common entropy

Whoever did the music for this show is a little bit sadistic and I applaud them. There were so many scenes that had the perfect music overlay to amplify the emotions portrayed with an almost alarming accuracy. Like this scene where they straight up tore my heart to shreds on behalf of Deb. The way that the music played into that wistful, dreamlike and sad letting go as the pain begins to drizzle before it eventually takes hold (at the end of the episode when she cries alone in the dark).

It's so well done though, with the way this is the climax of an entire episode of Deb being denied. I mean the scene even starts with a shot of a Give Way-sign. One event after the other through the whole episode to drive home the point that Mihi could never be hers again, that whatever they had it is now dead. First, Mihi straight up telling her she loves Milan and treating that as a full stop. Then the Sarge informing her in a very straightforward way that there can be nothing between Mihi and Deb or she will be forced to report them. So even if there wasn’t the wall Mihi had put up, the circumstances are still against them, personally and professionally. Whatever they had in the past, the present does not have room for it: one event linked to the next - all of them forcing Deb to accept that as an undeniable reality. Only for it to peak in this scene. It’s kind of the final rejection and the moment it so clearly sinks in for her. She sees an echo of a future in which she is an outsider looking in. Mihi’s future is with her husband, with a family of her own and behind that white picket fence of which Deb is trapped on the wrong side of. It’s just the final nail in the coffin, extinguishing the tiny little flame of hope “lesbian seagulls” had lit inside of her. Hope slashed, dream dead and the pain on her face as you see her realise it is intense. Makes your own eyes a little watery in sympathy for her.

But what I also love is the other side of that coin. For what Deb sees is one facet, she sees reality through a very specific Gaussian blur. She sees the happy smiling family that could be. What she doesn’t see is that Mihi’s nephew is actually a buffer between Mihi and Milan. In that moment he is what links them together, because the actual bond between them is struggling to hold its strength. Deb sees the picket fence, but what she doesn’t seem to realise is how weather-worn it is, how the paint is chipped and that the murky wood beneath is exposed. Deb doesn’t acknowledge that they step through that gate towards her, or that the kid rides off with her and Mihi, that they leave Milan behind. That part doesn’t click for her.

Or the way that Deb’s socially awkward response to Milan telling her “I hope you feel better soon” and him receiving a “you too, man” becomes it’s own echo of what is to come. An all thumbs comment which accidentally highlights what none of them have yet to acknowledge out loud, that he has already lost his marriage to a relationship that was never properly ended, merely put on hold.

It’s funny how metaphors work like that, the statistics of emotion – they can be used to tell whichever story you want them to, but for the main part your view of them are going to be coloured by your confirmation bias. Deb thinks she’s lost whatever second chance she had with Mihi, so that is what she sees. She doesn’t see the crumbling marriage, the divide or the choices made which further the newly formed abyss.

I don’t really have that many headcanons, I mostly have a lot of questions. I mean it, a lot of them.

Like - how come Deb knows all of Mihi’s extended family, but Mihi has never up until now met “Undiagnosed” and Dad? What's that about? Fear? - no, I doubt that considering the nose boop of "I know what you are" after one look of Deb's towards Mihi. Rita might be a self-medicating with red wine and a thousand wild projects, but she is emotionally bright enough to see right through Deb. So then what? Logistics? In opportunity? Shame...?

On the other hand, in what way does Mihi’s family know Deb? I mean Sonny clearly knew what was up, but somehow I doubt someone who runs away scared “because I didn’t know what you meant for my future” - would be open with her family to an extent they knew what Deb meant to her. Still they know her. How often did she tag along with Mihi when she went home? How often was she bent over a plate of food alongside the rest of them? Who knew why? Who suspected as much?

I want to know how Deb would react if the roles were reversed. I mean we have this woman who straight up steps in between a bank robber and their hostages. Who goes kamikaze cave spelunking because her person is trapped and alone. What would she be like if the woman she loved was put in harms way? A gun to Mihi’s head, a stray punch, a verbalised threat. Would she keep that calm and collected pragmatism or would it break? I don’t really think it’s a veneer with Deb, it’s just who she is. She is the kind of person who steps in between a stranger and danger, and she does it with calm and level-headed motivation. But if you lit a fire beneath her what would happen? If Mihi’s life was put on the line what would Deb do to that line?

And I want to know about Mihi. Why, despite seemingly having a better relationship in many ways than Deb with her family - why is there such a frosty veil between Mihi and her mother? When and how did that relationship slip and side into cordial awkwardness? Was that before or after Deb? Was that part of why she didn’t know what Deb would have meant for her future? Or did Mihi raise that wall herself when she was too scared to be vulnerable and open with who and what she was?

Then according to Mihi they were together for “six months, maybe a bit more-”, but how come they slip so easily back into caring and playing off of each other? Sharing grins, looks, food, ideas. That doesn’t feel like six months. That feels like a relationship that was left brewing for months and months before it turned physical, before it took on a name. It’s a relationship with too much definition, too much character to only have lived for six short months. That ingrained affection and deep caring, even with the “long winter” between them it rises to the top again with an effortless ease. It feels deep, rooted and like it had time to mature before it was cut off at the stem, leaving a dormant core that somehow survives sleeping for a decade and still manages to start growing again. That’s not six months.

I want to know if Mihi ever referred to herself as Deb’s girlfriend. I want to know if that filled her with pride and joy or if it just terrified the shit out of her. Probably a bit of both, if those words ever did actually leave her tongue in a setting with more of an audience then her own reflection in the mirror.

How did they find out that nosebleeds were a thing? One of the reasons it’s so easy to fall in love with Deb even as a viewer is because of her facial expressions. Imagine that, imagine the look on her face as Mihi bleeds all over her. That look of utter befuddlement, dash of fear and then morphing into a sly and rakish grin when it becomes clear Mihi is fine, Mihi is in fact very fine. I would have wanted to see that face.

And did either of them count how many tears were shed? And for how long? Deb had her box of “DON’T!”, but what did Mihi have? An advanced ability to compartmentalise? Impeccable skills of self-denial? Or were there tears? Was there pain? What did it look like? Was it fiery and red? Or was it grey and quiet? How did it feel when everything seeped back in as she put those binoculars to her eyes and spotted Deb in the middle of a bank robbery with a samurai sword in her face? What did that visual stir in her chest as her lips fell apart and a breath was stolen from her lungs?

So no, I don’t really have any headcanons. I just have a shitload of questions. And that's before we even begin with what happens after that finale.

Deb's awesome face tax if you actually read through all of that.

so you're just hiding this in the tags, while its absolutely the most poignant description of them... anyway, i was just doing some chill late scrolling and now i am having all the feelings

Maybe they only got 6 episodes, but fuck me they hit me in the feels. So yeah, all of the feelings.

It was just so well done. In that restrained way which sparks all of my imagination and feeds its mad flame for a lot longer than said 6 episodes lasted.

I recently found an old digital camera and looking through the pictures just sent me into such a nostalgic spin. I don't really remember exactly how long ago this was, but say almost two decades ago. A Xena convention followed by a backpacking trip through the US. A weird combination of being wrapped up in the happy excitement of a bunch of queers from all over the globe for a week, followed by two weeks of making my way around a totally foreign culture on my own. Fancy LA hotels to run down hostels in a New Orleans that was still years later recovering from Katrina. The contrasts were so damn insane, but such a good experience for the kid I used to be.

It's strange also to think back on that kid. I don't really recognize her even if I remember her. In some aspects more carefree, in others a lot more insecure. I wouldn't want to trade places, but I kind of do wonder what that version of myself would have thought about this one, the growner upper me.

It's also interesting how good pictures are at triggering memories. I was suddenly met with all of these faces of people I ten minutes earlier couldn't have told you their names had my life depended on it. But with those photos and those memories coming back to you so did their names and it seems silly you ever forgot them in the first place.

What would it be like for Mihi?! Like, just imagine it for a second.

Life was calm. Soft and gentle. Marriage, picket fence, promotion. Neat little upward trajectory. Then suddenly there was once again Deb, and in the span of a few weeks you have to deal with her almost getting shot, coming recklessly close to drowning herself in a cave, getting attacked in her own home and then getting fucking kidnapped. And almost a decade later and she still eats like that! 

But worst of all is that no matter how much water has passed beneath this particular bridge, Mihi still cares. Because the love didn’t end, she removed it from her menu like it was a vice. The problem with that is that a temptation is easy to abstain from when it is physically removed, but when it is once again placed right before your face – and when that temptation smiles at you with that trademark grin which now lights up new laugh lines as well as those familiar eyes - well? Well...