Post-ep c3e25
It's so great getting back to the Bells Hells! (This is not a knock on any of the wonderful things we've seen over the past month, but oh man I'd forgotten how much I missed these losers.)
Thoughts:
--Fearne's parents! Oh shit!!!
--No really, oh shit, because this is Fearne's quest. This is Fearne's quest and she's getting it answered in episode fucking 25 and that is absolutely impossible unless it's about to go south for her in a complicated fashion. (God, how much does 'my grandma told me that they had to leave because they were doing Something Very Important' sound like a little girl very seriously and sincerely explaining about the farm upstate that her parents told her about where the old dogs live? How much does it sound like a line? How much does it sound like Ashley knows or at least suspects it's a line, and Fearne has no idea?)
--(What I'm saying is, did Fearne's parents fuck off because fae have no sense of time and they specifically had no sense of commitment, and they're delighted to hear that Fearne exists now that they're hearing from her but they'd otherwise sort of forgotten about her for a hundred years while grandmama told fairy stories? Because that feels like the next step.)
--Side thought: obviously D&D characters so rarely have living parents, but between Fearne and Imogen we've got a trend of missing parents who left for unknown reasons that may or may not have been good at the time and then stayed mysteriously gone. It doesn't seem like anyone else falls into that category in the party so far? But it's a cool parallel that I'll be keeping an eye on as we find out more about the Calloways OR Imogen's mom.
--Ok yep time to have feelings about Imogen and Laudna and their beautiful mess, let's gooooo
--It's such a perfect storm of conflicting personal issues, is the thing, and it's not even JUST Imogen and Laudna, it's both of them spiraling out through who did they actually pick to talk to and how are they writing their own narrative about this disagreement in ways that keep folding back on themselves, right, because
--The actual reality of the situation is that Laudna felt a protective and inquisitive urge which seemed natural and normal to her, chose to give into it without further interrogating where that impulse came from, and then experienced a loss of bodily autonomy which led to something very important to Imogen getting broken. Since I have less than no desire for fandom's umpteenth round of Who's In The Wrong (and fuck Bowlgate), I'm much less interested in making declarations about how the argument Should Be Framed, and rather more interested in looking at how it is framed, and what that means for the characters involved. Because right now, both Imogen and Laudna are framing it as Laudna's fault, and nobody around them is actually questioning that, and that is not the only way this could have gone. And that's interesting.
--For Laudna, it makes perfect sense. She feels responsible, because Delilah Briarwood is an abuser who makes her bad shit somebody else's fault and Delilah Briarwood's been living in Laudna's head for decades. She feels responsible because Imogen is upset with her, and Imogen is the one person in Laudna's life, up until very recently, who believed anything good about her ever. Laudna is a people-pleaser, and we're starting to see some of the complicated ways that interacts with her whole everything, because it's not just that she's cheerfully oblivious to how people are afraid of her. It's that, with a few people -- with Imogen especially! -- on her side, she is cheerful enough by nature and by self-preserving design that she doesn't worry about the rest of the world. But that means that so much of her self-worth rests on Imogen's shoulders, and now that that relationship's been challenged, Laudna takes all of that blame onto herself.
--And it makes so much sense for Imogen, too, who's going through a whole slew of things that are and aren't about Laudna at all. She's cracking under ten kinds of pressure, and she was doing so well before this incident. Tonight we saw her not just mad at Laudna, but defensive as well as jealous. She said herself that she's not ready yet to admit that maybe it's good that the rock broke. She's also not ready to admit that maybe holding Laudna fully responsible for everything Delilah Briarwood does through her is a little unfair, or to deal with the thought that Laudna also suffered a violation and a loss in that moment. Which, good on Imogen for knowing what she isn't ready to deal with! Imogen has so much shit going on right now! Sleeplessness and tension and stress and also that damn rock all pushed her together towards cruelty, which because she's a decent person added layers of guilt, which added to the stress, which just keeps pushing and compiling. She wrecked the competing mercenaries in the museum and loved her horse and was full of compassion for a massive desert octopus. She'd rather talk to a massive desert octopus or cross half a city and buy a ring by herself without the rest of her party because she can't always handle being at the center of their mess. She is still having horrifying nightmares of her own death! She still doesn't know what's wrong with her! Being Imogen presumably really sucks right now, in that depressive episode way where she's protectively self-isolating and doesn't necessarily have the energy at hand to be fair about other points of view and other people's pain, because she's too swamped with her own. So yeah, defensively blaming it on Laudna, even as she admits that maybe losing the rock wasn't all bad, even as she stews in jealousy because she wants Laudna back so desperately -- of course it makes sense.
--But! Orym and Ashton and FCG! Their reactions are really meaningful too, and like all good reactions, say way more about the characters having them than about the situation at hand!
--FCG is Being Helpful, but tonight I think I really put my finger on something essential to him, which is that FCG does not understand the concept of an unreliable narrator. He is immediately 100% on board with helping and supporting Laudna. He also doesn't for one second question Laudna's assertion that she fucked up, that she's entirely at fault. In the words of some recent 4-Sided Dive or another, it's the undergrad freshmen psych major response; he takes Laudna entirely at her word, because he doesn't really understand the idea that somebody could absolutely be sure they're telling the truth about themself and their own experiences, and still be wrong. He doesn't have the context to ask the questions about, 'hey, why might Laudna be predisposed to take on more guilt and responsibility for things than is entirely her share?' He's aware enough to know that whatever is going on, it's going to have to be Laudna and Imogen who handle it, but he wants to fix things, and Laudna has offered him something to fix: she fucked up, she broke things, and now she wants to apologize.
--Orym is actively being a good friend here, which is great. He notices that Imogen and Laudna are off, and he asks Imogen about it. He notably doesn't try to fix things, but willingly listens, and encourages Imogen to let it out as she needs to. He assigns no blame, on either side, while making it clear that he's there to support Imogen as her friend. The fact that he doesn't take the opportunity to go, "hey, maybe Laudna didn't actually do what you think she did!" is the completely reasonable and correct choice. Orym isn't here to Fix This Relationship, he's here to support Imogen who is, again, having a godawful time of things right now and currently doesn't even have Laudna's support in it all. He's not taking sides in an argument, but he is firmly situating himself in Imogen's corner, as a person she can rely on, when she feels she has far too few of those in the world.
(--And there's something to it, the dynamic where your own mental health issues are such a mess that, when something goes wrong with your oldest/closest friend, you turn to a new friend instead because that relationship is too new to have all that impossible weight, because you haven't fucked that one up yet, because it's still shiny and not full of flaws yet, and maybe you'll do better this time, maybe you'll get luckier. It's a complicated sort of emotional moment, and very real, and that's without even glancing at the oblique tangle of romantic undertones that may or may not exist.)
--And Ashton! Ashton who's checking in partially because, for all he scoffed at it, he's honestly been working really hard at the whole I Guess I'm Sort Of A Leader Now thing, if only because he's the crew's local guide while they're in Basuras. There's a weird interpersonal thing! He should check in! And then of course Laudna collapses into sobs, which is very much not what he was expecting and oh boy now he's in way over his head whoops. Ashton also doesn't really question the way Laudna's presenting the situation, aside from the incredibly pertinent, "Does she know it was an accident?", and what's interesting is he does it for almost the opposite reasons as FCG. FCG doesn't ask because he assumes Laudna's relaying things accurately and he thinks he can help fix it. Ashton doesn't ask because he's real clear on, oh boy, Laudna is not particularly coherent on anything right now, she is probably not thinking at all straight, and I 100% cannot fix this so I do not even want to touch it. Laudna is, Ashton will maintain, a grown-ass adult, albeit a somewhat dead one. If she's claiming responsibility for a fuckup, he's not going to argue with her about it. He's not her therapist. He pushes back against some of her wilder self-flagellating plans, and tries to nudge towards a more situation-appropriate apology that actually addresses what she did wrong -- and maybe there's some subtle hinting in there about, hey, Laudna, pay attention to the reality of what you actually did wrong. He lets himself be used as a handkerchief for goo. In a lot of ways, he's doing the same thing Orym did, being a support post and a listening ear for a friend who needs one, without trying to pry or fix; it's just a somewhat wetter job from this side. Honestly, I think watching the Laudna-Ashton interaction was my favorite conversation of all three, because Ashton is so clearly still walking the line where he tells himself that, no, of course he doesn't love these people, are you an idiot? They're his coworkers and maybe, sigh, friends or something, he guesses. But meanwhile he's letting a zombie lady ooze black tears all over his shirt and telling her it's fine and not even getting annoyed about things, and being nice about it all, because what, is he going to be mean? THAT'S not very punk. But Ashton doesn't push too hard against the 'it's all Laudna's fault' narrative because that's not who he is either. It doesn't seem at all like a useful argument to have, and also they've got to deal with an armed military fort and a missing quokka and seriously he was just trying to make thirty seconds of conversation how did he end up in this mess.
--It's going to be SO INTERESTING to see where it all goes, and I love the impact Dusk is adding to the story! I love that Laudna is so bereft over Imogen that she hasn't even noticed them outside of group shenanigans, while Dusk is completely into her and Imogen is fuming. I love the way the party split worked out for the stakeout. I love the fact that they're clearly both hurting badly and want to have each other's support again so clearly. They both have regrets. I appreciate that.
--Nothing big on the shenanigans portion of tonight, although it was extensive and glorious (oh my GOD the Taste of Tal'dorei afternoon lunch theater). I missed these kids and their wacky antics during the grimdark pain of EXU Calamity. I'm so glad to be back.
And lastly:
--Every time somebody mentions Imahara Joe, the tinker and mechanic, my heart cracks absolutely in half, because you will never convince me this NPC we haven't met yet isn't named after Grant Imahara and that's beautiful and also I thought I was done being sad about that two years ago but nope, guess I've still got some sad left.
