i'm starting to think that part of the reason the pacing of season 3 feels so strange is because of how hyperaware the writers' room is of its own audience. like to me it seems like, in writing this season, they didn't take the time within the script to unpack certain events or explore certain implications or let certain things breathe because they knew that the fan base would do a lot of the unpacking/exploring/breathing for them.
and on one hand i think encouraging fandom discussion & transformative works is an interesting and possibly effective workaround for the curse of a <10-episode season. at the same time, another workaround would be to not try adapting several of the most lore- and plot-heavy books in a series into one <10-episode season, when adapting the first book took you twice that time. like yes TVL needed a 23-episode season that it was never going to get in the current tv industry but i'm not 100% sure that giving your fan base a podcast and unleashing them upon twitter/ao3 is the best solution.


















