Mummy on the Orient Express will never not be funny.

Danny: So this is your last trip, yeah?

Clara *tossing the sexiest dress of the century into her suitcase*: Yeah why wouldn’t it be

A Simple Favor (2018) dir. Paul Feig

On the Importance of Tears

I’ve seen a lot of post expressing exasperation about or mocking Clara for crying. But the undeniable fact is, she’s always had genuinely devastating reasons to do so. Circumstances of incredible stress, occasions of grievous loss, moments of betrayal. It bothers me that people would take issue with any of these moments or what they ultimately represent.

I mean, the instances I can come up with on the spot:

I have to admit, I feel insulted by the hostilitiy attached to the critiques. Yes, sometimes, just sometimes, she can change the world, right there. She can defeat Gods, she can alter the course of the last Great Time War, she can save the Doctor’s life. She can transform the world with nothing but words, with nothing but the fact that she cares, that she loves, the she has faith, that she loses.

And it is utterly beautiful. These tears become both an expression of genuine human weakness, of not being immovable, and a sign of strength. Sadness isn’t failure, it’s part of the human existence, and it’s not without goodness. Grief and fear and disappointment aren’t an irreparable damage. Sometimes they are power.

I can’t possible express just how important that is to me.

Clara took on his role. Not the Eleventh Doctor’s, but clearly the Twelfth’s, with none of the lightness of the former and all of the abrasiveness of the latter.

The scene in the flat turns the Doctor/companion dynamic on its head. It’s the Doctor who warns Clara to behave in a way which isn’t alarming and it’s Clara who fails only seconds later. She’s losing her hold on that bit of empathy which she needs to understand what she can say around people who are not used to this kind of life.

Later her first instincts is to lie to people to give them hope, fully knowing that at least some of them would probably die. There’s no gentle approach to make people do what she wants, it is “I am the one chance you’ve got of staying alive” and “you wanna walk, walk”. We’ve seen her in command before, but this is a new, darker tone.

Clara has seen two peole die in front of her and she drops them from her thoughts moments later. She adopted the Doctor’s approach to death instinctively, when she finds herself in his role. And so the woman who changed the world with just the power of her tears does no longer have the time to stop and grieve.

Danny saw the Doctor as an officer and saw himself in Clara, cast her in the role of a soldier. But if she ever was that, she’s grown out of that role. Even in the moment where she should have been in her element, keeping Rigsy from needlessly sacrificing his life, her words do not speak of compassion. They are merciless with regards to just how futile this is. They end on a call to arms. And she will defeat the enemy.

She truly wasn’t exceptional at being the Doctor just because she was good. It wasn’t only the cleverness and how she saved Rigsy’s life and drew on his talents. She was exceptional because she was just as flawed as the Doctor. Every step of the way. Lies, arrogance, and "people with guns to their head cannot mourn” are embraced without a look back.

Does Clara realise it in that moment? Or has she yet to notice that she is losing her grasp on what it means to be good, in the way that Clara Oswald is good?

She knew. His clever Clara. He’d never told her with the right words but she still knew. Later, much later, when the ache in his hearts dulled enough for him to function, to think, he’d find some comfort in that. 

He wasn’t very good at showing it. Never had been. But especially not with this face. Eyebrows too fierce. Body too awkward. So he spent time being against hugging, pretending not to be Clara’s boyfriend, trying to be grumpy. Too much time. And in those last moments, that last embrace, he’d worried. 

He had tried to tell her in his own ways. Used different words because the real ones were terrifying. Asked her to come away with him again because the thought of being without her was too much. Held her hand because he wanted to, needed to. Cheated time and death to come back because she asked. Hugged her because it felt right after all to have her in his arms.

Had he done enough to undo all that wasted time? Had she realized how precious, how important, how essential she was to him? Did she know the depth of his love for her?

Yes, she’d told him. She’d seen. She’d felt. She knew. Oh, she knew. 

edit: [he knew]

He knew. Her clever Doctor. He couldn’t remember that she’d told him but he still knew. Later, when the broken remnants of her heart stitched themselves back together, she would find some comfort in that.

She had never been very good at it. And it didn’t help that she’d been wary, at first, of his new face. Everything was so different, so fierce. The eyebrows, the accent, the not hugging. She wasn’t quite sure how to connect with him. How to show him how she felt. Now that she had, she was afraid it was all gone. The neural block was supposed to erase her from his mind, she knew that. But she couldn’t help hoping it wouldn’t take everything. So she’d set up the diner, put on a uniform found in her TARDIS, waited, and worried.  

Had she shown him in enough ways that he’d be able to hold on to it? Did he still know how precious, how important, how essential he was to her? Could he remember how much she loved him?

Yes. Even when she was right in front of him he couldn’t see her, and god, that hurt. But she could tell by the look in his eyes, the way he spoke about her, his smile. That sad, sweet song just for her. His determination to find her even though the neural block was meant to prevent exactly that. This wasn’t a man just missing the woman he loved. He was missing the woman who loved him. 

How desperately she wanted him to remember everything else. How her eyes had inflated with affection for him, how her face had glowed when they were together. How he made her smile and laugh. She knew those things were lost to him. But her feelings, and his, were as clear as ever. She was sure. And that was enough for her. 

He’d understood. He knew. He remembered.

[she knew]

“I think, personally, she is referring to O’Neill, and whether they’re dating or not, I mean, it’s—”

“They’re sleeping together…they’re sleeping together that’s for sure.”

- Ex Deus Machina (S9E07) commentary with Joe Mallozzi and Martin Wood

Whatever their relationship stage/status, Sam and Jack are obviously a couple in season 9 and I love that. 🥰

“You kinda very severely hinted that you and–”

“My fella back home might’ve been–”

“Exactly. Mr. Jack O’Neill.”

“Not to name names.”

“Oh, that’s what it…”

“Yeah, it was incredibly not subtle.”

- Trio (S4E16) commentary with Martin Gero, Amanda Tapping, and Martin Wood

The more I research about conservation, the more I cannot STAND climate doomerism.

"Ough oof we're all gonna die, everything is going extinct, blaaaahhh"

Meanwhile there are so many efforts and projects that are like "Blease...volunteers...interested homeowners.......random individuals who care.....pleas..........literally begging........."

marc spector + ptsd symptoms (insp.)

every time i hear superstar by taylor swift, i genuinely have to talk myself out of opening a word document and writing some twelveclara bullshit

Thinking about Steven Grant and the little pyramid paperweight in his flat that’s mentioned in 1.02 and which alter bought it: If Steven really did buy it himself in a paperweight shop and wasn’t just being sarcastic to the nosey policeman, I can picture him spotting it out of the corner of his eye in a shop window he’s passing by, tired brown eyes lighting up at the sight even though he’s barely slept in months, because it’s a tiny, desk pyramid how cool is that?? “Ancient Egyptians used constellations to align their pyramids, you know,” he can’t help but excitedly blurt out to the clerk who’s ringing him up. (“Look,” he says later, as he holds it up to Gus. “It’s you sized. Neat isn’t it?”)

But I can also see Marc buying it for Steven. Because Marc always gives Steven what he never had, has been building this fantasy of mother who loves him and wants to be part of his life. (And loving mothers gave you presents, didn’t they? Marc imagines they did. He wouldn’t know. His mom never surprised him in any way good.) He spots the paperweight in a store while out on a mission, and walks inside, fresh from a fight, with wild curls and a split lip and a bruise blossoming along his jaw. He’d just been using his hands to fight for his life, but he uses them now to carefully pick up the delicate little pyramid and push it across the counter to the cashier. To Steven. Love, Mum, he scrawls on a note before he boxes it up and sends it to Steven and pretends there’s no ache in his chest as does.

I also like to think of Jake buying it for Steven. Or maybe not buying it, per say, but obtaining it for him. Jake’s just finished a mission, is standing in the wreck of a bad guy’s safe house he’s just taken down, then checks his watch and realizes that he’s been out for so long that Steven’s going to be late for work and sore for reasons he won’t understand. Jake spots the pyramid sticking out halfway under a desk, and picks it up, turning it over in his leather gloves. The guy it belongs to, trust him, won’t be needing it, and Steven likes this kind of thing, doesn’t he? So Jake pockets the pyramid as an I’m sorry you’re late for work, are going to get yelled at by Donna, and have mysterious bruises you can’t explain, here have this gift and plonks it down in the flat, knowing that sooner or later, Steven will find it in that mess he calls home. (Steven does find it, three days later, at two o’clock in the morning, in the middle of his desk, beneath a paper on hyrogliphics and a book of Spanish poetry. He can’t really remember buying it, Steven realizes, as he moves the admittedly charming pyramid someplace he can see it better, but he must’ve because it’s in his flat and it seems exactly like the type of thing he’d buy himself.)

I love Steven Grant and his little reading glasses, and if he needs reading glasses, then that means that Marc and Jake need them too, so now I’m thinking about the other alters wearing them.

Jake in his newsboy cap and dark leather gloves, pulling out the glasses from the inner breast pocket of his jacket to read El Ibérico while he waits in his parked limo.

Marc struggling with a page in a book and Steven chiding him saying, “We’re farsighted, mate, just put the glasses on,” and Marc muttering lowly and begrudgingly in his flat Chicago accent as he fishes around for the little square frames that don’t match his bad boy mercenary style choices at all. “They make me look too old,” he complains, but puts them on anyway, and then Layla comes home and sees her husband in his usual fitted, all-black clothes but this time with glasses on as he leans over his desk, pouring over a book and she thinks, oh, I could definitely get used to this look.

i made a cringe quiz about when you realize you love someone. i dont knwo i think it’s fun also an excuse to practice writing here take it 💖💕💖💕💖

suzanne collins social commentary and foresight should be appreciated more