#....whoops

“Spiders... Put me.. down or they’ll.. catch us before.. we reach the Halls...” Years of fighting sleep and his own stubbornness, along with a ingrained sense of alertness kept the Esteldin commander on the edge of consciousness. Hal didn’t fault his two kinsmen for pausing momentarily at the request since his injuries prevented him from escaping if necessary. Pain shot through him when he was leant against a tree and darkness threatened his vision yet he remained standing.

Given the lack of colour in Hal’s features and the wavering on his feet, both of the other Rangers knew they couldn’t afford to waste time for long. “You know this forest better then I do, Strider. Go and get help. I’ll remain with Hal.” ‘A Ranger always keeps their calm no matter what happens.’ It was a saying that Saeradan had become familiar with in training and one that ran through his head during situations like these.

“I’m not leav-” The piercingly sharp glare from his second in command shut him up in seconds. Aragorn vanished into the trees, while the other two covered his back.  He didn’t want to leave his Rangers but Hal hadn’t give him much choice. His footsteps slowed as slate grey eyes scanned his surroundings and realised that he was nearly at the entrance to Thranduil’s Halls. 

Time wasn’t on their side though and he just hoped that the older Rangers, would still standing when he returned. Hopefully with assistance, although the Dúnedain Chieftain knew it would be far more likely that a patrol would find Saeradan and Hal first. A fact which became clearer when one of the guards told him that Prince Legolas was out in the forest with one of the patrols.

~

mostly, i want them to please slow down the pacing. let story arcs breathe and build and develop. last season was so rushed—ryan’s death and rigo’s death and pruitt’s death all crammed in, andy and sullivan having a shotgun wedding out of nowhere, maya and carina fastforwarding to i love yous with only 30 second scenes and not a real date to be seen, vic hardly getting to process ripley—i could go on. it’s cheap and messy storytelling. cut it out. 

i also really want them to let relationships do the same. i want to see the friendships that were so strained last season to grow again. show me andy, maya, and vic being friends and supporting each other!! for the love of god!! (show me andy and maya being friends, period. for the whole season. the whole goddamn season. no drama between them, only supporting each other through outside drama. if i have to see another season where these ‘best friends’ are at each other’s throats half the time, i swear to god.) 

show me more team-as-family! a) i eat that shit up, and b) that’s supposed to be the underlying theme and premise of the show. show them laughing and goofing off together, show them holding each other up when things get tough, show them teasing each other to hell and back while they cook together in the beanery. invest in that again.

for the romances....develop that shit. honestly, i really hope andy and sullivan either break up or really do the fucking work to fix their relationship, because as-is, it’s a hot mess. and not a hot mess i particularly care to watch. i liked them fine in season 2, but the sullivan arc in s3 (which...not to out myself as having watched chicago fire, but which is a blatant rip-off of severide’s s1 arc in cf) puts him in a place where he’s not really ready for a relationship. and with the amount of shit they put andy through, she’s not, either. i know it’s impossible on a drama, but i would really like andy to be single this season? idk, i’m tired.

maya and carina better not be all sunshine and rainbows. they need to do the work! they need to show the work! after that rushed-ass ‘forgive me’ scene (where carina was...pressured into forgiving maya like the day after she cheated on her??? and that was framed as a good thing?? make it make sense), they deserve to show them actually navigating that broken trust and rebuilding something real. and as someone who doesn’t watch grey’s, i really don’t know carina very well? 90% of her scenes were her supporting maya through her ongoing breakdown (though a  totally understandable breakdown! not criticizing maya for having trauma), so i’d like to see more of a balance of support in the relationship and more development of her as an individual apart from maya. she’ll be sticking around, and that will be much more interesting if she bonds with other members of the team.

dean and vic...look, my hands-down #1 wish for season 4 is that they treat vic hughes well, with respect, with screentime, and with a good arc. she’s the absolute best. and as much as i love dean miller (hint: a lot), he needs to start guzzling his respecting vic juice if the writers are gonna try to set up anything. personally, i’d really like to see them move past it? awkward crushes between friends happen. putting myself in dean’s shoes, living with one of my best friends who i’m also secretly crushing on, watching her play with my baby...it’d be a lot too!! but that doesn’t excuse being a dick, so i’d really like to see them take some time apart, and then start their friendship back up on a foundation of honesty and communication. because they’re so good, guys.

individual character notes!!!

well. i want every person at this goddamn station to go to therapy. they won’t, but i want them to.

andy needs to go to serious grief counseling after season 3. compounded by what’s bound to be a shitstorm from the discovery that her mother is alive? please. in regards to the whole mother arc, i really don’t want it her disappearance to have been like...gang-related. i’ve seen that posited as a theory, and that’s just a whole bundle of stereotypes we don’t need to get into. i also want the mom reveal to be the main revelation that takes up the majority of her arc the first half of the season, just to have time to process it. the captain’s race took up all of season 1—you can give this twist time to marinate properly.  

vic hughes, my moon, my stars! i really loved the snippets of vic’s backstory that they gave us in s3. as someone who lost a family member to early-onset alzheimer’s in november, 3x09 was...oof. a lot. i love how they committed to fleshing out her past and her backstory more and i love the emotional depth barrett doss always brings to the screen. for season 4, i’d love to see vic get to process ripley and jackson properly. (and here i repeat my forever adage for female characters lol: let them be single for a hot sec.) i want her to move in with maya, because i think that dynamic is so fun and ripe for exploration, and then i’d love to see her digging in to her issues and getting help—going back to the firefighter group, actually talking, spending time with her found family. (sidenote: would love to see her help out with some like youth community theatre classes on her days off? developing connections with kids who have gone through losses, supporting them and in turn realizing the support she needs herself...tell me vic singing with kids wouldn’t be the cutest shit). anyway, i just rly want her to get a good storyline. but i’m not a screenwriter so like...hope they come up with one!

i’ve already written much more than i’m sure you wanted, so i’m going to condense the boys into one paragraph lol. i want jack gibson to heal himself and stop sleeping with taken women! his new found family is super sweet, so i really hope he gets to keep it throughout s4. i want travis montgomery to get only good and happy things, and the same goes for warren. actually, i’d love to see warren step into his new role as team Older Person a bit more? i think that would be a really fun and heartwarming dynamic to play with all the other characters. dean i think i already touched on, but i’d love him to take a breath, apologize to vic and explain, and lean on the rest of his found family. he’s gonna be such a good dad and i’m excited to see more of that.

finally: maya. oh, maya. she needs therapy. you can’t have a character say she’s been dealing with suicidal ideation and anxiety for nearly 20 years and just...magically make it all better. she deserves to get to unpack all the shit with her dad, and all the ways that’s impacted her. on some level, i kinda wish she’d not stayed as captain—i love her scenes so much when she’s allowed to be just chilling on the same level as her team. since that’s not the case, finding a right balance of her as captain and her as friend is gonna be super important. i want her to open up to her friends and lean on them. i’d love for mason to come back, too? i think her trying to heal herself, establish herself as a team member and leader, and rebuild her relationships with her brother as well as her found family and girlfriend would be more than enough material for an arc. it won’t always go great! this stuff isn’t an easy fix! but that’s why it’d be worth writing. plus, so many members of the team have shitty relationships with their parents that even though they won’t understand what maya went through, there’s some really fertile ground for compassion and cathartic ‘fuck our dads’ ball-busting i’d love to see seeded. bonus father’s day episode where literally none of them are happy and they decide to like...go play laser tag or something.