Life is better in a Fandom

The child naively believes that everything should be fair and everyone should be honest, that only good should prevail, that everybody should have what they want and there should be no pain or sadness. The child believes the world should be perfect and is outraged to discover it is not.

And the child is right.”

bucky: steve, there was no other guy. you jumped out of a plane without a parachute.

Fanfic Authors:

“Did you have a good time?”

Bucky loosens his tie and thinks about his answer, “I didn’t hate it,” he decides. 

Steve holds out a hand and Bucky gives him the unknotted tie, and then the suit jacket when Steve keeps waiting. “Thanks,” he exhales, plopping on the bed. 

Steve meanwhile, hangs up their coats and ties and pauses to unbutton his vest to finish his set. Bucky didn’t wear one; one piece less from suffocating which he was grateful for. 

“I didn’t see you much,” Steve comments idly, padding over in his fluffy bunny slippers. Bucky straightens up from pulling off his socks and grins at him. “You were busy being Captain America,” he grabs him by his hips and pulls him in. 

Sitting down while Steve stands, makes Bucky crane his neck to look up, and he does; propping his chin over the hard plane of Steve’s stomach and he asks, “Did you have a good time?”

Steve shrugs, fingers reaching to run through Bucky’s hair and he tugs gently at the hair tie keeping his hair up in a bun until it lets loose. Then he cards through the locks, pushing the strands back from Bucky’s face. “I didn’t hate it,” he parrots Bucky.

Something about the way Steve looks; still clad in a white dress shirt and a snug pair of pants, bare feet in a pair of white indoor slippers with his hair coiffed alluringly. Still the process of stripping out of the outlandish fancy mask he put on for the public, makes Bucky want to help him complete the process. Help him strip.

Except he also feels bad that Steve didn’t quite enjoy the day, and he wants to fix that. Which prompts an idea, and he leans back a little, grabbing Stevie’s hips tighter and he says, “Dance with me.”

He doesn’t let Steve say no, doesn’t give him the chance to run away either. He catches his hands while Steve’s still poleaxed trying to think and puts them over his shoulders. Then he catches Steve by his waist, his eyes coming up to Steve’s lips and there’s a brief memory that flashes a time when Bucky easily towered him.

He shoves that away instead and pulls Steve in; chest to chest and he sways. 

“C’mon,” he murmurs, flashing his best smile, “Sway with me, Stevie.”

He does. Albeit a little stiff, Steve does, and Bucky loves him for it. “I’m gonna step on your toes and break them,” he grumps, red ears and red cheeks and Bucky kisses the corner of his mouth softly.

“I don’t mind,” he smiles, “You can break em all. They’ll heal by the morning and I’ll let you do it again.”

Steve ducks his head, forehead planting on Bucky’s shoulder and he mumbles something too hard to catch. Bucky holds him there, one hand still around his waist and he keeps swaying them both to a soundless tune. 

Elsewhere it’s song and dance, drink and drugs, important elements of any music biopic, especially Elton John’s. Through these scenes, Egerton’s steely, soulful performance — especially when he’s in a haze of pills at an extravagant mansion party — captures the frustration, longing and despair in Elton John’s soul, as well as his ability to light up on cue when he needs to be in rock star mode. The easy thing to do is hone an impression, but Egerton digs in deeper and finds the man inside the costume. Adam Graham, The Detroit News

It helps that Egerton so masterfully rises to the challenge of inhabiting the role in ways that go beyond a certain more-than-passing physical resemblance to the man (although that clearly doesn’t hurt) or the fact that he does his own singing and handles the choreography with ease. He’s got his mannerisms down and really throws himself into the more flamboyant side of John’s onstage persona. But perhaps more to the point, he conveys the emotional essence of the moment, whether that calls more for petulant pouting and throwing of fits or something far more devastating. Ed Masley, Arizona Central

Egerton, with what can only be called flamboyant understatement — and also, I suppose, understated flamboyance — in effect plays both the Lady Gaga and the Bradley Cooper parts in a fresh iteration of “A Star Is Born.” His Elton is the hard-living road warrior and the preternaturally gifted ingénue, the sacrificial hero and the plucky survivor, the rock god and the camp icon. The actor delivers a tour de force of self-effacement, a bravura demonstration of borrowed charisma. A.O. Scott, New York Times

If Rami Malek’s Freddie Mercury was good enough for an Academy Award, then Egerton might as well get an Oscar and a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony. He deftly handles Elton’s roller-coaster feelings, flipping from seething fury to wide-eyed happiness when he walks on a stage. And there are no lip-synced notes here: Egerton not only sings all of John’s most famous tunes but also makes them his own, at least for two hours. Brian Truitt, USA Today

But it’s Taron Egerton as Elton John who carries and sells the film — often backwards and in platform heels. Wild as it may sound to approach such a mercurial and marvelous character with beautiful restraint, Egerton’s performance is meticulously calibrated — the vulnerability, the playfulness, the towering ego of the genius and the agony of the moments when his lifelong battles with rejection and shame get the better of him, it’s all there. Erin Keane, Salon

“Ah sorry, man. Gets me every time.”

And the security guy is just staring and gulping nervously because he knows that this is the fucking Winter Soldier. “Of course. No worries. Step right on through,” the security officer waves Bucky forward, too scared to attempt a pat down on him.

As they’re walking away, Sam gives Bucky a suspicious side eye, “I thought T’challa said vibranium couldn’t be detected by normal metal detectors.”

Bucky just shrugs innocently back, “Do I look like I know anything about how this technology stuff works?” It’s one of his favorite cards to play. Sam knows it’s bullshit.

However, when these two inevitably find themselves in deep shit, because trouble is always following after them like a stray dog after a hotdog cart, Sam is almost relieved when Bucky starts pulling out all sorts of things. Guns, knives, even a couple grandes (that Sam isn’t sure he even wants to know where those had been stashed).

In the end, the bad guys are defeated and the two of them aren’t dead, so if Bucky wants to keep all of his stash of knives why should Sam tell him no?

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