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whump-town · 3 years

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Snippets From My Drafts That Have Been Collecting Dust

(but I don’t know what to do with them and they’re going to waste so..,)

Head propped up on a thin throw pillow, Hotch is laying out on the cheap carpet of the motel floor. One of his elbows rests leaning against the couch beside him. This arm holds the majority of the weight of the book he’s reading. Which he holds up over his head. The hand not holding the book, rest leisurely along its side. This hand loosely leafs a single page free from the other’s behind it, waiting for him to turn it over when he finishes it.

The end of the cigarette bobbing loosely between his lips lights a dark orange as he inhales its fumes. Embers. Reid can hear it sizzle, crack. Before Hotch’s face lips part once more and the smoke comes out his nose. It’s a slowly released force, a patient exhale. Relief.

Without a word, he shifts the weight of the book and reaches down to take the cigarette from between his teeth to pinch it between his fingers. Emily, who lays with her head propped up on his stomach, glances when she senses the movement. Without so much as a word, she takes the cigarette from him. Placing it in her own mouth she hands him the wine she’s eloquently made easy to drink via a tasteful neon pink straw.

He takes this without comment, sipping at it. He grimaces as soon as it hits his tongue, making a distinctly unsatisfied “ech” sound. “I thought you were making a screwdriver,” he mumbles, still grimacing but taking another sip.

Emily looks up and over at him. She shakes her head and her reply comes in a puff of smoke. “I was,” she mumbles, voice thickening with the smoke coating her throat. “Dave said we had to finish this before he was letting me near the vodka.” She returns to her own book, thicker than Hotch’s. With a cover, that’s effortlessly recognizable: Dr. No. James Bond. “I know you don’t like white wine. I wouldn’t have even poured it if Dave had let me pick.”

-------------------

(for “100” Season five episode nine)

Jack hands JJ a Captain America doll. “For daddy,” he instructs with a nod of his little head. His mother and father’s blood has mixed into his cotton blend baby blue t-shirt. An intangible stain on his most prized possession. His Captain American shirt.

JJ cups the figure in her hands, tears swelling in her eyes. His traditionally blonde hair has been crudely drawn over by a sharpie. Making it black.. “I’ll give it to him.” she promises. Lightly, she touches the tiny details of the figure. The belt and features that have worn down with use. With Jack’s love.

“Miss JJ?” Jack’s sucked his thumb into his mouth. A habit she remembers Hotch having a hell of a time getting the boy to kick only a few short months ago. A time that feels so far from now. Another lifetime. Today has been enough already, this isn’t a fight worth having.

JJ’s jogs him up in her arms, holding him a little tighter to her chest. His head having found her shoulder he swings his little legs as he looks up at her. “Yes, Jack?”

He yawns and rubs at his eyes with his fist. “How much longer tell I can see Daddy too?”

Hotch had been taken away in the ambulance. Nearly drunk with confusion he’d gone where directed with no complaint. Raspily asking Dave questions as the EMTs had strapped him to the stretcher, he hadn’t even been aware of the tear streaming down his face.

“In a while,” JJ whispers. She hopes.

-------------------

(I might have used this one in a fic already but I don’t know and can’t find it if so…)

Jack is a baby when Emily Prentiss dies.

Independent, for a five-year-old, Jack still has no formal grasp on what it means to die. He knows Mommy is dead. She’s sleeping in the cemetery and sometimes he and Daddy dress up and go put pretty flowers on stone that says her name. Aunt Jessica tells him Mommy isn’t with the stone anymore but Daddy still talks to it.

Jack doesn’t understand death but he doesn’t have to.

Aunt Pen holds him for a moment too long. His chest feels wrong, his little heart pounding because people hold him like that when something’s wrong.

Uncle Derek’s hand rest on his shoulder, his eyes wet.

JJ presses a kiss to his forehead and sends him to play with Henry. Jack loves Henry but he gets the feeling today isn’t a playing kind of day.

Eventually, Daddy comes and gets him. They sit on the floor-- despite the fact that Jack remembers his father playfully grumbling that he’s getting a little too old to play on the floor anymore. That was only just last week but Jack as the faintest memory of visiting his father in a hospital. Meaning, he understands how things can change very quickly.

And Jack knows. He knew the minute he had to put on the itchy shirt with the collar even though Daddy said they were only going to Uncle Dave’s.

“Buddy--” Jack crawls into his father’s lap and Hotch’s breath is knocked from his lungs. Emily used to fuss with him, constantly reminding him that children are smarter than they’re given credit for. Hotch knows now, as Jack curls his tiny body around his own, that in some small way Jack already knows. “Emmy... Uhm, Emmy’s gone.”

He remembers Daddy was gone once too.

He and Mommy went on vacation. The mean man found them. Then Mommy was gone and Daddy wasn’t.

He’s not so sure that’s what his father’s trying to say.

It’s all he says though because they’re talk it interrupted by Uncle Dave.

“Come here, bub.” Rossi picks Jack up, balancing him on his hip. “Let’s give your ol’ dad a minute, huh?”

Until then Jack hadn’t noticed the tears streaming down his father’s face.

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Every time Hotch asks someone to come to his office there’s a split second- no matter who is it- where they just sit dumbstruck and anxiety riddled because all they can think is “Am I about to be fired?” Then logic kicks in.

Hotch hasn’t fired anyone. Never. Not even when they deserved it.

Tell that to the seven coffee machines Reid and Prentiss have broken.

The time Morgan took his shirt off and did a hand-stand in the middle of the bullpen- of course, he thought Hotch wouldn’t look but that mother hen sees all.

Garcia’s, very much so, against regulation outfits and sexual innuendos that not only has he been on the receiver end of but also Strauss and the Director.

And he’s Hotch. Those perfectly manicured suits can only do so much to hide away his soft heart and goofy laugh.

-------------------

His fuse is running low. A candle drowning in it’s own wax.

Jack’s sick on the one day off he’s had in two weeks and so the one night he had procured for sleep has just been swept out from underneath his feet. Another cruel joke the world seems to love playing on him. Not that he can be mad at a toddler for being sick.

The team notices the next day. The bags under their eyes have dulled to light bruises, nothing a cup of coffee or two can’t fix. Hotch is late. Not actually late but late for his standards. For the decade or better that Derek Morgan has known Hotch, he gets to the office at 7:30, makes a pot of coffee, and hides in his office until 9:30. Today, he’s nowhere to be found.

When he comes trudging in at 10, two black eyes half-lidded and his suitcase nearly brushing the ground as he makes his way to his office. It’s the kind of sight that makes the busy bullpen sputter to a stop.

He sighs as soon as he notices the attention has shifted to him. He knows today is about to get 10x worse before it gets any better.

#criminal minds #aaron hotchner #jennifer jareua #emily prentiss #david rossi #spencer reid #derek morgan #penelope garcia

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jayne-hecate-writer · 7 years

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My Star Wars DVDs...

Hello there my Darlings, I have asked you here today so that we can discuss something that is rather close to my heart, so much so, that rather than just write this blog as I think it up, like I usually do, I have actually researched this one. Now before we get going, I will assume that you have all seen Star Wars...

Oh fuck yeah! I am going to talk about Star Wars and so now all of you nerds reading this are no doubt are sharpening your Wolverine claws, in readiness to tear me a new one for mixing up the basic facts. If that were not bad enough, you purists are then going to bite my head off for coming out and saying proudly that Jar Jar Binks was really not that bad and I actually quite liked him! Go on hate me.

If you are still reading this, then be warned, what I am about to discuss may contain spoilers, particularly if you have not seen all of the Star Wars content available.

However, before we get there; this blog is not me trying to work out the story of episodes eight or nine, nor is it me looking for hidden meanings in the stories. Instead, this piece is about my love of Star Wars, my personal journey both with and within the franchise and how I discovered some surprising things about myself and the world, as I explored the Star Wars universe.

My first real memory of Star Wars was seeing The Empire Strikes Back, upon its release, when I was probably no more than eight or nine, which would have been around 1982. The memory is hazy and to make matters more interesting, I saw the film in a British Army cinema while living in Germany, so it is anyone's guess how long after official release that was. Upon release of this movie, I can recall utterly falling in love with the Empire and in particular the AT-AT walker. The nerds among you will now be wondering if I call these great beasts at-ats or Aye Tee Aye Tees. This is by itself a complex question and one that I believe both Dave Filoni and Pablo Hidalgo have given ambiguous answers too, so I can hardly give an opinion, can I?

With the release of Return of the Jedi; I was again in a foreign country and I did not see this movie until it was shown on television! This is almost a blasphemy, but in my defence in lived in a country that was not English speaking and I do not know if the army cinema was still going at that point.

My Dad did of course show us all of the movies when they came out on VHS, but these were rentals rather than bought movies when back in the days of our youth, we rented the movies that we wanted to see, rather than collected vast sets of tapes, like we do now with DVD.

The next step for me came when I met another Star Wars fan and we house shared for a few years. At least once a month, we would go through the movies, starting with good old VHS and then moving into DVD when they became more common. My friend at the time also introduced me to the idea of collecting real movie props and well made replica props. Genuine prop blasters used in the Star Wars films were made from real guns, modified with added on parts. I seem to recall that the Storm Troopers used blasters modelled on the Stirling SMG, a gun I recognised because my Father was issued one while in the Army. My friend had a plastic replica toy, full sized and painted white with a bright orange tip. I was super impressed by this gun, even more so because it had Star Wars printed on the side in the the iconic logo font. These days I would be less impressed by such a toy, but this is only because I am now familiar with the replica props made by many You Tube users, that look screen ready.

In 1999 I got my first really good job on an activity centre in North Wales, working as a climbing instructor. On my first day on the job, I stood in my very first staff meeting and in front of a group of about twenty people, none of whom I knew, I laid my nerd credentials on the table for all to see. In my strong and determined voice, I informed my new team that I very much needed a day off in the middle of the summer season to go and see the new Star Wars movie: Episode One - The Phantom Menace. There was a lot of laughter from my new colleagues, but their laughter quickly faded until the summer and the movie came up in conversation once again, on the day it was released. My manager had forgotten that he had agreed, months in advance, for me to have the day off to see the movie; until I reminded him of his decision of course.

There was a lot of concerned faces and then a few happy grins as our conversation was remembered. My manager and I then set out in the company Land Rover, with half of the other instructors along for the ride to the cinema in Bangor just to see a brand new Star Wars film. The prequels came out over the next few years, but that first film remains strong in my mind for the memories it brings. Especially as a few days after seeing it for the first time, the Boss and I escaped again to watch the movie for the

second time. Yes, I know that many of you disliked this movie, but I enjoyed it and I actually thought that little Jake Lloyd was rather cute as Anakin.

After the release of Revenge of the Sith; things on the Star Wars front went quiet for a while. True, there was the Clone Wars cartoon, but the very first season of this was a stylised set of war movie shorts that never really gave us the strong characters whom we knew and loved. Later revamped seasons used a different style of animation that was more story oriented; but I am still trying to gel with the seasons as they are. Sadly and according to the Lead Star Wars Story Group writer, Dave Filoni, the Clone Wars came to an end before he was able to finish the story.

With the Sale of the Star Wars franchise to Disney, things looked bleak. A close friend of mine messaged me via Facebook to inform me that just like him and all of his favourite super heroes; Disney now owned my soul. At the time I felt like it was a sad day indeed. How wrong I was. George Lucas appointed Kathleen Kennedy to head of Lucas Film as he retired and she took the franchise to a whole new level.

Most recently Rogue One came out and for the first time in my adult life, I found myself sat with my girlfriend at a midnight showing, on the opening night of a movie so powerful, I spent most of the final act weeping. As the titles rolled at the end, the audience as one mind stood and they clapped a furious applause. As I wrote at the time, it felt as if I had found my people.

Which now leads me to this time, when as I write this, I have The Force Awakens playing on Blu-Ray, having worked my way through the whole fucking set set. Some time ago, I discovered within the forums of Star Wars fans that there is a suggested play list for all of the movies. Now obviously, our Great Holy Father Lucas says that we should watch them in numerical order. But if we do this, it leads us to some uncomfortable moments in the story, moments that Star Wars fans like Seth Green used to great effect in his TV show Robot Chicken.

We start with Episode One - The Phantom Menace

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMG2PQ7oIr0

Second comes Episode two - Attack of the Clones.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DFOE0td1Yw

Third is Episode three - Revenge of the Sith.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7FMh3YtK_w

That is the official prequels in all of their slightly hammy goodness and I love them. They do however lead us as intended into the original trilogy.

The fourth movie is Episode Four - A New Hope.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cizlx6ODhuE

Fifth comes Episode Five - The Empire Strikes Back

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMMVrYly73k

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpE_xMRiCLE

Sixth in the list is Episode six - Return of the Jedi.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvfp5l7kgo4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qAKXK_aLeA

That is the original child pleasing trilogy with all of the goofiness of stone age technology teddy bears bringing down the vast industrial complex of the empire with just logs on ropes.

Up next is the newest trilogy, only one of which has so far been released.

The seventh movie is Episode Seven - The Force Awakens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaOSCASqLsE

Later this year comes Episode eight - The Last Jedi.

In 2019 we can expect Episode nine – which is as yet still untitled.

Before you even start to think it, I am not here to theorise along lines of

what these movies are going to be about or how the death of our Princess Carrie Fisher will affect them. What I will add though is the thought that the other films and TV shows in the saga have to fit into this story line somehow, but where and when? If we insert them into the time line, we can put The Clone Wars after episode two and then rebels after episode three. At the end of rebels we can insert Rogue one and somewhere in here will be the new Han Solo movie, due out in summer 2018 (forty one years after Han Solo first hit the big screen). When asked if we should watch them in this order, it seems that official opinion is that the main films are in order with the other films and shows can be put in around them, pretty much when you fancy. But this does not work for me, I want see the progression of our characters. I want to see the story arc played fully.

This brings us onto the now famous Ernst Rister order, named after the man who developed it. His playlist puts them in a strange order so that the big reveals can be kept. After all, what good is it learning that Anakin and Padme had children, when the big reveal of episode five is that Luke is Vader's son? So with that in mind, his order goes as follows.

Episodes four and five in order. Flash back to episodes one, two and three in order. We then finish up with Episodes six, seven, eight and nine. Again the other films and shows can be watched when you like without upsetting the basic story too much.

For all of you baby Anakin haters, there is also the Machete Order. A dirty playlist which removes episode one all together, but still puts the rest roughly in the Ernst Rister order. The big difficulty with this dirty playlist is that when you watch the Clone Wars series and then Rebels, some of the plot makes no sense, especially if you are a fan of Maul in those later stories. Seeing the terribly sad closing of Maul's storyline in Series three of Rebels did once again move me to tears. Not bad for what is in effect a kids cartoon show. Don't judge me too harshly though, Father Lucas does get a little freaked out by us hardened Star Wars fans and he does remind us all from time to time that he did make them mainly as kids movies!

Now with the release of the breath taking Rogue One and the fabulous Rebels, I wanted to put them into the time line and the viewing schedule. Oh yeah, did I not say that I was a bit of a Star Wars nerd? Given that I own most of these on DVD now and with my being physically rather broken thanks to illness, I have the means to try to sit down and watch these things

in one go. I have since discovered much to my consternation that it is no longer possible to do all of Star Wars in a single day. Using an adaptation to the Ernst Rister method, I fitted Rogue one, Rebels and The Clone Wars into the set too and this was the watch order that I experimented with, along with my darling partner and it led to some serious discussion between us over whether it worked.

Jayney's viewing order.

Rebels season 1 - 3.

Rogue One.

Episode Four.

Episode Five.

Episode One.

Episode Two.

The Clone Wars Season 1 - 6.

Episode Three.

Episode Six.

Episode Seven.

I will add episodes eight and nine along with the Han Solo movie to this list as soon as they are released.

So what have I missed out? Well to start with there is the infamous Christmas Special... That horror is available on You Tube (I am not linking to it, if you want to look for it, that is up to you) and I have watched it. Well some of it, well I had to and I can confirm that it is nasty! I can see what Father George has disowned it!

I have also missed out the Ewok Movies. After all, in their day the Ewoks were considered to be as popular as Jar Jar became in the prequels. I have also missed out the animated series Droids, mainly because I don't think that it is considered cannon any more. According to my research it is available on DVD, but some of the less scrupulous cartoon networks on line also have it available. Now that you know this, be warned. If you want to show this series to your kids, the on line experience is likely to expose you and your kids to the sort of hardcore porn that is frankly frightening. This is after all how these unlicensed websites pay for their bandwidth. I have also not included the new animated series of short individual stories, called Forces of Destiny. This because at the time of writing, they are not officially

out yet out.

My biggest omission by far though is the written word, those stories of the expanded universe (known in Star Wars circles as the EU, probably the only EU half of Britain will allow discussion of!) of star wars, books that introduced us to fabulous characters such as Grand Admiral Thrawn, who later became a central part of Rebels. There are so many books, comics and shorts here, that it is all but impossible to fit them all in, let alone read them all in one lifetime. Unfortunately, The Star Wars Story Group have also stated that many of the original books are no longer considered cannon. They no longer fit into the Star Wars Universe, removed like a bad cutting in a row of vibrant plants.

Finally, I have also ignored the impossible viewing experience of the Time Machine Order, which takes the movies back to how they were when Jedi came out and before father George fiddled with them. My reason for this is simple. Face it people, that time has passed. From now on, Solo shoots second, Young Anakin appears as a Force Ghost in Return and Vader when revealed beneath his helmet, will always have lost his eye brows. So my fellow fans, wipe your tears away and move on. It is not the 1980s any more! More importantly, when I checked my old VHS editions of the original trilogy, it is the widescreen revamped version from the early 2000s. Bugger!

So you may ask, what was like like watching Star Wars in such a complicated and comprehensive way? Did it fulfil my viewing needs? Was the great reveal still a resounding shock? Did it work?

Well, ahhhh… No.

Now I can maybe see the point of viewing them like this if you have never seen them before. As a story teller myself, I can see the benefit in the mechanism of the flashback, I really can, but for me, it made the whole story too much of a mess. Flitting about in the time line made it a pain to follow. It also put some of the more boring elements of the saga right in the middle of the story. Namely following the terrifying end of Empire, where we witness the power of Luke’s failure on Bespin, we dived straight into a low grade trade dispute and encountered the jelly brained Jar Jar Binks. The lesson here is this, do as the Holy Father says, watch them in order.

Now on the subject of Jar Jar, I must say that I was genuinely taken by the theory that he was a secret Sith Lord. The evidence was there for Jar Jar turning out to be on the Dark Side, but it appears that the story was changed following criticism of the character by fans. The only person who knows the truth of what the Holy Father wanted to do with Jar Jar is the Holy Father himself and Lucas has been less than keen to discuss it as fully as I (and many others) would like. Instead, several members of discussion forums and even You Tube have dissected the theory, examined the evidence and stated their conclusions. Maybe Dark Jar Jar would have been an interesting way to go, but when you look at what we have in the story arc, it is Jar Jar who creates the special laws that put Palpatine in place. What bigger hint towards his fall into the darkness is there than that? I like to think of Jar Jar afterwards, once the Jedi are all but gone, with him sat alone in his world of empty rapidly fading power, lamenting on the choices he made. It is so sad and it was this type of thinking that gave me a new sympathy for him as a character.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rHyf0FBvt4

Meanwhile another development has occurred in the franchise that also appeals to me and it is something that comes up time and time again. If Anakin was destined to bring balance to the force, how was he to do it if he had to pick a side? By choosing between the light and the dark; he created an imbalance that Luke carried on into episode seven. Maybe this is why the Jedi order collapsed around him and why Ben Solo became Kylo Ren and followed Snoke? Maybe this is what is meant by Luke in the trailer for the new film when he says that the Jedi must end? Sadly I am not going to explore that line of thought. When the new film comes out this winter, I do not want to have spoiled it for myself by concentrating on theories and trying to work out the story. Instead, I prefer to wait and find out. Only then can I discuss it.

However, there is another area for clues that we can discuss and that lies within the story of Kanan Jarrus, in series three of Rebels. After he is blinded during his duel with Maul, Kanan escapes from the Sith temple with the help of Ezra and they take the Sith and Jedi holocrons to the new Rebel Base. It is here that Kanan sits in combined self pity and misery until, that is, until he encounters the fabulously interesting being called The Bendu. The Bendu is neither a creature of the light nor of the dark, but rather something else. He states that he is of the Grey. Thus The Bendu is

balanced in the force, he sees both the light and the dark, the Ashla and the Bogan and I would love to see the story take this arc. This is clearly preferable over the moralistically easier writing of “good over comes evil and everyone lives happily ever after”. As a plot device this vagueness is far more interesting. This is especially so when given that The Bendu is barely understood by Kanan or Esra and is capable of so much more than either Vader on the Sith side and Kanan on the Jedi.

When you look at Rogue One, there are again these moments of grey, acts of good carried out by the Empire and acts of evil carried out the Rebels. Neither Jyn Erso or Cassian Andor have led lives free of the dark side, Cassian pretty much admits as much towards the final act of the film as they prepare to take the Imperial transport. The result is that this film is darker, grittier and more believable. As we see Cassian and Jyn give up everything that they are to make the universe safer, maybe they have moved more into the light? But in doing so, they have walked through an awful lot of dark to get there. It is for this reason that I think that the stories should be viewed in Time line order

Maybe when Yoda states that there is another, when talking to Obi-Wan as he fears for the loss of Luke in episode five, he is referring to Kanan training Ezra? Providing of course that the Rebels of Lothal survive the final season of Rebels as it leads into Rogue one.

Of course, The Bendu is not the only Force wielding being not to follow so blindly the doctrine of the Jedi or the Sith. There is also Ahsoka Tano, Anakin’s former apprentice from the Clone Wars. She leaves the Jedi order and yet still wields the force and a pair of white sabres. Her loss in the Sith Temple was another moment that brought me to tears as I watched Rebels. The same Rebels that appear in Rogue One, with the Ghost appearing in several scenes, Chopper rolling through one scene and a PA call for Hera. Could they make it any more obvious that the Rebels end up in the world of Episode Four? This is why the Ernst Rister Order does not work for me, it leaves out far too much important detail.

Well there you go. This must be one of the longest posts I have written and it has taken me days of research, days of watching Star Wars and hours of thought to compile my argument. Was it worth it? The answer to that is obvious. I was watching Star Wars, of course it was worth it.

#star wars #fan theory #viewing order #Star Wars Viewing order #jar jar binks #rogue one #star wars rebels

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