sholio | (no subject)

spook_me is open for signups! I live in eternal optimism that I will actually finish a story for it. Now I just need to pick my monster ...

There's also this fun-looking femslash promptfest.

We finished watching season three of The Good Place tonight! That show is so fun.

I can't believe how much I ended up loving all of them. This is one of those shows like Schitt's Creek, where my reaction to the first few episodes was mostly "this is funny, but also these people are annoying and I can't stand them" and then by season three I'm riveted and only want all the good things for them and want to go back and rewatch the early episodes to see how much they've changed. The Michael-Eleanor friendship is especially neat.

None of the romances on the show really do much for me (the only one I was kinda halfway into was Chidi and Simone, but they were clearly doomed because of Chidi and Eleanor being Obvious Endgame Ship), but the friendships/teamwork/redemption arcs are all adorable, and I love the show's blending of those elements with serious metacommentary on morality, ethics, and TV genre conventions. It's one of those shows where the satire could easily slip over into mockery of everything (see also: a lot of adult animated shows) but actually plays straight the elements I want played straight (the friendships, redemption arcs, and basic decency of the characters are all real; the moral quandaries are sincere, the emotions heartfelt) while everything else is bonkers and ridiculous. I stopped watching for awhile at the end of season 1 because I couldn't tell if this was going to end up being one of those funny but cynical shows where part of the humor relies on no one ever really getting to win or change for real, but it's not one of those, even though the system itself is unwinnable and unfair.

I love that this show can make you laugh at the OTT absurdity of Tarantula Springs, Nevada and its casino grade school while also pondering the inherent unfairness and cruelty of a system that ties your eternal reward to points-based moral absolutism, and whether even immortal embodiments of abstract value concepts have the capacity to grow, change, and love.

ETA: You know, the other thing that this show manages to pull off with surprising success is memory resets. Normally, permanent memory loss that also resets the character relationships is an absolute nope for me, or at least a source of endless frustration. I think this show makes it work because the entire point of the resets is that even if they don't remember, they'll keep finding their way back to each other, over and over. And that manages to hit a particular narrative button of mine, which is the Saiyuki-esque "reincarnated characters keep finding each other again", even though what's happening to this set of characters is a bit different. But that's the basic appeal of amnesia as a trope, even though I tend to prefer the non-permanent version -- "no matter what, I'll love you again." And the way this show gives us multiple versions of the same people and the same relationships, under different circumstances, manages to get all the emotional value of amnesia, reincarnation, and alternate dimensions, all rolled into one.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Oooh [Bad username or site: spookme @ ...I] washed out of it last year with a prompt about Natasha and Baba Yaga. I could try again....

The nice thing about spook_me is that it doesn't matter how many times you wash out, you can just do it again. :D I've been signing up for 10 years and I think I've managed to finish ... twice? Maybe three times? It's very low pressure.

That is reassuring! lol. I love ToT, and I was thinking about Shipoween too, although I managed a big whopping ONE treat for ToT last year. Altho it was pretty long and ambitious, and I was happy with it. I always mean to write All The Treats. :-/

Oh, I have never heard of Spook Me! Interesting, but on the other hand, I only see like one fandom I know there. :-( . OK, two, so maybe I'll sign up?

I need to get some more mainstream fandoms, I guess, but they all seem to be movies/TV these days.

Spook Me isn't an exchange, so you can sign up with any fandom, no matter how rare! It's also super low pressure and not finishing is fine; I often don't

The memory resets are easily my favorite aspect of that show. The way they always find each other, and you know they always will is just...perfect. 😭

Yeah, at first I was thinking I was going to hate it, but then it turned out that the finding their way back to each other, settling back into the relationships they used to have aspect of the show is such a major part of it that I tend to forget that the current versions of the characters don't actually remember anything in seasons one or two (except for Eleanor, and that's only because Michael showed her some of it).

ETA: You know, the other thing that this show manages to pull off with surprising success is memory resets

Yes! I don't like amnesia/memory reset tropes, so I was very apprehensive about this, but the show is so smart about how it manages the balance of them. Like, the resets that are dwelt on are actually doing new and interesting things, as well as playing neatly off earlier material, and the reset memory state is there just long enough (with some judicious time skips / montages) to do its work and then the character move on and make progress. Usually with memory reset and amnesia tropes I very quickly get to a point here I feel like "but why are we doing this again?", and with The Good Place I pretty much never do.

Yes! Like I was saying in a comment above, it's so well done that I tend to forget the characters in each season don't actually remember the events of the previous season(s). Besides repetition, you'd think the other problem would be a lack of continuity, but the show doesn't suffer from that either. It's just so good.

The Good Place's next season is its last and I am SO EXCITED because if they bring it home they'll pretty much have achieved a perfect game, uh, show -- there is so much that they could do wrong that they somehow do just right. I honestly think the show is brilliant for how deftly it does balance comedy with genuine feeling with really thoughtful and meaningful philosophy. And for how much I love all the characters despite how they all start out so annoying and just, yeah, I love that show a lot~

Yeah, this is one show that I'm fairly confident can stick the landing. Or at least, even if they don't manage to pull it off, I think they'll have satisfying endings for the characters.

I honestly think the show is brilliant for how deftly it does balance comedy with genuine feeling with really thoughtful and meaningful philosophy.

Yes, exactly! And a particular style of comedy - I think that's one reason why I keep expecting the show to be more cynical than it is, because it's that late-90s cynical South-Park-ish sort of vibe, except it's based in a deep underlying faith in people and respect for its characters. I love it.

I keep hoping that next season, they'll let go of the Chidi-Eleanor endgame and make it an OT4, as it really SHOULD be.

Because Jesus Harriet, can we please just have an Eleanor-Tahani onscreen kiss?

You mean OT5 - Janet needs love too!

Because Jesus Harriet, can we please just have an Eleanor-Tahani onscreen kiss?

Awww man, no kidding. I love almost everything about this show, but it's the very definition of queerbaiting with constant jokes about Eleanor finding women hot (and Tahani in particular) but never even a hint of having, or having ever had, an actual relationship with one.

I felt kind of bleh about the first season of The Good Place, but I decided to give season 2 a chance before I gave up on the show, and wow, am I glad I did. The first season 2 episode was awesome.

I really enjoy the way the characters eventually grow fond of each other and get better once given a chance.

I was wondering how they were going to find new things to do with the show before it became too much, though. And then I read that season 4 would be the last, because they felt they would reach the end of the story they wanted to tell, and quietly rejoiced because at least, there's a good chance we'll get a satisfying ending. ♥