Inspirational quote of the day

"Jesus, remind me never to go back to Scans Daily. Good LORD, that was the dumbest conversation I’ve read in ages. Holy crap. What the hell HAPPENED to that place?" - Gail Simone.

In light of recent frustration from my friends, I thought this would be a good time to point out that Gail Simone is seen as just about the most feminist, progressive, talented writer in the comic book industry by Scans_Daily. When she says she wants to write an embattled character like Cass Cain, people see her as that character's messiah. So when I say this, I mean it in the most literal sense.

Warehouse 13 fic: I Will Survive (Myka/H.G.)

You asked for a sequel. You. Asked.

Title: I Will Survive
Fandom: Warehouse 13
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: 6,744
Notes: This story takes place during season 3.
Characters/Pairings: Myka/H.G.
Previous: Bastille Day
Summary: The one time Myka had her way with H.G. Wells

( Agent Bering, I have a proposition. If you accept, I'll give us another chance. If not, we call it off. )

Charlie's Angels is so awful, let me tell you about it, SO AWFUL

To be honest, I'm doing this for revenge. This show is from the guys who did Smallville, and Smallville is the show that devoted an entire season to Darkseid and sundry bullshit, but never gave me live-action Barda. And I know these assholes were out of power by the time season ten came around, but I'm like Dr. Phibes after his wife died. I'm not only going after the people responsible, I'm willing to burn anyone who looked at her funny. Revenge on!

Okay, what do you think when you hear the phrase Charlie's Angels? Cheesy 70s fun? Sexual exploitation under the guise of feminist empowerment? That crappy sequel where the Angels were CGI 60% of the time?

Well, fuck the entire concept of brand awareness, because the new Charlie's Angels is grim and gritty, son! With edge! To the extreme! Like, all the Angels are corrupt cops, dishonorable discharges, and third-degree murderers. And Minka Kelly gets strung up and tortured with a taser! And the Angels threaten to have someone tortured with a nailgun by a Russian crimeboss. Oh, AND THE VILLAIN MASSACRES AN ORPHANAGE FULL OF NUNS AND SELLS THE ORPHANS INTO SEX SLAVERY.

I am not fucking kidding here. That happened on primetime. From now on, I'm calling this show Charlie's Angels: SVU.

So, like, the pilot starts with the Angels all sassing around and rescuing a kidnapped girl from the sex trafficker who's going to sell her to pedophiles... it's really fucking dark, is what I'm getting at. I don’t know, it's like Murtaugh and Riggs quipping up a storm while bringing in a Nazi war criminal ("Looks like... it's just Jew and me!"). Just, not really an appropriate topic for sudsy fun.

Also, they rip off the spyhole bit from The Transporter and someone says she's dropping in while she's lowering herself into the bad guys' lair. Fuck this show and give it an STD.

And to continue the weirdly edgy, yet kitschy and girly and generally schizophrenic, nature of this show, the Hispanic Angel gets blown up. (The poets write of grieving: "I never thought my heart could... HURT THIS MUCH!" "Just remember: You're angels of justice, not angels of vengeance.") She's then replaced by her best friend, Minka Kelly Angel, who has the exact same backstory (she grew up in a South American orphanage because her parents were missionaries), but isn't as... ya know... swarthy.

Speaking of raciness, Bosley is now a Latin Lover instead of Bill Murray, Bernie Mac, or that other guy who I don't care about because I'm young and anything that happened before I was born is culturally irrelevant. But not only has Bosley been more races than Michael Jackson, he's now, you know, useful, and goes with the Angels on missions and can beat people up. So it's not so much Charlie's Angels as "Charlie's Angels And Also This One Dude."

Forty minutes in and we have the Angels "sexily" dressing up as devils (get it?) for a costume party. And Minka Kelly Angel hid in a church as a kid and used an angel statue to hit the bad guy. I remember that Smallville did this all the time, with little "Easter eggs" about how Clark Kent would eventually be wearing a cape, red manties, and blue spandex every five minutes, just in case we thought we were watching the secret origin of Dr. Fate on accident. Here, it's even stupider, because they're already Angels, so do they really need to rub it in?

I guess the "update" here is that the Angels are all kinda jerks, looking for redemption (which is so much more feminist than them being underappreciated women who joined a detective agency to use their talents to the fullest. HOW CAN YOU BE MORE SEXIST THAN THE 70s?). Only their criminal pasts really have no bearing on the plot or how they act. So scratch that as a reason for this to exist.

And another thing, the "team member dies, replacement serves as our protagonist and introduction to the ensemble" thing worked in The Inside because that was a dark show, but this is supposed to be light-hearted fun, right? We're supposed to be getting an idea of what the show is like, but it's all dowdy and grimy because someone died. Just very poor storytelling.

Even revenge isn't worth watching this show. I'm firing a bullet into the ground next to the bad guy's head and walking away. This is over. Revenge won't bring her back.