merricatb

Challenge #4

Today's challenge is all about favorite ships! Most of these are Sense8 of course, and I could probably include the cluster itself as one big happy found family but I broke it up and did some specifics.

1) Rajan/Kala/Wolfgang from Sense8. This is my OT3 and I cannot get enough of them. Love triangle? No thanks, give us a triangle in love instead. It's messy but somehow just WORKS, and honestly, it cemented all three of them as fave characters once they got together more than they ever were separately.

2) Wolfgang & Felix from Sense8. My idiot German babiesssssss. They love each other so much. Best Friends FOREVER. I love a loyal bestie, and basically include Felix with all my OT3 fics since he is absolutely part of Wolfgang's life and Wolfgang's relationships. And this gives me a good excuse to use this amazing gif maevedarcy made for me of my German/Indian quartet clasping hands.



3) Sun/Mun from Sense8. They're named Sun and Moon for heaven's sake, how cute is that? And he loves being kicked in the head by her. What a man.

4) Lito & Wolfgang from Sense8. Before Lito shows up, Wolfgang has had very little interaction with other members of the cluster (apart from Kala obviously, and the orgy). He's about to get himself shot in the face because his pride won't let him lie to save his own stupid life, and Lito shows up and basically gets his permission to intervene and lkjasdfkljadslkjfadsflk;. Then Wolfgang shows up to help Lito win a fight he was very much losing, and later slides in like an angry German fair godmother to protect him again. Lito sees himself as nothing more than a liar, and Wolfgang sees himself as nothing more than a fighter, and that's exactly what they need from each other. GAH it makes me crazy.

5) Lito/Hernando/Dani from Sense8. I love that this relationship went from the beard that wouldn't leave to a family unit that supported each other through everything. A beautiful example of what family can actually mean.

6) Will/Hannibal from Hannibal (NBC). The original Murder Husbands and my first truly toxic ship. It's so good y'all.

7) Eve/Villanelle from Killing Eve. The yuri version of Hannigram with a soundtrack that doesn't sound like dropping a silverware drawer down a flight of stairs.

8) Claudia/Madeleine from Interview with the Vampire. There are so many ships in this series but they're all so bad for each other it was hard to decide, so I went with the one where they're actually great for each other and don't cause nonstop destruction to everyone and everything around them by being in love. Changing the dynamic from mother & daughter in the book to not yet romantic lovers in the series was yet another stroke of genius on the part of the showrunners.

9) The crew of the Revenge from Our Flag Means Death. This show was so much fun. Every couple/throuple/fwb/whatever they had is worth shipping.

10) I'm going to embarrass myself thoroughly with this last one, but I think it says a lot about me that this was the first het ship ship so that's why I'm including it. Full disclaimer, I have not seen this movie since I was a literal child and do not remember much about it, but I'm going off the vibes that appealed to me and still do. April O'Neil/Casey Jones from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles the original 1990 movie. I know. I know. I'm stunned to even be typing that. But here's the thing: Intelligent independent woman/sarcastic badass guy who is actually a wimp IS MY JAM. It's why I loved Buffy/Pike in the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie. It's why I love Lenny/Mace in Strange Days. Make her tough, make him pathetic. I will eat that shit up.

This was so much fun to do post Snowflake Challenge and somehow February is already OVER??? Thank you to dreamersdare for putting on this event and giving me something to squee about each week.

Challenge 3:

Make a Top Ten list for your favourite music picks and share what you love about them. This can be in any format - songs, artists, albums, music videos, soundtracks, scores, something else not mentioned here. If it's vaguely related to music, it ticks the box, so go with whatever you like!

I'm not really fannish about music to be honest. I can't stand silence and constantly have it playing, but the idea of being at a concert makes me want to crawl into a hole in the ground and I loathe live music in general. But keeping with the fannish theme here are 10 scenes in movies/shows where the music plays a big part. I actually found them all on YouTube so beware of spoilers if you haven't seen them. 

1) What's Up 4 Non Blondes - Sense8 - The scene of all scenes karaoke lobotomy mix. I love so much of the music in the show but this is THE Sense8 song. Riley being all sad on her iPod shuffle, Wolfgang facing his stage fright, Nomi about to get Niles Bulgered, Will coming to her rescue, Sun singing in the shower, Lito in bed with Hernando and Dani, Capheus adorably getting the words wrong singing on his bus, Kala dreaming and showing up to rock Wolfgang's world, gaaaah it's so good. I'm using my Rajan singing Tujh Mein Rab Dikhta Hai icon and including that video as well because it's delightful. 

2) Starman David Bowie - The Martian - The sciencing their way to go get Mark Watney montage. This is usually when the tears really start flowing.

3) Hot Stuff Donna Summer - The Full Monty - When they're all standing in line at the job centre office and the song comes on the speakers and they just cannot resist their training and start doing their routine while queued up. Mark Watney from The Martian also falls victim to Hot Stuff. Cinematic proof that men are weak when it comes to this song and must do a shoulder shimmy.

4) The Chain Fleetwood Mac - Our Flag Means Death - There are so many songs and so many moments to choose from in this show but I like Fleetwood Mac anyway and this scene is chaos and romance and a naked Scotsman running around. What's not to love?

5) Love Crime Siouxsie - Hannibal - The romance the horror the gallons of blood. This song permanently altered my brain chemistry from the very first note.

6) Under Pressure Queen & David Bowie - The Magicians - This is my favorite episode and scene of The Magicians. Much like What's Up in Sense8, the characters come together while singing along (and save some lives in the process) and it gives me all the feeeeeels.

7) Major Tom (Voellig Losgeloest) Peter Schilling - Atomic Blonde - Iconic scene. Charlize Theron beating up men with her high heel in a moving car. 11/10 no notes.

8) Rivers of Babylon Boney M AND Dana-Dan Bloodywood - Monkey Man - This is technically two songs but they happen basically right after each other and it's my list so I'm going with it. Boney M makes me so happy and the elevator scene OMG Dev Patel was insane for this (and insane IN this). And I am already a sucker for pop music with violence (see #7). Dana-Dan marks the entrance of the Hijras and the flowing skirts and flowing blood GOD I love the visuals of this movie.

9) This Feeling Alabama Shakes - Fleabag - The song at the end of the series is just perfection. Fleabag has gone through two seasons of grief and love and heartache, and when she looks back at us it really does feel so nice to know we're gonna be alright.

10) I Will Survive Gloria Gaynor - The Adventures of Priscilla Queen of the Desert - The entire soundtrack is filled with absolute bangers, but this one has a special place in my heart. To this day I cannot listen to this song without hearing the didgeridoo accompaniment.

Challenge 2:

Make a Top Ten list for your favourite series and tell people exactly why you love it. This can be in any format - tv series, book series, radio plays, movie sequels, something else not mentioned here. Your series can be as short as two vaguely linked pieces of media and as long as... well, the sky is your limit. Whatever you like!

I struggled a bit with the first challenge to come up with 10 standalone faves (movies and books) and I'm definitely not making 10 on today's challenge even though two of them have been my most fannish fandoms.

Sense8 - The GOAT for me. I haven't stopped watching this for like three years. I'm constantly thinking about this show, about the characters and different scenarios, what happened after the fact and all the in-between scenes that we didn't get. I MISS it. I was never especially engaged in fandom activities before this. Now I post on tumblr about it, I joined DW for it, I read shit on the subreddit (despite really disliking reddit in general), and of course I read AND write fanfiction now which is just wild to me. Fanfiction never appealed to me before. For the most part, it still doesn't. Even other movies and shows I'm super into I have no real desire to read fics for. IDK if that's because the fandom is so small and there just isn't that endless sea of content like there is for other media, or there's just so much more of that world to explore that was stolen from us by Netflix canceling it, but this is my singular obsession these days and I know I'm very annoying about it. Sorry :)

Hannibal - This was my first real fannish obsession. I watched it weekly as it aired but wasn't all that attached to it (I had way too much other stuff going on in my life) until the final episode where I was absolutely blown away and immediately had to rewatch the entire series. That began what I imagine will be a lifelong fascination, one that I've spread to multiple other people. I never wrote fanfic for it (there's plenty out there without me adding to it) but I spent a LOT of time on that tumblr tag. It's actually why I joined tumblr to begin with. Story time: my feisty little dog had just been in a scuffle with another dog (she picked a fight with a bigger dog and lost, not that she realized that fact). I was super shaken up and still had to complete our walk, and my friend texted me a gif from tumblr of Mads pretending to bite Hugh Dancy to cheer me up. I still have that gif saved on my phone, and I downloaded tumblr that day. My dog (aka honey badger) was fine.

Our Flag Means Death - Here's another show that maximizes queerness in the most delightful way, with a great soundtrack to boot. A seafaring band of misfits with varying levels of incompetence at being pirates, somehow attracting the attention of the English Navy and THE Blackbeard. I love all the characters. Even the bastards (especially the bastards...I'm looking at you Izzy Hands). It's funny and smart and sweet and so very odd, and Jim please stab me. We deserved another season, but I'm glad we got what we got.

Interview with the Vampire - I don't like being wrong, and I really don't like admitting when I was wrong, but in the case of IWTV, I was so very wrong and I'm thrilled about it. When I saw the casting announcement for this show, I was...confused. Just at first glance there are major changes to the characters (Daniel "the boy" Molloy being old, Louis and Claudia being race-swapped) and the timeframe from 1790s/1970s to 1910s/2020s respectively. And I was especially not on board with the casting of Lestat. Merricat you silly silly girl. Sam Reid is no Australian farmboy. Sam Reid IS the vampire Lestat. And changing Louis from a white plantation owner to a black pimp was a stroke of absolute genius. I was a casual reader of the books and liked the characters more than the writing itself (or the wild directions the series went), and I grew up on the movie, but the series is superior to both in EVERY WAY. Season three is coming out this year, and honestly it's one of the few things I'm looking forward to in life these days. I thank tumblr for showing me gifs and convincing me to give this show a try when I was absolutely ready to write it off as a bad adaptation that took too many liberties from the source material.

Killing Eve - From the first scene of Villanelle knocking ice cream onto a child, I was hooked. The fashion, the music, the killing, the chemistry. Jodie Comer and Sandra Oh were born for these roles and Fiona Shaw is an absolute delight. It's a good thing that unforgivably bad fourth season never actually happened because then I'd be really angry.

Good Omens - Despite being a lifelong atheist, I've always been interested in fiction about demons and angels, heaven and hell (and priests, but that's a story for another day). This was the book that introduced me to Neil Gaiman. It was given to me as a birthday present from a friend, and over the next twenty or so years I read most of his work. It was even on my nightstand, ready for another reread when the story came out about what a piece of shit he is. So fuck Neil Gaiman. Seriously. I still love the story, I love Aziraphale and Crowley's relationship, and I'm even still looking forward to Good Omens 3 when that comes out. I want to support the people who worked on it and aren't pieces of shit, but don't want to support Gaiman (or Amazon for that matter) so I'm torn about watching it.

Fleabag - I'm not fannish about this one per se, but I've watched it end to end about as much as I've watched Our Flag Means Death so it deserves a place on this list (and my list is too short anyway). I have to admit, the thumbnail for season one of her with mascara streaming down her face put me off and I didn't give this show a try for quite some time. But I'm so glad I did. It's funny and cringe and tragic and Fleabag is an absolute garbage human being I love her so much.

Deadloch - This show starts out with a dead man getting his dick lit on fire and it stays wild. Interesting commentary on colonialism and misogyny and homophobia and feminism. Madeleine Sami's character is the hottest mess in Tasmania, and possibly the entire world. Plus an a capella version of I Touch Myself. What's not to like? Can't wait for the second season.

On account of my list being a bit short, I'm going to include a few YouTube channels that do reaction videos I enjoy. I'm relatively new to reaction videos and only started them because I watched Sense8 so much it lost its emotional impact. If you haven't watched them and want the feeling of seeing something again for the first time, reaction videos are a great way to do it.

Sesskasays - Her Sense8 videos were fantastic, as were her reactions to Good Omens and Fleabag. She cries easily which is *chefs kiss*.
Andelain - I've only seen Andi's videos for Sense8 so far but she's brilliant and I'll definitely be watching more.

I'm doingdreamersdare Stuff I Love challenge and you should too! 

Challenge #1: Make a Top Ten list for your favourite standalone media and tell people exactly why you love it. This can be in any format - movies, one shot dramas, novels, short stories, plays, something else not mentioned here. Whatever you like!

Growing up, I was always a movie person. I'd watch the award shows and I loved all the behind the scene tidbits about actors' inspiration and shooting schedules etc. Gag reels were my fave, and I sincerely miss the extras menus that used to come on DVDs. That being said, lately I've just been over it. Some of the movies I used to love are unwatchable now that I'm older, and it's rare for me to squee over a movie at all these days. There are movies I love and will watch over and over, but for this list I'm only including ones I'd consider myself fannish about to at least the point of looking up memes on tumblr (plus two books).

Lord of the Rings Trilogy 
The first time I saw Fellowship of the Ring (in theaters) I was bored and confused and thought it was finaaaaaally over at the fellowship part, but alas there was another hour to go and I really needed to pee. I have pretty bad face blindness so I couldn't tell Aragorn and Boromir or Merry and Pippin apart, but once I rewatched it at home where I could take potty breaks as needed I fell in love with it and was in the theaters opening day for the sequels. Two Towers is my fave of the trilogy since it's a bit darker than the others and I'm a dramatic bitch at heart, but they're all absolute masterpieces and the extended versions are even better. If you've never taken edibles while watching them, I highly (get it? lol) recommend it. 

The Old Guard
I was OBSESSED with this in 2020 when it came out. Women in front of and behind the camera bringing a tenderness you usually don't get to this type of action movie, a beautiful MM relationship (that unfortunately was all anyone wanted to talk about despite the whole women in front of and behind the camera thing), and depression portrayed with heartbreaking realism. Toxicity in fandom and the long-delayed (and then intensely disappointing sequel) kinda ruined it for me, but some day I'll be ready to fall in love again.

Knives Out (and Glass Onion)
I need to rewatch Wake Up Dead Man before I give a final verdict on that one, but I just love Benoit Blanc and his little sidekicks. These movies are silly while remaining sincere, and you can tell Daniel Craig is having a delightful time.

Monkey Man
Dev Patel could've made this movie just for me I loved it so much. It was everything I never knew I needed. This was the first movie in YEARS I actually considered seeing in theaters based on the trailer alone (but alas, it wasn't even playing near me). 

Mad Max: Fury Road
This movie doesn't let up from start to finish. It was meant to be Max's movie, but it was Furiosa's from the second she showed up. The competency of the characters handling their machines, the RAGE of Furiosa and the other women, the War Boy earning redemption after experiencing kindness for the first time, and Max just going along for a ride that had nothing to do with him gaaah I love it. Plus Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron hated each other but on screen there is nothing but admiration between the two of them. 

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
This book speaks to me in ways it probably shouldn't. It's my all time favorite, and where I got my UserID. I remember picking up a copy at the Portland library because I loved the spooky cover and fondly remembered hearing about Shirley Jackson getting death threats over writing "The Lottery", and I read it on the floor in my first ever apartment in one sitting. If I'd read this book as an impressionable child, my life might've turned out very differently iykyk

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
Just reread this one recently with my sister and it was as magical as I remembered. Red and black and silver, it couldn't be more to my taste aesthetically. Every line is gorgeous and I can't wait to read it again.

And there you have it. If you like any of these and want to squee with me, or want to hear about other movies I watch over and over but don't necessarily go crazy about, leave it in the comments :)

Challenge #15

How Did the Fandom Snowflake Challenge Go? Post your answer to today’s challenge in your own space and leave a comment in this post saying you did it.

This was my first time participating so I don't really have anything to compare it to, but I'd say it went pretty well. I talked to new people and made some friends, and came out of my shell a bit. Plus it was a nice distraction from an otherwise horrible start to the year. Huge thanks to everyone who put it together and participated :)

Challenge #13

TALK ABOUT A COMMUNITY SPACE YOU LIKE. It doesn’t need to be your favorite, or the one where you spend the most time (although it certainly can be). Maybe it’s even one that you’ve barely visited. But talk about that space and how it helps support fannish community.

Tumblr was my go-to place for fannish content long before I really engaged in fandom myself. I was mostly a lurker but I liked the mix of gifs and images and meta all in the same place. It also makes it easier to interact with people there, although I'm sure I'm not the first to mention how quickly fandoms can get super toxic and how generous you have to be with your block button to ensure a positive experience. I've gotten into more media from seeing gifs on tumblr than any amount of ads or movie previews could ever accomplish. Plus, where else could you get such legendary terms like blorbo and spiders georg? There's nothing quite like the hellsite out there, and it remains my favorite. 

OMG Y'all pattrose made me a Wolfie and Felix moodboard! Look at these dorks they love each other so much! I'm so happy I'm going to stare at it forever!

Challenge #11 - In your own space, grant someone's wish from Challenge #5. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it and include a link to your own post with the wishes you granted if you feel comfortable doing so.

I did grant a fic rec wish for soricel and made a new fandom friend with my own wish. Done and dusted. 

Fandom Snowflake Challenge #9 - Talk about your favorite tropes in media or transformative works.

I'd say my all time favorite trope is Found Family. So much of my favorite media centers around people who don't fit in and feel alone until they meet their people. Sense8 is probably the best Found Family dynamic I've ever come across, but things like Our Flag Means Death (and coincidentally a fair amount of queer media) also fit the mold. I'm also really into the Grumpy/Sunshine or Golden retriever/Black cat dynamic, and I loooove seeing the wholesome sweet ones absolutely LOSE THEIR SHIT protecting their loved ones. 

I'm kicking off the new year with something a little different from my previous fics: Hernandooooo

Hernando Fuentes has been one of my favorite characters since his very first scene in bed with Lito. I love the way he sees the beauty in everything, and how kind he is. That being said, I found it challenging to write him, mainly because this fic is basically in the format of a lecture on the artistic merits of a film that doesn't actually exist. But I hunkered down and rewatched all his scenes and read a bunch of Chekhov, and now I'm participating in PolyamShippingDay for the first time!

Love Made Public

An Analysis of Iberian Dreams with Professor Hernando Fuentes
When: Monday, 08/08 at 11:30am
Where: The Dolores Olmedo Lecture Hall
Open to the Public
[Or, Hernando gives a lecture about Lito in front of an enthusiastic crowd]

Teen 1866 words

This was submitted for

smallfandomfest under the prompt: Art, as well as polyamships PolyamShippingDay under the prompt: Inspire.