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What’s your opinion about Luke?

Lol, after my recent track record of hating dim white guys, you’d think I wouldn’t care for him, but honestly, he’s a genuinely sweet dude who was already in over his head BEFORE his gf realized she was in love with a girl and is now stuck in a situation he has no knowledge or understanding of. I actually feel sorry for him (although not as much as for like, every other character, given what they went through). 

The writers always center Sterling or even April in his scenes, so he just furthers their story, beyond providing comic relief. In fact, a lot of the first half of the show was setting up moments that would later be contrasted with Stepril, like how Sterling happily left him to help Blair but clearly did not leave April, to the point of actually hurting Blair. Or how she couldn’t even force herself to be sad after the breakup with Luke while with April…yeesh. 

As long as this kind of character in female-led media serves the female characters, I’m fine, but when they get the development at the female characters’ expense? I don’t love that. And it’s not like Luke didn’t get any development, honestly, his scene with Sterling in the finale and especially during the breakup earlier were my favorite with him, not even when he was being dumb and funny but just heartfelt and genuine. So yeah, currently, I like him. Could change in s2 if they do what I said I don’t like up there, but I hope not!

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I feel like April is totally within her rights to not be ready to be out yet. She’s been hiding her sexuality for years in their very southern, very conservative world. And Sterling expects her to be out after like….what two days of secretly hanging out and kissing? I mean, they weren’t even together for a week were they?

Oh, for sure! My position from the start was actually a very strong “she doesn’t have to come out at any point for the likely duration of this show!” so that’s what the previous answer was, me lightly backing off of that because it IS so painful and you can see its effects on her. But of course it has to be done with so much care. That’s the thing, this being a TV show, there’s what’s best for the character/rep and what’s most dramatic and often those are not the same thing. 

About Sterling, like. I sympathize! She got caught up with it, she’d JUST had a huge fight with her twin where the issue wasn’t the same-sex thing but instead the secrets, that’s the mindset she was carrying with her into the finale. It’s hard to balance, and even if it was a few days, clearly it was this very charged satisfying new dynamic that was making her feel something she seemed to have been chasing since the start of the show and probably before. And on some level she and April have known and been circling each other since at least the 5th grade. I can get that it felt super significant to her, worth the coming out.

Neither side is wrong–this isn’t even a sides thing, this is just…circumstance. They both have done not great things but are both understandable and ultimately sympathetic, they’re just kids making the best of normal kid stuff as well as the larger social injustices of homophobia.

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I would love for April to come out but for her, not only to get back with sterling, I want her to come out and then working things out with sterling and eventually that they get back together ❤️

I’ve been thinking over this and I know that when I first watched I was all, some people just don’t get to come out early! April shouldn’t have to go through this arc if she’ll be left disowned or whatever, they shouldn’t focus on coming out as the only goal, she has a right to prioritize her security and future, but I happened to catch a gifset of the skeeball scene and as always, paused on this one because it is the cutest:

image

And like, it made me super sad! For ONCE, she’s allowing herself to be so open with someone, not having to guard every word and glance and motion, knowing it’ll be accepted without judgment and with safety, like, she can trust in this dynamic in a way she can’t with anybody else! The closet is such a particular kind of hell when you know how the people around you will react, it truly is traumatizing to be that watchful and careful and afraid CONSTANTLY. I used to be afraid I’d accidentally say something incriminating in my sleep! It’s literally like being undercover or a spy in enemy territory, you don’t get any respite. Except the enemy in this case are your family and friends, the people you’d go to for comfort in any other situation.

But for just this moment, she’s letting herself relax with someone, and the worst part is? The worst part? She’s fully self-aware! She knows how intense she is! She knows how high-strung she usually is, how she comes across, how people regard her, how she’s been forced to be these last years. But what other choice does she have? Nothing until she comes out.

So I’ve changed my mind, anon. You’re right, I hope she does come out, and of course she is a fictional character, but I hope that kids–people in her position get to see a way out of it without too much loss. Her father becoming accepting would be too unrealistic but maybe it could be a Quinn Fabray kind of situation where they deal with him once and for all, that is actually plot-relevant, and then her mom is better about it? I just hope they treat it with the kindness I want for her. 😡

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You know what was a “cute if you catch it” moment? Sterling pretty much crouching against that wall in the laser tag room so she was the same height as April when they kissed. I am a sucker for height difference.

Aww, I didn’t notice that!

Aw, she’s just like, braced against the wall to stay that low for a lengthy period of time. I don’t really care about height differences in the sense that, like, I prefer them, I’m fine either way, but they’re still adorable! Especially when the shorter one is way more the scarier one. The second season should make use of a reversal, with like, I dunno, stairs or a desk or something. 

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I’m glad I follow you because had I not know where TBH is going, I wouldn’t have made it through the opening without knowing it wasn’t just super hetero the whole time.

And another anon:

I just wanted to thank you for the Teenage Bounty Hunters rec, I saw your gif posts and was curious. It was a revelation. I binged it in one day, the show is completely off its rocker its actually refreshing. Thank you!

I’m glad you gave it a chance! I liked it a lot, the humor, the love, the f/f.

I really wish there was a way I could alert y’all to new f/f without giving it all away in the gifset, it’s a fundamentally different experience not knowing who it’s gonna be or how it unfolds! 

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Ok but my favourite moment between them is the phone call when Sterling says she’s not coming to school. The whole exchange is just for freaking adorable.

It isssss. It’s so them, April is written so distinctively and she is just, like, aside from the Christian thing and the closeted thing, SO intense and extreme. Truly Paris Gellar if she’d been born in Atlanta. The way she jumps from not wanting to get sick to being afraid Sterling is a Slacker (and probably rethinking their relationship–she can be with a girl but not with…a bad student) and then thinking Sterling’s told Blair who reacted badly and just running away forever. What a kid! I love her. 

But I especially love how Sterling just calmly responds to each escalation, knowing how to deal with April. It’s a representation of the best part of their dynamic, where April expresses concern in her own super intense way, Sterling understands where she’s coming from and reassures her, and goshhh, the whole prolonged goodbye. I can’t blame April for getting carried away, it was the sweetest thing ever. At that point, they both really thought this was going to carry well into the future and were settling in.

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As much as i hate it, i feel like if we do get a second season, the truth about april knowing the twins brought their dad in is gonna be like another last episode cliffhanger and possibly “undo” much of the pining thats gonna build throughout the entire season

Ugh, I knowwwww. Surprisingly, they saved some pretty major revelations for next season and while I don’t know when the parents will find out they’re bounty hunters (that might just last throughout the show, like Clark Kent’s secret identity), Sterling’ll sexuality’ll be revealed to her parents at some point so we can process through a coming out, possibly bad reaction and all, but the s1 finale really set up April finding out next season. The dad’ being out means he’s going to make a move and if he does, April’ll find out at some point. 

Unfortunately, it really would be exactly the kind of drama I expect from TV shows, for them to finally work their way through their current obstacles only for this next huge one to pop up. It’s not just that they turned him in, April hates people lying to her SO MUCH, especially the people who love her, and Sterling offering her sympathy about her dad multiple times and having done this? She’s gonna be SO MAD. The show’s not gonna get that out of the way early on, right, not when it can milk it for extra drama. 😡

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I really think Teenage Bounty Hunters just loves its own characters way most shows would never love people like that. Most TV with a liberal mindset seems to have no respect at all for classic red state values and always needs to disclaim the values before showing the holders as good people. I legit think that the Wesleys might be the emotionally healthiest TV family I have ever seen. (Blanket publishing permission disclaimer for this as I found you in public searching.)

Hmm, I’m not sure I entirely get what you mean by classic red state values, but I do think the show did disclaim and at times gently and affectionately mock the characters? And I feel like most shows in general do love their characters? Suddenly on the spot I can hardly think of any at all, but for example, as harsh a look at that world as it was, Justified really examined the circumstances that created its characters and seemed to have this understanding and sympathy for them. Or, actually, another southern Christian series, Greenleaf, that show loved those characters! …Ambitions loved its characters less, lol. D:

Hmm, emotionally healthy… I mean, I don’t think they’re unhealthy, but I think as a TV rule, they’re about as healthy as most fictional families where the conflict isn’t about how unhealthy they are? But they are pretty solid and I want to see how they deal with this upcoming drama from all these secrets.