Different is beautiful. Dare to be different.

Kim Possible & Ron Stoppable from “Kim Possible”.

Me watching this show seriously suggest Artemis/Will as an option:

For years I asked, pleaded for a chance to own my work. Instead I was given an opportunity to sign back up to Big Machine Records and ‘earn’ one album back at a time, one for every new one I turned in. I walked away because I knew once I signed that contract, Scott Borchetta would sell the label, thereby selling me and my future. I had to make the excruciating choice to leave behind my past. Music I wrote on my bedroom floor and videos I dreamed up and paid for from the money I earned playing in bars, then clubs, then arenas, then stadiums. 

Some fun facts about today’s news: I learned about Scooter Braun’s purchase of my masters as it was announced to the world. All I could think about was the incessant, manipulative bullying I’ve received at his hands for years. 

Like when Kim Kardashian orchestrated an illegally recorded snippet of a phone call to be leaked and then Scooter got his two clients together to bully me online about it. (See photo) Or when his client, Kanye West, organized a revenge porn music video which strips my body naked. Now Scooter has stripped me of my life’s work, that I wasn’t given an opportunity to buy. Essentially, my musical legacy is about to lie in the hands of someone who tried to dismantle it.

This is my worst case scenario. This is what happens when you sign a deal at fifteen to someone for whom the term ‘loyalty’ is clearly just a contractual concept. And when that man says ‘Music has value’, he means its value is beholden to men who had no part in creating it. 

When I left my masters in Scott’s hands, I made peace with the fact that eventually he would sell them. Never in my worst nightmares did I imagine the buyer would be Scooter. Any time Scott Borchetta has heard the words ‘Scooter Braun’ escape my lips, it was when I was either crying or trying not to. He knew what he was doing; they both did. Controlling a woman who didn’t want to be associated with them. In perpetuity. That means forever. 

Thankfully, I am now signed to a label that believes I should own anything I create. Thankfully, I left my past in Scott’s hands and not my future. And hopefully, young artists or kids with musical dreams will read this and learn about how to better protect themselves in a negotiation. You deserve to own the art you make.

I will always be proud of my past work. But for a healthier option, Lover will be out August 23. 

Sad and grossed out,

💔

So I’ll start this by saying that if I’m wrong and they do die (one or the other or both), I will be totally devastated and feel slightly stupid. 

But something tells me that won’t happen. Why?

1) GRRM’s bittersweet Tolkien-like ending. If we’re to base our assumptions of the GoT/ASOIAF ending on the way LOTR ended, with Jon being Aragorn and Dany being (a much better and badass version of) Arwen, then clearly they can’t die. The end of LOTR you have Aragorn - a secret heir who wasn’t told about his heritage to protect him, sound familiar? - is crowned king and marries Arwen. They reign for quite some time together until their son becomes king when Aragorn is close to death. 

2) Harry Potter. No, of course there’s nothing to suggest D&D or GRRM take any queues from JKR but, it’s that same situation where you build up these characters for years and years and as writers they get attached and as viewers/readers we get attached and then you can’t kill them. GRRM said the series was about Jon/Dany so while in earlier books/seasons, other characters were built up (Ned, Rob, etc.) the story wasn’t about the others so they were expendable. It might have been shocking to us that they died but that’s just the way the books /show are written. If J&D were written as the center of the series, it wouldn’t surprise the audience that much if a secondary character were killed off. 

3) The Characters themselves. First Dany: Dany starts off in a pretty horrible position, a pawn for her brother to use in order to take back the throne he believes is his. Through her own cunning and determination, she rises up in the world and earns her place in it. But as much as Dany is a queen (breaker of chains, all that), she has two character motivations - of course the first is to be queen and break the wheel. But her other character motivation is to go home and have a family (even though she doesn’t think she is able have one). This is the house with the red door and lemon tree thing. She wants to live in peace. She already is a queen. But GRRM can’t kill her before she’s fulfilled that other thing that’s kept her motivated throughout her whole life. She won’t die in childbirth* (there would literally be riots). She has to find her house with the red door, and whether that’s the Red Keep or Winterfell or some other place with Jon and their children, she will get there.

Jon: Jon has grown up a bastard and believes he is not worthy of love and family because he doesn’t want to contribute to another child having to grow up with the surname Snow. But like Dany, he is realized as someone who has a good heart and could be a leader. Jeor Mormont asks him outside Craster’s Keep “You want to lead someday boy?” to which Jon nods. Everyone saying he doesn’t want to be a leader, doesn’t want to be king, etc. That’s not entirely true. He did want to become Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch and he did what needed to be done, despite the hate he got for it. And he became King in the North, rising to the ultimate leadership position in order to save his people. But also like Dany, Jon has a second motivation which is finding where he belongs in the world. He went to the Night’s Watch because he wasn’t a true born Stark. He left the Night’s Watch because he was killed for doing his duty. He fought to take back Winterfell and was crowned King in the North. But then gave up that position and bent the knee to Dany because he felt she would be a better ruler to his people than he could be. He’s still Warden of the North but he’s also still kind of drifting. Jon’s purpose to the story - bringing people together to fight the dead - has been fulfilled. But he still hasn’t quite figured out where he belongs. He can’t die without finding that first and finding his own home. 

*Quick logical note about the childbirth death and why it’s ridiculous - the timing doesn’t line up. Even if Dany is pregnant at the very beginning of the season, things will move very quickly as the Night King and army of the dead are beyond the wall. They’re not going to wait for her baby to be born. And obviously, her child has to be born otherwise it’s a completely useless plot that leads nowhere. So unless the dead take a really long time to get down south, she’ll likely give birth after the War for the Dawn at the end of 8x6 (or near it), so they wouldn’t just let her live that long only to kill her with ten minutes to spare of the episode.