Madamemidnight - Author & Aesthete - Tumblr Blog

Messaging people for the first time is so hard. What am I supposed to say? Like, "You seem really odd and your blog intrigues me. Do you want to have philosophical conversations or perhaps talk about fictional characters?" What! Whatever. I will just follow you back and stare at your blog with my big beautiful brown eyes.

Chapter 85: Resent like a Vine Grows

Life continues without Gabriel there and the others try to carry on while adjusting.

This, but also, he didn't try to "rape" her. He thought (because she'd been doing so the entire fucking time), that she was playing hard to get. When he finally understands that she's really serious and means it, he stops and feels like shit. This is the problem with relationships based in dubcon and hot/cold dynamics. The line isn't very clear for either party, until it is, usually only after it's been crossed. If Spike were actually trying to rape her he wouldn't have stopped. Rapists don't just "come to their senses" when they see how scared the victim is. They, in fact, get off on that because it's about the control and power and not sexual or physical pleasure. It always annoys me when people say he tried to rape her because he didn't immediately take no for an answer. Did he sexually assault her? Yes. Was that entirely his fault? It's a gray area in this scenario because their sex often occurred during attempts to murder one another. Resisting her attraction to him (psychologically and physically, via assaulting him), then immediately kissing him, or opening his belt, etc, had been a fundamental part of their relationship since it began.

Conditioning someone to understand that you don't really mean "No," then getting upset when you actually do, and they ignore you, is obviously going to confuse them. This is also why Buffy isn't actually upset with Spike. She's upset with herself for the reckless and contradictory way she's been behaving towards him. She knows that she fucked with his head and she feels guilty about it even though she tries to convince herself he's a monster and that that's the reason he didn't understand he was crossing a line. Truth is, she knows she's just as much to blame, if not more, because she couldn't just be honest about wanting him and turned it into a convoluted and unnecessarily complicated thing. Spike would have tried to woo her and do everything the romantic route if he thought she'd allow it. Look at how he treated Dru and that was without a soul. If he thought Buffy would let him openly and honestly love her he would have been acting very differently. He was trying to play things by her rules, but she kept changing them without being clear what they were.

I'm not one to victim blame, but in this particular scenario they are both victims because she was abusing him physically and emotionally, and using him while knowing that he was in love with her. She even tries to invalidate his feelings because she doesn't want to accept them as they would (and later do), make her feel like she's being a selfish asshole towards him. Spike knows he deserves better, but he also feels like he doesn't after all the fucked up shit he's done for the greater part of a century. He's settling for what he can get because to him it's better than having nothing and he knows she'll never love him. That's why when he survives and is revived he doesn't go and find her the way he searched the ends of the Earth for Dru every time she left him. He decides it's best if she thinks he died a hero. It's a much cleaner, nobler, and romantic ending than an eventually messy break up, and the poet would absolutely choose that route.

In summary, Spike didn't try to rape Buffy. She blurred the consent lines from day one and the second he realized she was serious and it wasn't an act he backed off and apologized. The only reason she reacted that way is because she'd been wanting an excuse to justify mistreating him to absolve her guilt and jumped on the first one, which unfortunately for him happened to be a damn good one. Buffy isn't the type to have told someone that tried to rape her that she loved them. If she actually believed that was what happened, and that he had sincerely attempted to force her, she would have staked his ass no questions and gone back to business as usual.

Everyone was reaching so hard to hate on Spike in season 7 that it spins back around and makes them look like they have no real moral compass

Xander's all "I don't care if he has a soul now, he'll always be an evil thing because he tried to rape Buffy." So did you hyena boy but everyone forgave that as soon as you became your old self again

And Giles' acting like Spike needs a chip just in case he goes evil at some point. Anyone can go evil, there were 7 seasons of nice people going evil and Giles wasn't advocating that the whole world get chipped

Chapter 84: The Angel from My Nightmare

Claire follows the instructions Gabriel's left behind.

What the first closet looks like.

But it has islands like these that are all white with gold handles and trays just like that one.

The bookcases of shoes are similar to this but all one colour down each.

This is what the tub and window set up look like in the bathroom except there are no blinds. There's a see through shower where that left sink is and the sauna starts where that right sink is. The floor is marble like the closet, not diamond tiles like these.

fanfic writers are so fucking awesome in the sense that they can take one single scene, that lasts less than a minute, from the source material and turn that one single scene into a 40k word long fic with depth, feels, character study and development and create a whole storyline out of that one single canonical moment.

fanfic writers are so fucking awesome in the sense that they can take one single scene, that lasts less than a minute, from the source material and write 40 entirely different fics about that one single canonical moment and each one of those fics is a literal masterpiece.

shout out to us fanfic writers ♡♡♡♡♡♡

Exquisite.

▪︎ Lantern Clock.

Artist/Maker: Andrew Purdonne (Glasgow)

Date: 1657

Medium: Brass

Le sigh. *Lamenting in author*

🤣🤣🤣 He'd be all knots and snakes inside debating it and the next picture would be Crowley giving him puppy eyes. He'd go then, immediately, and only after arriving realize what he'd done and stay just long enough to say something like: "Oh, hello. You look... well." Then Az would stare hungrily, giving him a once over before saying: "Right," clearing his throat, and going back to Heaven. Crowley would say nothing because he wouldn't need to. He'd be too surprised it worked and then smile devilishly that it had and keep coming up with ways to get his angel back.

Sweet, sweet Gabriel. Just wanna pet and validate him until he cums and cries, in no particular order, maybe all at once.

one year of sylar ♔ - day 269

Must be

THE LOVE WITCH (2016) dir. Anna Biller

Chapter 83: Lazarus Weeps

Aftermath.

Never forget this. It lives in my head forever and so too shall it live within you.

I'm crying. Please! 🤣😭🤣

Discord shenanigans resulted in this

They weren't even trying to be subtle with where they were going to take the narrative. Look at the season 3 and 4 promo art and dvd covers.

In both Claire's body language is towards Sylar while looking away but she gets closer to him and all the other characters get further away from them. Peter and Hiro are barely in the "eclipse" ring for the last one. In the first Sylar's body language is guarded and he's facing the camera but in the second he's open and angled towards Claire.

For anyone that might think they don't consider things like this when posing people for shoots, you're 100% wrong. The point of the photos is to capture the mood or theme of the season to entice the audience while conveying the relationships of characters. It's done all throughout film and television promotional art. They were like Mike Tyson with the doves for these two, and, in this season, they do in fact kiss. Consensually or not, it happens.

And on the matter of consent, it amuses me that Claire never tells him to not touch her affectionately and doesn't say a word of protest when it's abundantly clear he's about to kiss her. She only glares at him, and if she's mobile she stabs him, but she never tries to prevent his advances using the only tool he leaves her with. Not saying she does want it, mind you. Just that I think it's strange she tolerates it when she has no problem telling others to get off her or to not touch her. There's a literal unspoken permission he gets that others don't.

What was the reason?

I get it, it's a figure of speech. But knowing Sylar's future obsession with Claire, his weird romantic relationship with Elle, the fact that Elle and Claire look almost identical to me ... That wording is nice

😈 You are not bound by the Hays code.

😈 You are allowed to have evil characters who are not punished by the narrative by the end of the story.

😈 You are allowed to have evil characters who win.

😈 You are allowed to have evil characters who make evil look fun and cool.

😈 You are allowed to make your fun, cool evil character the protagonist.

😈 You are allowed to glorify, romanticize and eroticize evil characters and villainous acts.

😈 You are not obligated to teach your audience a moral lesson.

Adding my two cents as a Heroes fic writer and someone that's seen it three times including my first watch back when it aired. I think Elle knew the exact depths of those insecurities because she had the same ones on the opposite side causing her Daddy issues. She was always trying to be enough and to be what he wanted and anytime she tried to be her own person, even a little bit, Bob manipulated her by telling her he was "Very disappointed," in her. The fucked up thing is that Bob gave her those issues intentionally in order to manipulate and control her and there relationship was exponentially more abusive because he had her tortured regularly in the form of experiments as a child. Bennet mentions the fact that she was constantly "Haitianed" so that she wouldn't remember, another form of Bob's control. Thing is, trauma doesn't only exist in memories it's a neurochemical and physiological reaction as well, so Elle was all fucked in the head and had no idea why, which she blamed on herself because she was just like that. It added to her feeling more broken and unworthy because she saw herself as inherently flawed.

I also think the reason she chose to be with Sylar, why she intentionally pushed him to be a killer again and more Sylar like, is because she wanted him to be even more relatable. To be more like herself. However, it was also for him to be a male figure she feared, just like her father was. People choose partners that remind them of the way the individual that had the most influence over them as a child made them feel; this isn't always a good thing. If someone made you feel safe, validated, and loved that's what you seek. If, however, someone regularly made you feel worthless, and afraid of punishment and being abandoned then you'd look for that because the brain craves familiarity. She knew Gabriel had a short fuse and exactly how to provoke him which meant she could earn punishments whenever she wanted them, in the same way she'd occasionally rebel against Bob. That's why she'd flinch any time he touched her, even though he'd never harmed her prior to killing her. She was constantly waiting for him to punish her for what she'd done to him, which is why she chose to lie and manipulate him the same way. She wanted him to. Otherwise she'd have tried to stop him when he killed her, but she didn't resist at all. She was with him because of her daddy issues every bit as much as he was with her because of his mommy issues.

I'm pulling @heroes-trash and @siderealtime tags from my recent post because I want to reply! Why did I place Elle in the 'mommy issues post'?

First, disclaimer: I'm still rewatching, I'm on episode 9 (s3). I don't remember all the plot points (I watched the show more than 10 years ago), so I might be wrong. But I'm interpreting things as I see them unfold on the screen.

Also, this is my excuse to write an essay on Sylar, bear with me.

So, Sylar ...

He's insecure and unloved by his parents, so he craves attention from other people. He wants to be Gabriel Gray, to be enough, to live his life knowing that someone will love him for who he is.

This issue stems from his emotionally abusive relationship with his mother, Virginia.

He said it, Virginia, he doesn't want to be a banker. She doesn't care, because all she cares about is keeping up appearances and making him do what she wants, not what HE wants. "You could be anything you want" my ass.

This further proves the idea that she doesn't care about what he wants. She wants him to be someone Of Great Importance in the eyes of other people. This formed his trauma and shaped how he views relationships with others.

Also, this foreshadows him being a president in the s1 alternative future. Nathan-shaped, he lost his identity and is now following his mama's wishes.

This shot shows how creepy that mother-son relationship is.

The idea of him being 'not enough' is evident to everyone, that's why he's so easily manipulated.

The scene that shows how Elle first met Gabriel proves that the Company has been watching him for some time now.

I believe that they might have been watching his mother's apartment as well, so they know all his triggers.

They send in a girl who can play him like a fiddle by showing him compassion and understanding – something that he couldn't get from his mother.

He calls Elle 'an angel', which is an interesting word choice since he's named Gabriel (archangel) and his mother is Virginia (pure).

Elle is able to manipulate him by resorting to 'mommy tactics'. (Angela did the same)

Let's compare two scenes: the scene in Virginia's apartment and the scene in Gabriel's apartment.

So, both scenes involve 'mother' figures (with updos, lol) and food. In the first scene, Gabriel is forced to eat the sandwich (or else he'll make mommy upset). In the second scene, he's finally presented with something that he actually prefers and he can share it with another person.

Now, the final blow:

Playing on his insecurities and his desire to connect with others, Elle breaks him. Just like his mother did with the whole 'president' speech.

TL;DR: Sylar's desire to be 'special' is based on his trauma and relationship with his mother. The Company (Elle) is able to manipulate him using that against him. Mommy issues prevail.

Draco: Ladies and gentlemen of the wizarding community, I am now officially the King of Hogwarts!

Hermione: He is not the King.

Ron: Of course he isn’t.

Harry: I am the King of Hogwarts!

Blaise: Okay guys, stop mucking about.

Hermione: Thank y-

Blaise: Clearly there is only one way to decide the King of Hogwarts.

All Gryffindors: Rap Battle!!

(All houses get up and push their tables to the side, standing in a wide circle. Harry and Draco stand facing each other, and prepare to battle.)

Hermione: Stop this now!

Ginny: Guys, come on…

Luna: The Nargles are attracted by your animosity, you’re endangering us all!

Draco: *beatboxes*

(Snape, Dumbledore and McGonagall enter)

Snape: What is going on here?

Blaise and Ron: Rap Battle!

Dumbledore: Alright, everyone out of the way. Now boys…

(Harry and Draco hang their heads)

Dumbledore: Drop the beat!

Hermione and McGonagall: *bangs head on table*

We've gathered here today in celebration of men with pretty brown eyes

The way I'm laughing really shows my age. 🤣😭

Mood.

𝔤𝔯𝔢𝔢𝔫 𝔞𝔠𝔞𝔡𝔢𝔪𝔦𝔞

Addams Family Values — 1993, dir. Barry Sonnenfeld