Playing with words

Books/Webcomics:
Made a goal of 50 books for the year and have already made a good start towards that! All of the ones I read this month were in series, which I didn't do on purpose - in retrospect, my choices seem based on a philosophy of Pirates Float My Boat. 🏴‍☠️⚓

( Books )


TV:
I finished a couple of series in January: S1-5 of 911 and Andor. I've also been rewatching Castle, which I can honestly say, I find a lot more fun than Mentalist. 911 feels a lot like Grey's Anatomy to me, with the Crazy Storylines built around the theme of the ep. I can also see why everybody on tumblr (and I think somebody on my reading list) ships Eddie/Buck - they're like Wednesday/Enid on Wednesday: sure they have obligatory hetero romantic interests but it's pretty obvious the cornerstone of their hearts, the person they have Intense Emotions for, is actually the "best friend"? (The writers seem to acknowledge this with Eddie and Buck being mistaken for a couple in series too, LOL.)

Andor was honestly amazing - how does it exist in the same Universe as that last movie that Shall Not be Named because it was so bad? Or Obi-Wan which was all hype, overacting, and plotholes big enough for the Death Star to slip through. Andor just had so much to say about societal control and politics, about human flaws and love in spite of that, and its characters are so real, even the Imperial bad guys. The impenetrable bureaucracy too, hahahaha too real! Plus how the tension started out as a trickle of unease that kept ramping up as things got revealed! I am just despairing at how the next season won't be coming for about two years, but I'm sure it will be amazing too. I will probably re-watch this soon, but next on my TV list is Interview with the Vampire. 

Any thoughts on these series, oh reading list? Or pirate-y book recs? LMK!

Wishing you all a wonderful New Year! 🥳🙌 This will be another many updates at once post because so much has happened but I've been too busy to sit and compose a post!

First! Thank you to spikedluv for more DW points via holiday_wishes ! So much appreciated!!! 🥰

Second cool thing: I've won a few Discord Nitro giveaways ever since I started entering lots of them? Law of averages, so I've been cruising along with Nitro Classic (which is basically just Extra Emoji Powah - it's the discount version of Nitro) and I have a few months of classic credit stored up now. Then a couple days ago I basically won the jackpot: one year of Nitro Boost! 🙌🥳This is the fully souped up version of Nitro that costs $100! So I can boost the little B2 server again, which is awesome! (It means all members on the server can use more of our custom emoji and stickers and our icon can be a GIF one, plus a few more perks.)

Third: I spotted a new gift on AO3 and went rummaging through the tags at fandomtrees and ooooh! Can't wait!

And finally, the person translating my fics into Vietnamese has finished An Exchange of Kings now and the link is here!


In not so cool things: tumblr is basically totally non-functional for creators right now. 😭 It's probably them trying to fix their banned tags issue, but now any tagged post doesn't show. 🤨 So I'm not making any more GIFsets until they figure out WTF they're doing. Really sad that I might have to redo the tags on all the sets I've posted - that is at least a hundred sets.😭 I have two more weeks of work, so maybe after that?


November/December media

TV shows: So much quality content! I have been very happy with the TV offerings lately. I think I'll be trying Wheel of Time next, since the people in the Gendrya server are talking about it. (I read the books ages ago, so I don't think I'll be offended by the "narrative diversions" that husbands everywhere are complaining about!😂) 

Squid Game- I totally get all the hype over this series - it was sooo good! I started it one night, just to see why everybody was talking about it and flooding my dash with people in tracksuits. Watched two episodes, and then binged the rest the next day! It is very intense though - I can see why people just can't take the strain of it, and the seemingly cynically violent narrative. This show breaks your heart on purpose? I do like what it says about capitalism and human nature in the end though. I have caps for icons, so I will be working on those sometime!

explained S3- There was a chess ep and one on dogs! Awesome season!

The Mind explained- The last ep on brainwashing was uncomfortably relevant. 😖 Radicalization in small groups: it can happen to you! I want to watch the one on personality again - the different traits are really interesting! 

Lost in Space S3- I can't believe it's over! And I liked where the characters ended up, mostly, although I am sad it wasn't a little bit shippier for the pairings I was rooting for. 🥺 

Arcane- OMG this show blew me away! I think I actually like the love triangle on this show because it's such a fresh take on the trope and sooo heartbreaking?! Plus what a corruption arc! And the character designs and artwork and music were all just stunning together! Definitely going to re-watch just to be wowed all over again. 

Hawkeye- I did not expect this show to make me ugly sob because I'm going to be honest: I went into this not giving a damn about Clint. My fave was Natasha and I have been bitter for literally YEARS. This show had everything though - humourous banter, great character arcs/plot, awesome action sequences and emotional catharsis like whoa. 😭😭😭 So well done, and it totally blew away my expectations. Plus the holiday setting was perfect - my kiddo and I watched it all over Christmas and it felt so sublime! 

The Witcher S2- I liked it for the most part although Jaskier should have had more songs! Having Ciri a lot more central at last was great, and I also like the time spent with more of the minor characters like Fringilla, whose choices and struggles I find a lot more relatable than say, Geralt's? Although I don't like what they did with Yennefer since it was so contradictory and also not in the books?! 🤨(Yes, I am the annoyed husband here: what was that?!)


Movies: Only watched a couple. I'm hoping to see No Way Home in theatre soon though! It comes out here on the 7th!

Shang-chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings- This was such a fun romp and I kind of ship Katy/Shang-chi now. I loved how they were so solidly each other's person. 

Don't Look Up- I found this so depressingly realistic that I had to stop watching in the middle for a day. Like maybe it's satire but it felt terribly plausible.  


Books:

   Scythe, Thunderhead and The Toll by Neal Shusterman

In an overpopulated world where an ubiquitous, omnipresent AI has solved all mundane human problems like death and disease, there have to be those who must reduce the population instead. This was such a neat dystopian concept and I think the first book in this series was definitely the strongest, although all of them have several gut punch twists. The weakest part of the series was the romance - I just didn't feel it between the two main (young) protagonists. (Maybe I am over YA romance? IDK.) The third book is strangely structured too, because one of the minor characters from the second book gets a leading role for most of the first third of it - it's a jarring change when you're so used to his chapters being the occasional interlude instead of the main focus! I have a bunch of fic bookmarked for this, but for the mentor scythes, who had the most tragically separated for eternity soulmates story ever. It still makes my heart break a bit to reflect on it. 🥺

 A Psalm of Storms and Silence by Roseanne A. Brown

Ooooh this was such a good finish to this duology! I feel like anything I say will be spoilers for the first book, but the great worldbuilding continues out into the world around the city in the first, with a wonderfully diverse range of characters, and some realistically motivated characters? Like at first it seems like the author is playing to a romantic trope, but noooope, character was motivated by something deeper! 😅
A great YA fantasy read - I'm reccing this series to my kiddo for sure.


Finally, here's my last fic of the year for newyearcntdown 

Title: Cold Hands (Cold Feet) (Joy and Harmonny for the Season Chp 3)
Fandom: The Queen's Gambit (TV)
Characters/Pairing: Beth Harmon/Benny Watts, Jolene DeWitt & Benny Watts, Benny Watts & D.L. Townes
Word Count/Rating: 2424 words, T
Summary: Counterpart to the previous chapter: Whatever did Benny get Beth for Christmas?
Link to AO3 here

This was expanding on the backstory of the last chapter of Exchange too - I wasn't planning to write that in when I first saw the prompt, but the more I thought about that other meaning of Cold Feet, the more I wanted to add it. I was originally going to write eight stories for this community and only finished three, but I am keeping the option open to post a couple more on AO3 even though the community on DW won't be open for cross-posting!

I was still reeling from something that happened in July, so I wasn't able to read much (books or fic), therefore Ted Lasso and Rom-communism were the gist of my media consumption last month. 

S2 thoughts thus far: 

I really trust these writers? They write in a way that's both emotionally honest and funny, with homages aplenty, which is smack dab in the middle of my sweet spot. And there's unexpected twists, but not the Shitty Shock Value variety. That and a series about people being thoughtful, kind and accountable for their actions is really what I need right now. 🥰 There was so much griping on Reddit and twitter about how S2 was too positive until things started taking a darker turn in the last eps, and now it's gone the other way (F- this character! I thought this was a feel-good show!) And um. LOL Ok fandom. Like, no,( Cut for TL S2 spoilers ) It is still absolutely the highlight of my week, and I am already bummed about how our free Apple+ is going to run out just before the last ep drops. 😭 While we all loved and needed Ted's #BELIEVE philosophy during COVID, I think his arc this season is about the limits of "just being positive", which I think is really cool? 

Anyway, since there were a metric tonne of rom-com references, I also re-watched:

You've Got Mail (Did NOT age well - Tom Hanks plays a creepy jerk in this and by the end I was actively rooting for him NOT to get the girl, although I already knew the ending and I love Tom Hanks as an actor. Very weird to have a totally different perspective this time around.)

Sleepless in Seattle (LOVE THE KID IN THIS! Also the depiction of Sam's grief was so poignant.)

When Harry Met Sally (CLASSIC FOR A REASON. Also I forgot Carrie Fisher was in this, which.😍)

Jerry Macguire (A sports agent who wants to do ethically better things for the sake of his clients - really seeing the Ted Lasso inspo in this!)

Notting Hill (Okay, great casting but the story was so ??? Princess Anna insisting IT'S TRUE LOVE *swing a flaming brand* kind of forced? Forgettable.) 

Love, Actually (Hahahaha baby TBS is so baybee I can't wrap my head around how he was actually 12 when he did this role. Like no wonder he still looks like a teenager.)

Book-wise this was the only thing I finished, but it was AWESOME. 

 Ariadne by Jennifer Saint

I love how the author made a minor character from Theseus' myth her main character and that this follows Ariadne's little namedrop mentions in other myths completely from her POV. Canon compliant, so it ends up tragic/bittersweet, but it gets there with such empathy and understanding for her choices. I might buy this one.  

Okay, posting a bit late because it has been A Week, but I'm almost at the end of my to-do list! 

TV:

TED LASSO
😭 Okay, so lyrawhite insisted that I watch this and I was like. ...A soccer comedy with a white American football coach transplanted to England to coach their football. Really? 😅 BUT IT WAS SOOO GOOD because it completely ran counter to my expectation of dumb jock humour. Ted believes in people and makes tonnes of silly jokes and he is 100% genuine. And the way that positivity really does bring out the best in others is just the most heartwarming thing? Fantastic cast of characters, spot on writing, awesome narrative arcs. Season 2 is coming in July and I honestly can't wait. HIGHLY RECOMMEND.

Lucifer 5B
Cheating a little bit because I did not actually finish binging the season until yesterday even though I started it when it dropped last week! I was reaaalllly looking forward to this and found it oddly disappointing? Too many bottle eps in an already short half season, which meant the main storyline had to be compressed into even fewer eps and considering Deckerstar had FINALLY just gotten together, there was really not enough shippy stuff! 🙁🙁🙁 They did some narrative tie-ins to much earlier eps though, revisiting and closing a couple of arcs, which was somewhat satisfying. And the ending sets up a huge game changer for the final season too, but it just didn't have the same exciting momentum as past seasons and the spectacle factor didn't deliver in the finale because of COVID filming restrictions. :/

Books:

 Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells

This was a great little novella and the only thing that bothered me was its place in the timeline: it's probably set before the last novel (Network Effect) but I didn't know that going in so I was rather confused at first. Anyway, Murderbot is still grumpy and competently working its way through challenges and around The Rules given to it by humans, and it was a lot of fun to see some of its favourite humans pop up again! "That left me with the human most likely to want to drop everything and come watch me break into a damaged transport and the human also most likely to come watch me break into a damaged transport but only so he could argue with me about it." 😂 Good fun and definitely recommend! 

    Temeraire 3-6 by Naomi Novik

So these are basically Temeraire and Laurence wandering around the world constantly getting into trouble and also finally meeting the Napoleon threat in battle! I loved the way Napoleon is depicted too - his vision for infrastructure etc. is innovative and progressive, like his battle strategies, it's just that he wants to take over your country's resources and autonomy, is all. 😁 I also enjoyed how Novik depicts yellow, brown and black people having complex and progressive cultures and customs, while the white colonizers are basically entitled racists with guns and ships enslaving people (and treating dragons and women badly) and Laurence is in a state of constant facepalm. The plot ends up a bit meandering though, and the endings are rarely triumphant and conclusive in terms of arcs? So I'm pausing on this series for a bit because I have a lot of other things on my list I want to get to.

 Shrill by Lindy West

I liked this a lot more than The Witches are Coming! Does everything a good feminist novel should: shine a light and make you think, and West does it with a wicked sense of humour. She makes great points about fatphobia, responsibility in comedy and vitriol in online media. I will probably revisit this one in future, and I definitely want to watch the show based off this.

 Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

OMG GUYS. THIS. BOOK. 😭😭😭 I literally had tears in my eyes when I finished it. This one is very much more in line with The Martian than Artemis but it went in completely unexpected directions despite Weir's signature nitpicky science details and hilarious delivery. Might make you believe in the basic tendency towards cooperation in sentient beings. Going to add it to my bookshelf as a keeper. HIGHLY RECOMMEND.

 Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

Re-read for obvious reasons, and I loved it all over again. HEIST HEIST HEIST! 😁 I'm holding off on re-reading Crooked Kingdom though because uh. I know how it ends and Fuck No right now. 😅

 Letter to My Daughter by Maya Angelou

Interesting and revealing - I don't agree with a lot of her final pronouncements (especially the ones with a devout Christian bent) but I enjoyed the poetry and hearing anecdotes about her life and the way she shows how her perspective was blown wide open sometimes. 


Next up: The Rose Code and The Faraway Nearby. I usually read e-books on my phone nowadays but since the new job has long periods of waiting for drop-ins on Fridays, I'm taking it as an opportunity to also get through my neglected bookshelf! So far both are excellent and I predict I'm going to be adding The Rose Code to my shelf too. 🥰

Films- watched more kids movies than usual because the kiddos were home too. Also re-watched a lot of old faves for comfort.
( 2020 movies  )


TV- watched less than I would have expected, but that is mostly because the kids were home a lot more, I think, so obviously what was on the main screen had to be kid-friendly

( TV in 2020 )

Books- link to book post here


Music- still soundtrack heavy and TAYLOR BLESSED US SO MUCH THIS YEAR. <3

( 2020 music )


Fic recs- I'm just linking to my bookmarks- I've been all over different fandoms this year. Some that wowed me were in The Old Guard fandom, and there are some amazing GoT ones. My biggest !!! was being told that astolat is actually Naomi Novik. Which OF COURSE SHE IS NO WONDER THE WORLDBUILDING AND CHARACTERIZATION AND TIMELINE DETAILS IN HER FIC WERE PERFECTION.

My own stuff:
Fic/Meta -16 fics this year, 15 of them complete, one of which was a previously abandoned fic! 6 of them have a POC (or two) as the main characters, and two are femmeslash because I know I tend to write het (or slash) for white mains but I really don't want to write just one kind of story? Wrote about 30000 more words than last year, and for far more fandoms than usual. Also participated in March Meta Matters challenge, uploading 16 meta to AO3 for the first time. I think I'll do it again this year, but since it'll only be new meta there should be less of an inbox flood to my subscribers.

( 2020 Ao3 stats page under here )

I'm particularly proud of Metamorphosis because it had/still has no audience and I wrote ten thousand words of fic anyway just so that it could exist. Also Love is a Wild Thing was an experiment- combining prompts from Gendrya week in August to make a single, cohesive post-canon fic. I actually like it better than my previous post-canon fics too, which might explain why I feel like I'm kind of done with Gendrya fandom? Check and Mate was my surprise hit- it's doing better than all my Gendrya fics combined, and since people were already following me for Gendrya content, it's kind of wild. It was one of those fics I wrote in a fever of inspiration like Smitten and Deep Tie Knot and I think it also gives that feeling of post-canon catharsis that people are looking for when they go trawling for fic? It also goes counter to a lot of (misogynistic) fandom assumptions, so it's gratifying that people seem to like it so much.

GIFsets- I think I've come pretty far in my skill at making these even over the past year. Even though I had no idea tumblr had changed the max size from 3MB to 10MB until my last set of the year I managed some pretty things! Biggest jump in quality was when I stopped skipping frames and just went with a shorter but smoother GIF- it might not be terribly noticeable to anybody but GIFmakers, but well. I'm one of those. LOL Got better at playing with brushes and transparency and layers this year too.

Proudest of these:
long story short x The Queen's Gambit (I hadn't done delayed subs for forever. Also included a Matrix reference that has whooshed over people's heads BUT IT'S FREAKING THERE. How perfect is this song for Beth's journey in TQG?!)
cowboy like me x Beth/Benny (TQG) (OK, I should have done another transition sequence back in the second GIF but I was so pleased I'd remembered how to do it at all that I plain forgot. THIS SONG FITS THEM PERFECTLY.)
asoiafnet underrated characters: Meera Reed (Time consuming to put two GIFs in one, but so pretty! Also brushes are fun and that last scene took so much coloring to not be dark, you have no idea)
asoiafnet underrated characters: Missandei of Naath (I don't know why the source on the first is so blurry even though it's 720px, but it's pretty despite that.)



I realized that I'd completely forgotten to link my holiday wishes list! If you have one and I've missed it, please link me too! :D Happy to send out green tea Pocky and washi tape etc.


Fannish plans for the next year: A Beth Harmon GIFset, finish An Exchange of Kings and a NYR fic for Yuletide (I defaulted on my PH. My first default ever but I just couldn't think story and didn't want to half ass it.) and as usual:




I'm sure we're all eager to put this year in the rearview- wishing you all a healthy and Happy New Year! (良いお年を）

I bet I have forgotten stuff but listing what I remember anyway!




Here's hoping the new year is just as productive, although I'd like to see some more endings that make sense and not HAHA YOU NEVER GUESSED THAT HUH as a driving force in the increasingly fewer studios feeding us all our media. Like didn't they learn their lesson from Lost a billion years ago? IDGI

So I watched the series finale of Reign without watching the final season and lollerskates I forgot about the random witchcraft SLs they bring in sometimes XDDDD What was even happening there- was it like An Indecent Proposal but with morning after regret stabbing? Also, was Catcisse a thing again? How come he didn't die in agony like Nostradamus predicted in S2?! Poop. And ahhhhhh I was not expecting that version of heaven for Mary, BUT I APPROVE. MY SHIPPER HEART. Made me want to rewatch S1, and I might just do while packing/cleaning/selling. As a series finale, it felt rushed and ??? Like, we got the fate of our Three Queens spelled out, but Mary's ladies, Catherine's children and Narcisse didn't get a conclusive ending, which was a bit sad. 


Also, I am excited about the apparent end of Always~ and Forever~ next week on The Originals! :D Which totally won't stick because they got another season, but still. :DDDDD I loved seeing Jackson again the previous ep too! And Hayley breaking things off with Elijah because who he really is freaked her TF out is AWESOME. I know all the shippers are crying foul, but I love that she gets to see their relationship and the effect it's had on her and Hope with utter clarity? She's bled and suffered to protect an unrepentant monster; put her child in harm's way. If she didn't want to examine those decisions after he attacked her, that would be totally fucked up. And yes, she's a killer too. This doesn't mean she doesn't get to say no, she doesn't want to be with him. (Yes, I know this applies to Davina and Kol too, and I think it would have been awesome to see Davina have the same FUCK NO reaction to him after he killed her. Because that's a natural knee jerk reaction to have? Although in her case, she was aware the Ancestors had cursed him to kill her, so her perspective going in was different too- Hayley expected the gallant lover version of him or the sophisticated family man at his true core.)


Speaking of shrieking knee jerk reactions, this week's iZombie looks hilarious! Can't wait!

I WAS SO FREAKING WORRIED! ABC made so many pilots (but didn't like very many of them, it seems) and the cancellation news stopped after a single show yesterday. TROLLS.

Receipts here at TVline and via twitter, with an explanation about the numbers at the former. Looks like DVR playback is also what helped save iZombie and The Originals!


SEASON 5 HELL YEAH! *dancing in my seat*

Fox cancelled Pitch. :((((  I am so bummed. I know it was really not what the typical Fox viewer wanted to tune in for, but DAMN. I wish critical acclaim had more affect than $$$. :((( I also wish they'd put it on a better night to start- there was no way it was ever going to hack it on Thursdays against the lineup on ABC and CBS.
There is no talk of it being picked up by another network or Netflix/Hulu/Amazon. (Yet.) MPG and Kylie Bunbury stayed out of the running during pilot season in the hopes that it would be renewed. 

space_swap  has been revealed! Honestly, hits/kudos are super low- not sure if it's because maythe4thbewithyou  is imminent too. I know I'm waiting on making a rec post until there are more fics up my alley to glean through.

It's Golden Week here, and the weather is cooperating so I'm going to go dig in the garden a bit instead of being all mad and sad here at the keyboard. 

From alittlehuntress 

Give me a TV series and I'll tell you:

1. My all-time ultimate fave character:
2. A character I didn't used to like but now do:
3. A character I used to like but now don't:
4. A character I'm indifferent about:
5. A character who deserved better:
6. A ship I've never been able to get into:
7. A ship I've never been able to get over:
8. A cute, low-key ship:
9. An unpopular ship but I still enjoyed it:
10. A ship that was totally wrong and never should have happened:
11. My favourite storyline/moment:
12. A storyline that never should have been written:
13. My first thoughts on the show:
14. My thoughts now:

Fandoms in the tags!