Stuff! And things!

[alias_sqbr]

Who wants a postcard? I printed samples of some of my redbubble art to make sure it printed ok and now have nothing left to do with them. Leave a comment with your address to be sent a random piece of art! Comments screened, any country is ok, art may contain mermaid boobs unless you ask for it not to.

metanews has started up and is worth checking out.

Speaking of meta, Skygiants has some really interesting meta on Night Watch and Les Mis (I am only vaguely familiar with Les Mis and enjoyed it)

Firvulag gave a nice review of Core Cidery which we all went to for Cam's birthday.

I finished and reviewed "Delusions of Gender by Cordelia Fine over on my other blog but in short: it was good! I ended up skimming "Gone Girl" by Gillian Flynn: it was triggery (emotional abuse and to a lesser extent rape) and mean spirited and I have very mixed feelings about it's portrayal of gender but afaict is a very good psychological thriller. I also skimmed "Railsea" by China Mieville just because it was boring, but it you like boys own sea adventures, trains, and clever fantasy worldbuilding you'd probably enjoy it (I only like the last two)

Something that recently struck me: Sherlock uses the fact that their Watson is male to play up the "wow, isn't it a bit weird how close these two are?" slashy disquiet by having him do things that seem almost but not quite romantic and thus feel wrong (to a heteronormative audience). Elementary uses the fact that their Watson is female to play up the "wow, isn't it a bit weird how close these two are?" slashy disquiet by having Sherlock do things that feel wrong between two people of the opposite sex that aren't dating (to a heteronormative audience), like him choosing her clothes and offering to choose her underwear in a totally non sexual way.

I personally prefer the Elementary version, but mostly I just find the symmetry interesting.

Comments

[sanguinity]

Sherlock and Elementary: ...y'know, so they do. Which makes the queerbaiting-ness of the first even more annoying.

[alias_sqbr]

Yeah, it's one of many reasons I never got around to watching season 2.

[hebethen]

That's interesting! I feel like Elementary's more casual and less shipteasy about it? Dunno, maybe I just don't have strong shipping goggles for m/f pairs :P

(Your arts are purdy but I would feel bad about shipping to US aha)

[alias_sqbr]

I think Elementary is deliberately not ship teasing, since ship teased het is indistinguishable from "they are actually going to get together" foreshadowing. Joan and Sherlock being a very close unrelated m/f pair who aren't being ship teased is part of what makes them unusual. (It's possible the show will ship them eventually, but it doesn't feel like their current relationship is UST setup)

I am happy to post to the US, sending postcards isn't that expensive!

[hebethen]

Right! Which is why I feel like "they aren't getting together" holds more weight coming from the Elementary writers than "they aren't getting together" coming from the X-Files dude ages ago.