ive been watching this series on netflix called echoes (spoilers next if you care to watch it) i wasnt super into it especially in the beginning bc the dialogue and exposition are pretty clunky and cliché but then this scene happened and i laughed out loud with delight and then was immediately like 'ohh thoschei au'

so this series is about two twin sisters who have made it a habit since childhood of pretending to be each other for long periods of time. it starts when they accidentally push their older sister off a tower and she gets hurt pretty bad. the one sister, leni, is like “you’ll get punished for this gina, but if we pretend to be each other, i can keep you safe” so they switch identities and live as each other for a bit.

they keep switching to get out of trouble throughout their childhood and they also share everything. they get in a fight once bc one of them (i think probably gina) had a secret and leni found out and was pissed. from then on she was like “we’ll keep this shared diary and we can have secrets from each other but not the diary”

they share a boyfriend until the boyfriend has sex with leni and gina feels like she should maybe get her own life independent from her sister. so she goes and gets a boyfriend. leni gets jealous and sets a fire in the church where gina and her boyfriend have sex once. the church burns down and leni does her old trick of “switch identities with me gina, then i can make sure you dont get in trouble for this” and she basically pins the arson on gina’s boyfriend who gets a bad reputation and has to leave town for a while. you get the idea of this whole switching thing.

the reason i think this scene where gina demonstrates how easy it is to switch works so well is because as an audience member you keep being kept on the back foot. the serie starts with us following who we think is gina. we get her pov. she lives in hollywood and goes home for the first time in a while to the country because her sister (”leni”) is missing. she goes home to try and help find her and finds all kinds of weird mysterious sketchy shit that “leni” has left for her. at the end of the first episode she finds a message from “leni” thats like, leni’s clothes on a doll thats left in some secret spot they both knew with a note that says “you get both lives. choose”. so “gina” is like “wtf leni??” and she goes home pretending to be Leni The Daughter Returned and she decides to play both gina and leni for a while to figure out where leni is and what shes doing.

but so at the end of that first episode where we THOUGHT we had been following GINA the entire time, “gina” decides to play both parts for a bit and in voiceover says “okay gina, i’ll go back to being leni for a bit”. so from the first episode youre made unsure of who youre watching. because leni had been living gina’s life for a year before returning home and going back to being leni. if youre more smart than my dad and i are then it’s probably super clear and easy to follow but for the first half of the series my dad and i kept asking each other “wait so this is leni?” “is this gina?” “is gina now pretending to be leni or is this leni pretending to be gina pretending to be leni?” etc

for the next couple episodes as we now realise we’re in leni’s pov not gina’s, we get to know gina as someone who seems to have been fucking up leni’s life from the inside. stealing a baby horse and some ketamine maybe, having an affair, letting out some horses from the stables, idk im not good with plot but some stuff like that gina has been stirring shit up and now shes missing. so leni is pretending to be both sisters for a while while she tries to get answers about what troublemaker gina was up to and what shes done to leni’s life.

but then at some point the a little past half the series i think, we switch to gina’s pov, we get to see what gina-pretending-to-be-leni for the past year has been doing, and our sympathies switch. instead of gina being the troublemaker we get the impression of gina just trying to wrestle herself free from her sister’s control. because as she says in the clip, theyve been switching lives every year on their birthday since the birth of leni’s daughter, who is like 12 now. leni got married to her high school sweetheart who they already shared back and gina is with someone in hollywood (her THERAPIST lets not get into it ghkgkjgj). so theyre sharing lives, sharing husbands, sharing a child, and nobody knows about this except the two of them (and turns out later the therapist husband too, he went along with it. this whole situation is fucking great)

in the last episode and their house burns down and leni tries to keep gina from escaping the burning house, fails to do so, and then chases gina into the woods. leni is like “nobody understands, why dont you understand i love you more than anything” shes chasing her sister through the woods yelling “I LOVE YOU SO MUCH COME BACK TO ME” it’s Good Shit. leni is like “come home” and gina says “i have no home” and leni goes “IM your home”. GOOD SHIT.

gina tries to get away by crossing a river over a waterfall and leni tries to drown her, they struggle, some family secrets and misunderstandings are brought to light and leni always tried to protect gina from everything etc etc “i had to take care of us. i always take care of us. just come back to me so we can be together” and gina says no and jumps off the waterfall. leni then goes to find gina’s husband charlie and i wish i could put the scene in here but i cant so heres a transcript:

CHARLIE: What happened? LENI: Didn’t the sheriff find you? CHARLIE: She did. THey think it was a suicide. I don’t believe that. LENI: I tried to stop her. CHARLIE: She went over the falls. LENI: Yes. CHARLIE: Why? What did you do? LENI: I didn’t push her! Jesus! CHARLIE: That’s not what I meant. I just want to know what happened. LENI: I followed her into the forest. I told her how much I loved her. It didn’t matter. There was something so broken inside her that no amount of love could heal. CHARLIE: I know there’s a deep hurt in both of you. LENI: You knew. All these years. Why didn’t you say anything? CHARLIE: I thought I was doing the right thing. Being present. Accepting, loving you. LENI: Watching, judging, playing along. CHARLIE: Was it play, for you, Leni? Because it wasn’t for me. It was a life. LENI: Two lives. CHARLIE: Yes. LENI: And now? CHARLIE: Do you think she’s dead? LENI: I don’t know. I thought I’d know. Wouldn’t I know? CHARLIE: You know there’s two images I can’t get rid of. The first one is her body. On the shore of the rvier somewhere in the darkness. Waiting. THe second one is she’s on a bus. Or a plane or something. And she’s happy. But in both cases, I can’t talk to her. I can’t touch her. I can’t hear the sound of her voice. She’s just gone. WIthout a goodbye or any kind of resolution. It’s unfinished. You are her. And not her. LENI: I’m so sorry Charlie. CHARLIE: (he holds her face like hes gonna kiss her) I never judged. I watched, I went along, but I never judged. And I loved both of you. LENI: I love you too. (he doesnt kiss her and leaves)

then at the end of the episode, after a scene in which leni leaves the country with a fake passport and gets told by the airport employee “hey werent you here a few days ago too?” and she goes all “uh no? someone who looked exactly like me? how funny. nope wasnt me :) but out of curiosity where did she go?” after all that theres a scene where charlie reads from the book hes written about leni and gina in a bookstore and someone in a hat and glasses in the back asks him whether gina’s body was ever found. then he goes home and theres someone there and THAT scene goes like this:

CHARLIE: You know it felt silly sometimes, not changing the locks. Like I was holding out too much hope. Not being realistic. GENA??: That doesn’t sound like you. CHARLIE: Well this changed me. Probably for the better. GENA: Thats nice to hear. CHARLIE: You prefer a twist if I remember correctly. GENA: That’s right. CHARLIE: I did think the hat and glasses were a bit much though. GENA: Hat and glasses? CHARLIE: Yes, at the reading, just now? That was you right? Asking the first question? GENA: No? I’ve been waiting here tonight for over an hour. CHARLIE: Hmm... GENA: Hmm ;) CHARLIE: I’ll find out, you know, which one you are. GENA: Maybe. Maybe even I don’t know any more.

That would be pretty creepy if you just saw yourself.

Walking ahead of you, making your friends believe it's you. And this other version of yourself would have a darker streak. And you can't do anything but watch as this darker version takes over your life. And scariest thing would be if your loved ones loved this dark doppelganger, and the real you is just hiding longer and giving up in chains. Because it seems like everyone else is happier with the false you in the first place.

When really, your friends actually love the real you, for you. It's just hard to find sometimes, but they don't know that. They don't know about the curses or the night or the spells going on in the background, but they will love the real, pure you that's just trapped in that.

What I learned recently though is that you shouldn't mistaken not knowing with not caring.

When the prince of Swan Lake made that vow of everlasting love to the black swan, he seriously meant to break the spell. In his heart, the vow was for the one he truly loved from the start. The love was still strong and pure - it just may have come out wrong.

Maybe when good friends seem to love the-you-that's-not-really-you, it's not that they want you to stay that way, in your shell or pretending to be something else. Perhaps you shouldn't be afraid that if you confess something or change that they'll desert you. It could be just that they love you regardless, the core soul of you that's underneath all this, going through the spells.   

That, and the spells don't define you. They can alter you, change your life, force you to adapt, turn you to new directions. But the fair maiden was still underneath all that sorcery and she still existed despite the false, black swan that seemed to take her place.