Would You?

my read on the chances of a successful gemma rescue was already very low but having mark basically turn to the camera and say "maybe I am the one guy who can bargain my way out of experiencing grief....?" oh buddy you are so fucked.

Me reading trc

It is simply not fulfilling to enjoy media in the height of its popularity. You need to show up so late to the party that everybody else is gone and the hosts are asleep so you can rummage through their trash for chip dip and stale hors d’oeurves to eat alone in the dark like a dirty little raccoon secret

“Is that all?” She whispered.

“That’s all there is.” Gansey replied.

I hope Devon leaves her loser sellout failhusband for the slightly unhinged fugitive brain surgeon living in her brother's basement

Imagine scarfing down chinese food like a rabid animal only for jeff bezos to come and sit next to you and insult your dead wife, so you go home and get a lobotomy about it

I've been pondering the split fandom reaction to Helena Eagan trying to make sense of it all. On one side there is an understanding that all of the harm she has done is unacceptable and irreconcilable. On the other hand some people are intrigued and empathize with the misogyny and pressure she may face and how love and acceptance may be a salve to those issues.

A little bit of it is girlbossification and fandoms yearning and enjoyment of redemptive narratives but I also think the privilege of whiteness is also at play.

Helena Eagan is a rich white woman who benefits and aids in the oppression of the average laborer. And though she is a victim of misogyny and daddy issues she is still the heir to a major corporation. Parts of this fandom have twisted themselves into pretzels trying to justify why she is actually the victim and heroine of this story. And maybe they're right I have no idea what Dan Erickson has planned but the need to make her the central victim when she is facing the same facets and tools of oppressiveness that Devon and Natalie are doesn't make her particularly special.

It just means that she is in a world in which these systems and attitudes exist. It doesn't make her any more oppressed than any other woman who lives in this society. The thing that actually sets Helena Eagan apart is the power she holds as an Eagan and the harm she perpetuates and creates. Helena Eagan RAPED Mark S./Mark Scout. She took away Helly R's autonomy.

Why hasn't the same empathy been given to characters like Seth Milchick and Natalie Kalen. It's because they are not white. As the racial contours of this story continue to take shape I urge you to deconstruct where your biases lie and how they impact how you interact with the characters.

Noah Czerny holds a permanent place in my list of characters of all time because like, there was a Noah Czerny, but our Noah is a boy who never existed. The Noah who loves Blue’s spiky hair and watches over Gansey to remind him not to waste his chance and hangs onto existence even as he’s constantly dying and likes snowglobes was never real, he was a shadow of a very different boy who once lived, and at the end of the story it is that Noah—the flesh-and-blood Noah—who is remembered, memorialized through the continuation of Raven Day, while our Noah slips from existence, and is forgotten.

You can be talking to someone and she'll be like, "Oh I made a silly mistake. Women don't deserve voting rights teehee." And you'll be like, "What." And she'll be like, "Oh I'm sorry! That must sound so bad out of context. No it's this Tiktok meme where, if you're a girl and you do something dumb, you say 'Women don't deserve voting rights teehee.'"

And you'll be like, "That sounds bad." And she'll be like, "No no. It's totally not that bad. It's just a meme. Men say it too. Like if a man does something silly he'll be like, 'I am like those women who do not deserve to vote.'" And you'll be like, "Does that make it better?" And she'll be like, "Well there was one guy who tried to make 'Men shouldn't vote' a popular meme. But it never caught on and also he got yelled at a lot."

And then you drop it there because like, you're harshing the vibe.

One thing I truly love about the raven cycle is that Ronan begins as this cool, mysterious alt guy and then the farther you get into the books the more of a loser he becomes and it simultaneously becomes increasingly evident that he grew up on a farm in the middle of the country

Adam to Ronan in TRB