#iz rambles

Your partner since you were young goes on a mission to save your dying planet and doesn’t return as expected. He is assumed lost in space, and everyday things get more dire on the surface. You miss him terribly. And then one day, an ALIEN SPACECRAFT shows up with not only the solution to your dying planet but also your partner.

And you’re probably thrilled but also thrown for a loop because what do you mean 1. Aliens are real 2. They breathe highly flammable gas and 3. Your partner made friends with it. And said alien looks like nothing you’ve ever heard, and has a sense you don’t have at all and is also apparently dying of nutritional loss? And your partner is like codependent as hell with it, and suddenly your entire life changes overnight. Also your partner is himself but also completely different in ways you don’t understand, in ways that are sometimes scary because all that time in space changes a person.

I don’t know how anyone would react to that, cus damn that’s overwhelming, but I think that’s an interesting dynamic to have with an alien. Your partner’s closet companion besides you is an alien. It feels like the alien knows your partner better than you do some days. The alien also helped save your entire planet.

Gale: A completely accurate and detailed lecture regarding the theories of teleportation magic, how it works, and the differences between it and plane shift. There are multiple charts and graphs.

Wyll: “Choosing your hero name: an adventurer’s guide” He does have suggestions for the entire party.

Karlach: “Ranking bars in the gate based on how much they remind me of Avernus.” She has provided illustrations that she made herself. Anything in the Upper City is ranked “like Avernus” because “occupied entirely by pricks.”

Shadowheart: “So I was wrong about Shar: a reluctant apology.” It’s mostly a debunk of Shar’s lies but the entire time it does look like she is pulling teeth. However, she cheers up considerably when she presents on some of the church’s secrets, including the weird ass code names for things that she always thought were a little silly.

Lae’zel: a very educational and complete history of her people’s war against the mind flayers. It’s all rather academic until the last slide which says “AND THIS IS WHY WE DON’T EAT THE WORMS” in all caps.

Astarion: “Ranking you by whose blood I’d want to drink most.” In order, it is as follows Gale (rancid), Karlach (spicy), Minthara (probably is poisonous after all the poison she’s been exposed to), Jaheria (that story about what she did to one of the spawn was memorable), Shadowheart (does cleric blood taste radiant?), Lae’zel (curious how Gith taste, doesn’t want to die), Minsc (large and has extra blood to spare), Halsin (can turn into a bear, think of all that real estate), Wyll (canon verified snack)

Halsin: “Foraging: what’s edible and what isn’t” Gale takes very dutiful notes given someone gave him a mushroom two ten days ago that gave the entire camp food poisoning. Astarion, the only one who did not get food poisoning, who has completely forgotten what he foraged was the culprit, takes 0 notes.

Minthara: Battle orders and tactics. All of these fools need to get whipped into shape.

Jaheria: “Get it Fucking Together: Stop Doing this Shit.” What follows is a callout of everyone’s worst habits and decisions. One slide just says “stop snitching.”

the way the house fandom minimises chase to his controversies but glorifies characters like wilson is genuinely one of the most infuriating things ever.

don’t get me wrong, i love wilson… but he is a serial cheater and he enables houses awful actions at every turn. yet, the fandom seemingly don’t care.

is chase perfect? no, and i’ll never seriously say he is. if i do, i’m joking.

no matter what you’re talking about when it comes to chase, wether it’s his relationship with another character or something entirely unrelated the only thing members of the fandom have to say are: “he killed a dictator”, “he hates fat kids”, “he kissed a 9 year old”, are those things bad?… yes. But why are we minimising him to just those things.?

why not talk about him becoming house and all of their parallels? why not talk about his religious guilt that controls the way he acts throughout the WHOLE show or his alcoholic abusive mother. why not even talk about or attempt to analyse how raising his baby sister who later became an alcoholic may have effected him.

is he an angel? no way. nobody in the show is, but minimising him into a controversial meme to he hated on is so strange.

he was always the protector friend. he was the one who immediately tried to stand up to Mr Perry when Neil was dragged out of the theatre, he was the first one to stand up when Mr Keating wanted them to stand on the desk. He was the leader, the protector, the one to tell the rest it was okay to do something.

He took this self assigned role very seriously and felt like he failed when Neil died. He failed to protect Neil from his father and from himself and so he died.

He saw Cameron as a scapegoat for his failure, he felt that if he was gone, he couldn't fail anymore.

Todd knew this. Todd became the leader. He stood on the desk to stand in solidarity with Mr Keating because he knew Charlie would've done it.

- Ethan’s ‘oh, god’ before he cuts himself free from his parachute on top of the royal palace and falls another thirty feet or so. Ethan Hunt is always having a Bad Time

- ‘hope is not a strategy’ ‘you must be new’

- Walker figuring out in the van that Ethan caught Lane; given that Walker is Lark and this whole plan is to frame Ethan, it’s likely a very good show of acting (and a nice little insight to what knowledge the average cia agent does and does not have - the IMF is Halloween and they have no idea what the ghosts are capable of)

- it’s dark but how quickly Ethan kills four of alanna’s men; Ethan as we typically see him is not killer, not like that, but they go to shoot the police officer and his response to them crossing that line is brutal. we don’t always see this Ethan this late on in the franchise

- the introduction of the gay professor outfits for Benji. I miss the guy who had fun outfits but it feels right for how on edge Benji seems at the start and the toll London definitely took on him. it’s also some great groundwork for the acting on Benji’s part for how they fool Walker. the layers.

- the framing of Ethan and Ilsa in Paris, the way he knows she’s following him after his second meeting with Alanna, the way they move under the trees, it’s gorgeous cinema and they’re in sync

- and their scene together; I’d almost been expecting retribution for him springing lane, running her over but they’re 100% on the same page. any tension soon bleeds away the second they’re actually face to face and he has nothing to be sorry for despite the fact that he literally hit her with a car

- Luther chipping Ethan. amazing moment no notes. sooo dog-coded.

- ‘I’m jumping out of a window’ this entire scene. shout out to the woman who nods at Ethan when he needs reassurance. it’s a blink and you’ll miss it moment but. i love that woman (and i love the fic on ao3 about her. it’s late rn but if i remember i will link back to it tomorrow)

- Luther has a Speech about Ethan. (lutherethan bestieism ftw)

- JULIA. Julia. The forehead kiss ‘I’m so sorry’ moment. ugh.

- Benji thinking about shooting open something that could be housing a nuclear bomb

- no one thinking Ethan should be in a helicopter

Which is a wild concept at first glance, because Gabriel is presented to us as the “black sheep” of the family. He’s the one who is different than Michael, Lucifer and Raphael. But once we learn Chuck is God that entire arguement falls apart. Because while Gabriel THINKS he’s nothing like his Dad, they actually turn out to have the most in common.

-they both ran away from their problems and took on an entire new identity to get away with it. Gabriel went for Loki’s job and Chuck went for a human role.

-Despite running away, they can’t help but interfere with their past lives: Chuck turns himself into a prophet of a story he wrote, Gabriel messes with his Father’s favorite mortals.

-They love and hate their siblings, something that causes them great frustration. The loathing and love makes them conflicted.

-Storytelling is what they do: Chuck is obvious but Gabriel enjoys narratives himself, stealing from the tabloids, using television shows and constructing elaborate sets. While Gabriel is never coded as a writer like Chuck is, he is a creator in his own right but in a temporary basis. We don’t see Lucifer, Michael or Raphael ever make anything like Gabriel does.

-They have a cruel sense of humor: see Chuck and Miracle and Mystery Spot.

-And they’re sense of Pride hides a lot of insecurity and regret. They doubt themselves and hide that behind bravado (for Gabriel) and a sense of showmanship (Chuck in the last season)

I find this so interesting because the show never mentions it. Dropped themes are par for the course for Supernatural, but one they actually do touch on a lot is toxic cycles in families (Dean echoing John’s closed off emotional repression, Sam coping with John’s one minded focus for revenge, Lucifer and Michael stuck in the familial roles they were cast as for all eternity). But while Gabriel’s relationship with his brother’s is talked about, we never get into Chuck. Which is wild in season 13; when he could have learned that not only was his father around and watching this mess, but he did so in a persona that is so like Gabriel’s.

And that’s a shame, because Gabriel’s arc in season 13 is about breaking that cycle of running away. It could have landed so much stronger if the show confronted Gabriel with the fact his “odd one out” routine was bullshit, that in reality, he was acting EXACTLY like his dear old Dad. I think it would have made his change of heart land a bit more, and more importantly, set up Chuck to return as a villian later on. Because Gabriel changes but Chuck? He keeps running.