef with this storyline: you were supposed to be the ending. The show is called How I Met Your Mother, so I mistakenly assumed the show would end with the mother. How foolish of me to think the show's title character would be used as anything but a plot device to help the leading male pop out a couple of kids before he tries yet again to woo his best friend. I really should have seen this coming; I should have known that by How I Met Your Mother, Bays and Thomas really meant How I Pursued Your Aunt Robin and Settled for Your Mother Until She Died and then I Pursued Your Aunt Some More. Really, my disappointment is my own fault. I could probably rant forever on everything that was wrong with this finale (in fact, my friend made a list. I helped), but I think this is a good place to stop. I really can not even comprehend the amount of idiocy went into the writing of this finale. I don't really think Thomas and Bays realize that by planning their ending way back when, they restricted themselves to only being able to write their characters as if they were still in season 1 - as the show goes on, your characters change and evolve, and when you write the ending before your characters evolve, they will revert back to how they were in season one in a matter of minutes.
I've seen a lot of finales, and this is probably the worst finale I have ever seen - and I've seen the Cheers finale. If I could show how much you’ve made me smile,
I’d steal blue horns and walk five hundred miles. For the good, for the bad, for slightly crude - I’ve seen it all, every one I have viewed. No words can show how much you mean to me I’m at a loss: no show I’d rather see on CBS, Monday evenings at eight Each goddamn week I patiently await. I’ve loved all character flaws, growth, and change: When Ted’s a bitch and Barney is just strange, Marshall and Lily now parents of two, Oh Robin, my love, grew the most - it’s true. I have laughed, I have screamed, and I have cried; Thanks for these nine years - I’ve enjoyed the ride. Ramin Setoodeh is the author of the ‘Veronica Mars’ Movie review - “‘Veronica Mars’ Movie Makes No Sense Unless You've Seen the Show”, written for Variety.
Dear Ms. Setoodeh, First, I would like to say that your snarky and witty writing style is usually something I would enjoy under any other circumstances, but bashing this clearly wonderful movie based off my third favorite show is something I cannot look past. ‘Veronica Mars’ Movie Makes No Sense Unless You've Seen the Show - you know who paid for this movie? People who have seen the show - not Hollywood, not some big film studio, but fans of the show. I bet if Rob Thomas made a movie not for the fans, you would be complaining that he didn't give the backers what they wanted - and, hey, they paid for the movie, so they should get a say in what’s in it, dammit! Who else would he make a movie for if not for the fans, the people that paid for it? And, yes, I agree that the cult-show-following does not translate well into mainstream media - but that is what makes it a cult show. Do you remember the show Dead Like Me? It was another cult-show that got cancelled after two seasons. They made a movie that you would be able to understand if you did not see the show - they explained the background of the characters, the background of the relationships, the background of the entire grim-reaper circumstance. And you know what? It was horrible. It was actually one of the worst movies I have ever seen - not just in continuation of the show but also as its own movie: it was just horrible - so bad that I actually regret watching it. These movies - movies that are made for a show that is cancelled way too early - are made for the fans of the show because they are the ones who want it, who need it. You’re complaining that Thomas was “targeting his feature only to those diehard supporters who wrote his paycheck”? Well, who else would the movie be directed at? When a movie is made normally - funded by the studio - the studio gets the final say: if they don’t like something, it gets cut, and if they want to see something, it gets put in. Fans who funded this Kickstarter payed for a movie that answered the questions that the premature cancellation gave them - where did the characters go, who is still in-touch with whom, who does Veronica end up with? And this movie did a beautiful job of answering all of these questions. Now, I can't tell if you were a fan of the show or not... who am I kidding, you clearly have never seen it because you go on complaining about the lighting. Veronica Mars, the TV show, is a teen soap-detective drama - with a little deviation from the soapy-teen stuff in the third season. The show itself contrasted light and dark shots to portray the mood, even the forthcoming mood. And I don’t know if you watched the movie with sunglasses on or what, but clearly something was blocking your vision because what you describe is not the movie I watched. There were clear contrasts and clear reasons to use the darker shots: for example, the scene between Logan and Veronica - oh, man, that scene - was intentionally dark because a) it happened at night, so there’s one pretty obvious reason; but also b) Logan and Veronica’s entire relationship is messy and impure and chaotic - which is represented by the dark lighting and slightly-choppy camera work. It follows the shows lighting and editing patterns, which, again, gives fans the comfort that they paid for. I understand where you’re coming from, I really do - the movie may not make sense if you have never seen the show. And if that’s the case, then I’m sorry, but this movie was not made for you. It’s like if you started watching a show at the fourth season and then complained because you did not understand the relationships of the characters. The whole point of the movie was to be a continuation, not to introduce the characters to a whole new set of fans - but, hey, if it did, that’s great. Maybe they’ll watch the show and we can make even more money for the sequel’s Kickstarter. An Avid Veronica Mars Fan, Olivia Federici And you know who you can love?
Bryan Fuller. The writer/producer is best known for Dead Like Me, Pushing Daisies, and most recently Hannibal, "which is why he is the greatest human ever" (Oonagh Kligman). He created two of the best screwed-over-by-their-network shows (the top five being Firefly, Arrested Development, My So-Called Life, and of course Pushing Daisies and Dead Like Me. Obviously) and really struck gold when he adapted the Thomas Harris book series into a critically-acclaimed prime-time series. What's great about all of Fuller's shows is that they all - according to fans - take place in the same universe: easter eggs and overlapping characters and tropes provide this theory and avid fans stick with it because if all the shows taking place in the same universe isn't the coolest thing, I don't know what is. Fuller is a mastermind at making sci-fi and fantasy shows that are not quite sci-fi and fantasy shows: when you watch Dead Like Me or Pushing Daisies, the fact that the main characters, respectively, kill and bring back to dead does not particularly jump out at you as the main point of the show. George is just a girl who died and has to deal with her life and her family moving on - not to mention her troubling personal life, oh lord, poor girl. And Ned the piemaker just makes pies and loves a girl so much that he wants to be around her, even if he can't touch her (if you know what I mean). Hannibal is just, well... Hannibal is just a crazy-ass show with a bunch of psycho- and sociopaths for psycho- and sociopaths. Also there's a lot of blood so. In short - Bryan Fuller: amazing, wonderful, a genius (I will die protecting his work). There are a lot of great things about the show How I Met Your Mother: the continuity, the guest stars, the songs, Cobie Smulders.
One thing they really messed up? The main character. "He's just looking for love and he believes in fate and in finding 'the one' - what's wrong with that?" you might be asking, and nothing is wrong with having those things as some of many characteristics; but when the desire to find "the one" overpowers every other attribute of a character - well, that's when it becomes a problem. Ted's journey starts when his best friends, Marshall and Lily, get engaged. That right there should be a red flag: he sees love happening before him and instantly needs to have that for himself. He wants it so badly that he convinces himself that he has with the next person he dates. He knows going into the relationship with Robin that there is no future there: she does not want to get married and she has no intention of having kids - two things that Ted has a mighty need for. Nevertheless, he tries to force his love onto Robin (at least five different times), who in the end, ends up falling in love and getting married to Ted's other best friend, Barney. (That's another thing this show did well.) "Teds just a hopeless romantic." Yes, he is hopeless. And, yes, he is a romantic. But he is a romantic to a fault. A big fault. The biggest problem about Ted is that he is needlessly this way - he does not have to be so invested in finding "the one"; he does not have to take everything as a sign from the universe; and he certainly does not have to force his love onto anyone. Ted's a catch - save for the hopelessness: he has a stable job as a college professor, he's funny, he's cute, he has a great apartment and really fun friends. But he just gets so invested in his relationships - trying to decide if they're "meant to be" or not. His major characteristic ultimately leads to the demise of every single one of his relationships - not to mention he convinces himself that he's in love with Robin more than he should. Ted's really gotta get a third dimension before he meets the mother. (SPOILERS AHEAD)
A while back, I told y’all what we thought we knew about the Doctor Who Fiftieth Anniversary Special - it happens right after Clara sees that the purpose of her life is just to keep the Doctor out of trouble; John Hurt is playing the Doctor; and Billie Piper and David Tennant are reprising their roles as Rose Tyler and the Tenth Doctor. We now know, however, that those things are not completely true. I am going to preface this by saying that I did love the special - I thought it was brilliant and well-written. As a stand-alone special that has nothing to do with the rest of the season. But as a continuation of the seventh season - or even as a continuation of the entire series - it was horrible and a complete disappointment in every way possible. Steven Moffat thinks that, as the newest show runner of the BBC show, he has the right to do whatever he wishes, despite the thirty seasons and a movie that came before him… In the first episode of the seventh season, Moffat made it so the Doctor’s arch enemies since the second episode of the entire series just forgot the Doctor completely. Now, fans were very angry about this - especially those that have been fans since the beginning - but they got over it, realizing that this made room for other monsters to fight the Doctor. Flash-forward to the end of that season, and (like I said up there ^) Clara has spent several lives trying to keep the Doctor out of trouble: she followed the Great Intelligence into the Doctor’s timeline and got spread out through his life. She had a hand in the Doctor taking the TARDIS; she has saved the Doctor’s life more than anyone can count; but the Doctor conveniently does not recognize her until - wait for it - Steven Moffat started to write the show. Fans were not as understanding this time. The writer before Moffat, Russell T. Davies, wrote in a war between the Time Lords and the Daleks in between the 1996 movie and the 2005 revival. Steven Moffat, however, thought that the fiftieth anniversary was the perfect time to decide that the Time War just did not happen: the Doctor saved Gallifrey, leaving it in an alternate, frozen universe. He reversed all the canon that all the other Doctor Who writers established before him. The power is getting to his head. He thinks he is invincible. He must be stopped. Recently, Netflix has released a handful of its own programs - shows like Orange is the New Black, Hemlock Grove, and House of Cards. This is one of the smartest things that Netflix could have done in this day and age of network snobbery and program competition.
Between network channels trying to change their reputation (see Shift of Comedy) and new shows not getting the exposure they need to stay afloat, creating a television show is not as easy as some may think: you cannot merely write a script, present it to producers, and make it. It takes effort and money; and if it does end up getting produced, you have to figure out a way to generate enough viewers so the network actually keeps you on the air. But Netflix bypassed all those obstacles and just let the producers run with the show - they let them make the shows how they wanted. They had no restrictions and no qualifications: they made the show, and Netflix put it online for the whole world to see. And since Netflix presents the whole season at a time, there is no worry that people will lose interest after the first week or two, because all they have to do is click ‘play next episode’ and they can continue to watch the show until the end of the season. In addition to making its own shows, Netflix also re-booting the critically-acclaimed 2003 FOX comedy, Arrested Development. It was brought back for a fourth season (with talks of a fifth and a movie) because the buzz of the show never died down: Netflix saw an opportunity to make money on a show everyone already loved, and they took it. Now they just have to bring back Firefly and everything would be right in the world. |
O. FedericiI like to like things. Archives
May 2014
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