Things I made today

[sabotabby]

 1. Charoset that looks like vomit but tastes roughly correct:



It's a bit boozier than I remember it being. Probably because all the recipes call for Manischewitz, which has been banned in my household ever since I became a grown-up who lives on her own and drinks actual wine.

2. This logo for my new baseball league:


For those of you who aren't Canadians, it's a reference to this. I want to make baseball jerseys or hoodies or something. After I've cleaned up the design, anyway.

3. A difference in the lives of children. :)

In other news, I still have massive feels about the Black Sails finale so anyone who wants to talk about it with me, please please please. Also, I'm wondering if I should end my paid account on LJ and get a paid account on DW to get more icons.

Comments

[smhwpf]

Aaah, it was awesome, was it not? (Black Sails). You were right, Flint was capable of happiness! Amazing how they pulled off leaving Flint, Silver, the Maroons, Jack, Ann, and Max in a good place, and Woodes Rogers in a bad place, while not messing with either history or fictional canon too much.

Was Silver right to do what he did? He was manipulating everyone, but he was surely correct that the war Flint and Madi wanted could only have ended with massive loss of life and almost certainly the brutal crushing of the Maroon communities as well as the pirates. But Madi had a right to feel betrayed.

It's amazing just how many times everyone betrayed everyone else, yet you can still sympathise with most of them as characters. (Well, not really Woodes Rogers. Glad he came to a bad end.)

Silver got more and more awesome. And I love Max. Even though she did betray the pirates. (Again, understandable from her pov. What, another fucking war? Do. Not. Want.)

What was your take on it all?

[sabotabby]

I HAVE SO MANY THOUGHTS

So as much as Silver was right about the inevitability of the outcome (and as much as a viewer I'm pleased to see his Machiavellian tendencies being used towards an ending where everyone lived happily ever after), he was wrong to take the choice away from the Maroons and Madi in particular. Remember, she's not just a damsel in distress—they made that clear repeatedly—she's a military leader, and the person that the community has decided is best equipped to decide if they go to war or not. We as viewers know that there was not a combined Maroon-pirate revolt that drove the British out of the Caribbean, which makes him far more sympathetic as a result. From her perspective, this is the best shot they have ever had at ending slavery. He has far less to lose than any of the Maroons do—he could die and lose his friends and the love of his life, but they're facing maybe centuries of their entire people being enslaved. A brutal, endless war may be a better option than that if there's even the possibility of victory.

I'd have liked to see a scene between Flint and Julius. Without it, we don't know to what extent the Maroons are okay with the treaty. If there's an internal coup with Julius as leader, it is still horrible (and sexist) for Madi, but at least they have some self-determination and it's not a white guy deciding what's best.

I struggle to think of a single other show, ever, which has given us a queer antihero with ideas that are radical even to a contemporary audience, had them do a bunch of terrible things in the name of a cause, and then given them a happy ending with the person that they love, and this show did it twice. (Ann/Max/Jack being together at the end isn't shown on screen, but Ann and Max got the beautiful reconciliation in the penultimate episode, so I'm going to go with the OT3 still being together and possibly becoming an OT4 because lol "Mark" Reed.) Like I can't get over how gleefully happy this makes me, and how utterly surprised I was by it. I was gearing myself to see Jack or Flint die in the finale—not because it makes sense historically/fictionally, but because that's how stories like theirs always end. Thomas being alive was a fan crack theory after S2; again, not something I'd expected to see at all. And they completely made it work and it was wonderful.

I love Max too. She's only ever been about survival—all of her power plays are in the interest of survival—because as a queer WOC born into slavery she has never had the privilege of ideals. Her betrayals are entirely forgivable in that context, and I'm so happy to see her on top with her badass new advisor.