Portwell - Tumblr Posts - Page 2
Hey Portwell nation (and everybody else) !! Just a quick PSA but i accidentally deleted my account so if you want to refollow me here you can hgdvbbjh
accidentally just typed “gina caswell” getting a bit too ahead of myself
Chapter 2 of You’re Like Lightning in a Bottle is officially out !! Gina and EJ are getting risotto in this chapter ;)
i wanna start a lil' chain of positivity here, so i'm gonna ask you: why do you ship portwell? what about them resonates with you in your life that makes you wanna fight for this ship? just curious to see everyone's answers :)
Hi, anon! Thank you so much for your ask. This is such a great question! I adore portwell for a ton of reasons, but I think one of the big ones is how pure their affection for each other is. Their relationship storyline doesn't have a ton of unnecessary drama or random out of the blue love triangles and it doesn't need that to stay interesting. I love how they constantly uplift each other and cheer each other on. It always sounds cliche, but they genuinely make each other better. Another reason I tend to connect with the ship a lot is because I see a ton of myself in both EJ and Gina. I relate to the two of them for different reasons, but those reasons immediately made the both of them my favorite characters so the fact that they got/are getting together just made me !!! Plus, I’m always a sucker for the frenemies to lovers plot so really me being obsessed with portwell was inevitable ;).
Thank you so much for the ask!! It was such a fun little surprise and I always love talking about hsmtmts. Feel free to drop into my ask box anytime <33
PORTWELL in “RED MEANS LOVE”
ej asking gina if he should let ashlyn paint his nails when he was clearly going to do it anyway
Sometimes I’m having a bad day and then i just think of portwell <3 and it’s all better
HERE’S WHY EJ AND GINA ARE SOULMATES
a very long post under the cut mostly me being overanalytical and crying about portwell and their perfection. i may or may not make sense but in my defense it’s like 2am. enjoy!
after the musical video call
ej: so you’re leaving? gina: maybe. i’ve never really stayed anywhere for more than four months. having to commit to another five it’s like learning a foreign language, you know? ej: not really. i only speak english.
i’m not sure how canon these video chats are but it’s interesting how ej sees gina transfer money onto his account and immediately leaves his chat with ashlyn, carlos and seb to check up on her. not only that but he continues to keep the conversation about her even if he can’t relate to what she’s going through. notice the expression on his face after she hangs up. ej genuinely cares about gina.
their scene in 2x08
gina can’t relate to having her life planned out for her because there’s constant change in her life. she says she’s “always one natural disaster away from landing in a new place.” and although the conversation began because of ej’s reluctance in attending duke, he asks her and shows interest in learning about her experience. it parallels to their video chat—they can’t claim to know what the other is going through because they have never gone through the same experience. however, they’re willing to listen and help each other as best as they can. the way gina sees ej shows that she genuinely cares about him, too.
while they may not share the same backgrounds, they do have some subtle similarities that aren’t brought up verbally to one another because portwell has a way showing, not telling which makes their dynamic so much more compelling.
for example:
although their dynamic began to develop in s2, it began in s1 when they were less developed versions of themselves. gina and ej 1.0—chaotic, self-serving and overly ambitious. nonetheless, they found solidarity in that even though they weren’t always on the same page but at the end of the season, we see that ej appreciates gina and although their plans failed, he wanted her to be part of the show and took action in making it happen.
moving onto s2, they’re the 2.0 version of themselves—working on being better people together. they were together during their darkest moments and now, they’re each other’s light. a bit like chidi and eleanor from the good place. “i was dropped into a cave and you were my flashlight.” they continue to be there for each other and understand the other’s needs. ex. gina letting ej tell her how he felt about duke and ej showing up at the airport to pick gina up and bringing her a granola bar without knowing that she’d been looking for one earlier that day.
there’s just something so magical and wonderful about this dynamic that if it weren’t about regular high school students i’d swear they were some type of cosmic soulmates brought together by the universe. whether you ship them romantically or platonically, they tell a good story.
I love that I started the #teamrisotto tag for portwell a while back. I love seeing all the portwell content
ej, waking up in cold sweat at 3 am: there's something going on with gina, where's my car keys?
EJ, holding up a stuffed animal: and they say no one beats the claw machine!
Nini: that's great, EJ! Aren't you going to give it to Gina?
EJ: she won it for me!
Gina: Stop buying plastic skeletons for Halloween! It’s terrible for the environment!
EJ: Yeah! Locally sourced, all natural skeletons are much more environmentally friendly!
Gina told Ricky in the flashback that she doesn’t do anything right the first time. When she confessed her feelings to Ricky she didn’t flat out say “I like you” instead she beat around the bush and said “I wouldn’t quit on us if I wasn’t moving” which could be easily taking as she meant it platonically not romantically. In 2x08 Gina describes E.J. the way she describes herself in the flashback because they both try to do the right thing which gives me soulmate energy.
I don't think there was any way for Ricky "Actually prove to Nini that I'm not a quitter at this so she realizes I'm not a quitter at us?" Bowen to misinterpret "I wouldn't quit on us if I wasn't moving away" as being platonic. She said it to him in a private setting and was clearly very emotional and having a hard time getting the words out. When he said "Say it", he knew what was coming next.
The difference between the 2x06 confession and the 2x12 one, in terms of Gina's character growth, is that she doesn't need this big lead up in which she avoids saying how she feels for as long as possible anymore when she asks EJ if she can kiss him. Gina finds it terrifying to talk about her feelings. That's why she calls herself stupid for crying when she's trying to confess to Ricky and why she takes so long to get to the point. During S2, she grows a lot, to the point where when she's confessing to EJ, she only briefly hesitates ("Can I...") before putting herself out there in one clear sentence. That's a testament to her huge character growth over the course of the season!
Another big difference between the two confessions is that Gina is still taking full control over the conversation in 2x06, while in 2x12 she puts her feelings out there in the form of a question, leaving space for EJ to answer. Which, again, shows how she's more comfortable with putting her feelings out there now. With Ricky, she told him how she felt in the same sentence where she tells him it can't work out cause she's moving away, and then she tells him she's gonna give him a tight hug and walk out with her head held high. She doesn't even really leave room for him to tell her how he feels. All she's doing is telling him how she feels before she leaves. Mostly because she doesn't think anything can happen between them, but I think part of her is also protecting herself from potentially getting rejected. With EJ, that's no longer the case. She already knows he likes her back, but she still asks him if she can kiss him (twice). She makes her feelings for him clear and gives him room to either reciprocate her feelings or reject her. Again, that shows huge character growth for Gina!
I totally agree that Gina describing EJ the same way she describes herself bodes well for them as a ship. 2x05 set up that Gina is looking for people who just get her. Her describing EJ the way she describes herself tells us that she feels EJ is a person who gets her. He's the kind of person she's been looking for all along. She's found friends who get her in Ashlyn and Carlos, and now she's found a romantic partner who gets her in EJ.
EJ: Wassup lover
EJ: Uh… *loser
EJ: Haha whoops autocorrect
Gina: EJ, this is a verbal conversation-
I still think their age gap is nasty. It reminds me of another Disney show that tried to normalize a college freshman dating someone who hadn't even entered high school yet. Though maybe it's just the 7 year age difference between the actors that throws the whole thing off for me.
I was a bit torn whether or not to reply to this since you're clearly not looking for me to change your mind. You sound like you think this is something I won't be able to respond to, like it's some "gotcha" moment. So this response isn't really for you. It's just a way for me to talk about this subject that is brought up a lot by people like you and to give my perspective on it.
You think a relationship with a 1-2 year age gap (the only age confirmation we have is that EJ was 17 post-S1) between two characters who are both in high school, in the same theater/friend group, and close friends is comparable to a ship (calling them a ship cause I don't think they were ever together?) between a college freshman and someone in middle school? I've never seen GMW so I can't say anything about how those two met and whether they ran in the same circles (though that too would be a bit odd), but nothing could make their age difference look any better. There's a HUGE difference between these two ships, anon. This isn't the same situation at all.
And it's not like EJ is a random senior who fell for a sophomore he saw in the hallway once. Nor is he a college freshman hanging out with middle schoolers. He and Gina are in the same school, in the same theater group, became close friends, and fell for each other. That's a very different dynamic and age difference with a very different context.
As for Matt and Sofia: first of all, their age difference is 5 years. You'd know that if you bothered to check your facts. And since I've already talked about this topic before, I'm just gonna repeat that answer here:
First of all, age gaps between actors playing love interests are different than age gaps between people who are in a real life relationship. Actors playing love interests on screen aren’t actually dating each other and work in a controlled environment, so the issues of consent they deal with are very different than people in actual relationships.
Whether or not an age gap between actors is inappropriate depends, imo, on how young the youngest is (I’d say below 16 is definitely a no for kiss scenes, 16 and 17 depends on consent from the actor/actress and their parents, and 18 or older on consent from the actor/actress) and what kind of scenes they’re being asked to film (as in, is any sexual content involved). Given that HSMTMTS is a Disney show that will at most ask for a kiss, I don’t think the age gap between Matt and Sofia is inappropriate.
But what matters most is that Sofia feels comfortable doing romantic scenes with Matt and that she consents to whatever the writers/directors may ask of her. We can’t know what happens behind the scenes, but I take it in good faith that Tim ensures that such consent is given. Especially since Sofia has never given us a reason to believe she feels uncomfortable shooting scenes with Matt. Quite the opposite. And since Matt and Sofia seem to be good friends, I find it hard to imagine that she feels uncomfortable filming romantic scenes with him. So as long as Sofia feels safe on set, I don’t see an issue with Portwell.