#breckstonevailskier

[makesitprecious]

I know that Matt, that mystery besides me loves me in a way that makes every contraction, every conflict in him and me a part of us.

[thefutureiswhat]

Episode 10 promo dissection?

"Did I draw first? Did he?" This dialogue from Odin could support the multiple endings theory. Which is the true truth?

I wonder why Witt is alone going into the dugout -- what happened to the other guys? And if he's tracking Dot, does that mean she's down there?

The irony of Roy leaving the lights on in the tunnel, and Gator not being able to see anything anyway as he moves through.

Dot appears to be kicking a gun (Roy's?) out of the way on the porch of the ranch house.

Roy appears to be shot or stabbed in the same spot as Danish (lower right abdomen), which might explain him bleeding from the mouth, rather than a poisoning like I theorized.

Who is Karen backing away from on the porch? We've seen both Roy and Dot on the porch with weapons in teasers. (In one shot from a previous teaser, Roy stands on the porch holding a bloody knife.)

The orange soda moment mystifies me. It's been pointed out that the person toasting Munch could be Wayne. It does look like his watch. Munch also appears to be missing part of his middle finger. There's a bandage on it.

Can't believe one of the first shots we ever saw of Dot (her on the porch with the rifle) is from the very last episode.

I know nothing about guns, but is she re-cocking the rifle in that shot? If so, who did she already shoot? Or was it a warning shot?

[captainpikeachu]

The Dora Milaje fight is multiple levels of frustration for me.

I understand the tantalizing concept of seeing strong badass competent Black women knocking down a peg against the symbol of white imperialism and colonization, except as usual, TFATWS plays with political and social commentary with no understanding of the nuance or the ability to actually follow through on what it wants a pat on the back for trying to criticize. And they end up making the Dora look like a bunch of politically unsavvy doofus who lost their target and nearly started an international incident for the offense of white arrogance.

Firstly, both John and the Dora want the same thing, to take Zemo into custody. Having a fight in the middle of all this literally did nothing except let Zemo get away and wasting their time to have to chase after him. They were lucky Zemo simply just went to the memorial and waited to be caught, what if Zemo had just wanted to disappear and they never found him again. They didn’t know what Zemo was going to do.

Secondly, numerous moves during that fight could have easily been fatal had John and/or Lemar didn’t have quicker reflexes and managed to parry off the hits. So did the Dora want John and Lemar dead? Or were they just messing around to scare them? If it’s the latter then it’s again wasting time to let Zemo get away. And if it’s the former, then I fail to understand how it helps Wakanda internationally if the Dora Milaje killed Captain America on foreign soil. Why would the Dora do something that purposefully puts their country in international crossfires in such a dumb and obvious way? It makes them look incompetent.

I get that John shouldn’t have touched Ayo, and if she smacked him, I wouldn’t have an issue with it. But the way this fight was done, it just makes little sense. And sure on a first glance maybe it’s a surface level cool fight scene of the Dora being badasses, but it just ends up on deeper analysis looking like the creatives simply needed a cool looking fight scene to knock John down a peg without considering how it makes the Dora actually look incompetent. They’re supposed to be spies and protectors who know when and where to strike, yet here we have them nearly starting an international incident by almost killing the new Captain America, which would have brought a political nightmare to their country’s doorstep — how are they protecting Wakanda by escalating trouble?

And that whole line about the Dora having jurisdiction wherever it finds itself to be — it’s deeply uncomfortable how that line is spoken and supported unironically by the narrative and fandom, effectively saying ignoring and invading other countries’ sovereignty is totally cool as long as it’s the people we like doing it.

Literally all they had to do to make that Dora fight scene work at the very least within the narrative is actually let John throw the first punch so the Dora has to get through him to get to Zemo. But for some reason they decided to make the Dora do it first when John is trying to de-escalate and come to a compromise and the whole thing lets Zemo escape and Sam and Bucky spends a part of that fight basically watching from the sidelines like it’s a funny joke. Imagine if John hadn’t been quicker with his reflexes, what if what happened to Lemar later happened to John then in that fight? Who would be laughing and mocking and finding the situation funny then?

For a story that certainly doesn’t hold back on critiquing John, it never takes a critical look at its own perceived heroes/protagonists. The show lacks so much self awareness.

[team-cap-for-the-win]

Honest question: what would need to differ in the airport battle for everyone on Team Cap to escape with Steve and Bucky?

Hi, thanks for the ask!

Well, the shorter, easier answer is that Team Iron Man would just let them - because ideally they talked it out and Tony could see they have a point in needing to stop Zemo's super soldiers from being activated.

But for the more drawn out what-if scenario, where there still is an airport battle and all, I think the easiest way for them to all escape is to incapacitate as many members of team Iron Man as they can. I feel like they sort of tried to do this - Scott tried to deactivate Tony's suit, Steve got Peter stuck under the airport stairs thingy, and Natasha (honorary team cap member) electrocuted T'challa. All of these factors helped them more than say, Wanda throwing the cars around. So with that in mind I'll try to imagine how they could do this more effectively than in the movie.

So, from what I can tell, they split up in the beginning to try to get to the quinjet and disperse team IM, which isn't a bad idea. You can't account for who is gonna chase who, and throughout the scene, people pick fights with different characters so I'll try to cover who's best equipped to deal with each member.

Tony - Clint could use an EMP arrow, although I can't tell if that would work with the upgrades Tony's got on his suit. Maybe it could slow him down. Likewise, Scott can do the thing he did in the movie and disconnect circuits. And lastly, Wanda could definitely crush the joints of the armor or something like that, but I don't think she'd be willing to risk hurting Tony doing that, for all his faults (I'm not sure how delicate she can be with her magic). Also, any one of them could have a lucky shot and break the arc reactor.

Rhodey - Same as Tony.

Natasha - (disregarding that she helps them later on) Clint knows how she fights the best. Someone super-powered like Steve or Bucky could most likely beat her. Sam could carry her away from the battlefield.

T'challa - He's enhanced and also really wants to kill Bucky, and Steve & Bucky combined could probably take him. Like Natasha's widow bites, Clint could probably use some sort of electric arrow on him.

Peter - The thing Steve did in the movie, trapping him under something heavy, seemed to do the trick. Peter is tricky because he's got webs that could disable like, all of team Cap, but he doesn't use them like that much lol. I don't think anyone is strong enough to fight him hand-to-hand and win based on strength. But he can be outwitted because he's new to super-heroing.

Vision - let's be real the only one capable of making a dent in Vision is Wanda... Which is a problem, since she doesn't want to hurt him again! But to be honest if she did the same thing to him as in the compound (but in the airfield) that could occupy him long enough for them to get away.

Overall Wanda is the strongest member and she could probably wipe the floor with all of them if she really wanted to... Sam (and Clint) gets the short end of the stick here but I think he could definitely distract team IM members and make for easier takedowns. Redwing would be useful for that too. Scott is also a great diversion.

TLDR; Their best bet is disabling team IM members more effectively instead of engaging them needlessly. Which is easier said than done, but maybe in a different timeline they managed that :)

Again, thanks for the ask!

[neshatriumphs]

Cate's bloodshot eyes and seizures are due to Shetty's pills.

I am not being facetious when I say that I do not recall contesting this, though I don't recall them telling us that. But, I will take your word because that woman is turrible

[usaonetwothree]

I'm tempted to ask for a prompt as to how Sam would react if she (instead of Tory) caught Silver paying off the referee.

Sorry it took me so long, @breckstonevailskier! Thanks for the plot bunny!

-----

“You cheating bitch!”

Sam’s hands make contact with Tory’s shoulder, shoving her into the lockers. She manages to catch herself with her elbow and throws herself back upright. Her hands come up, Sam’s not far behind, but when Tory sees who it is, her hands fall back to her sides.

“Get over yourself, LaRusso,” she snaps. “It was a good fight, but I won. Fair and square.”

“No, you didn’t.” Sam shoves her again. Tory takes this one straight to her collarbone, bumping back against the lockers without an attempt to deflect. “I saw Silver after the match.”

Tory’s brow furrows. “I don’t know what he told you, LaRusso, but I didn’t cheat.”

“You didn’t have to. He paid off the refs.”

Sam didn’t know what reaction she was expecting, but Tory’s face falls for a brief second. Just as quickly, her wall goes back up and she licks at her lips. “You’re lying.”

“Don’t try to deny it, Tory. You knew the whole time. You just had to make it look good for everyone else.”

Tory blinks. “I didn’t know. Really.”

She looks so confused that a small part of Sam wants to believe her. But the rest is still raging, burning hot from all their history, from their first meeting to this latest bout, and that’s the part that wins out.

She opens her mouth to unleash a tirade, but Tory beats her to it. “You’re messing with me, right, LaRusso? You didn’t actually see him paying off the refs?”

Her tone was so uncertain, almost breaking, so unlike the Tory Sam had seen in all their previous interactions, that Sam can’t help but relent. Slightly.

“I saw it on the way back to the lockers. They were in the offices. Silver mentioned something about a deal, how the ref played it just right. And then he paid him.”

Tory licks her lips again, and looks dangerously close to crying. “I didn’t know, LaRusso,” she says, almost pleading. “I swear.” She looks over at the trophy where it sits on the bench, and bites down on her lower lip. “He didn’t trust me,” she says, almost to herself.

Sam is suffering through metaphorical whiplash, unable, or unwilling, to process what was happening. She’d come in here wanting a fight, a fair rematch of the final, but instead was watching Tory react what looked genuinely to the news. “You mean you really didn’t know?”

Tory shook her head. “I mean, your mom came up to me before. Wanted me to fight fair.”

“She what?”

Tory apparently misunderstood Sam’s outrage since she barreled forward. “I did, LaRussso, I swear! I didn’t mean to kick you in the eye. I just reacted and your face was right there.”

“Not about that. My mom. She really talked to you before the final?”

Tory nods, then her expression softens even more. “You didn’t know?”

Sam shook her head. “Guess she didn’t believe in me either.”

“She didn’t ask me to throw the fight. Just to fight fair. Which I did.” Tory rolls her shoulders, stretches her neck, looks down at the cement floors. “It was a good match. Could have gone either way.”

“Yeah, but it didn’t. And now my dad’s dojo has to close.”

“What?”

Sam nods. “It was part of the deal. Cobra Kai wins, Eagle Fang and Miyagi-do shut down.”

Tory swallows hard then says, “Sensei Kreese never mentioned anything about that.”

“I don’t see why he would have. With Silver’s money and resources, he thought you had it in the bag. Turns out he was right.”

Tory looks down at her trophy again, this time with sadness. And briefly, Sam feels bad about stealing her joy. She had definitely wanted to, but not like this, not when Tory, for all her faults, seemed to be as much of a pawn in all of this as she was.

“I’m sorry,” she says, before she could change her mind. But only about this. Not about anything else that had happened over the past year.

Tory shrugs, shakes her head. Then her expression hardens into indifference and she turns to face Sam. “Anything other bombs you want to drop on me, LaRusso? Or can I finally go shower?”

“No. That’s it.” Sam takes a breath, then heads for the door, almost but not quite turning her back to Tory as conflicting emotions and thoughts war for her attention.

She wants a rematch. She wants to fight Tory again. Fair this time.

She doesn’t want to fight Tory again. Ever. Not at a tournament, not anywhere else.

She’s exhausted, mentally and physically.

She doesn’t want the pressure, the deal, the consequences. She just wants to do karate. And maybe not even that anymore.

She wants a senior year without a Battle for the Soul of the Valley. She wants to find the bit of herself that was lost over the past eighteen months.

She doesn’t know how to get there exactly, but after a minute, she is able to figure out her next step: a much-needed, and long-overdue, conversation with her mother.

[thomas-the-goat-of-satan]

There is a part of me that feels in 5x04 that Amanda shouldn't have left Daniel. And that by this point, she should've learned the importance of believing Daniel without question when he says "This Cobra Kai individual is bad".

yeah. I feel the same, to a certain extent. however, I kind of understand why she wouldn't? this ordeal has been going on for months now, and the main perpetrators, from her personal experience, have usually been. children. Johnny, someone that Daniel had spoken about for years, ended up not really being That bad. and the other guy, the one that she was genuinely worried about, ended up going to jail. from what I've gathered from canon, I don't think that Daniel has even shared dramatized horror stories about that one crazy guy that he met when he was a teenager the way that he did with Johnny and The Cobras. I don't think he's ever mentioned Terry at all. so from Amanda's perspective, a dude emerges out of the literal shadows, someone that she's never heard of, and everything that's easily googleable about him is staunchly positive. everything that she saw firsthand with Terry was Daniel taking issue with everything that he did, seemingly unprovoked, at an event that she was placing a lot of importance on.

it's just... fuck man, I'm not saying that she was right, not at all. but I am saying that I get it. she doesn't have the perspective that we the audience have, and Daniel seems incapable of expressing exactly what happened, (not said negatively, just... said) so what exactly does Amanda have to base herself on? honestly, the way that she speaks about Daniel's issues with Terry isn't that much different from the way that she's been speaking about the karate war pretty much this whole time, it's just this time she doesn't get how real it is. and how could she? until Jessica, nobody really tells her anything with any substance. and as soon as she gets even a shred of context, she immediately begins to get with the program.

[chocolatequeennk]

Is it just me, or was RTD very careless about Martha's romantic life? I feel like he insisted on writing her into relationships without doing any of the foundational work required to let the audience connect to them, and that seems to be the common thread between her engagements to Tom Milligan and later to Mickey.

The point of Tom was that he was a rebound. So the relationship moving unnaturally fast kind of goes along with that. She found a doctor who travelled and latched onto him. Plus, on her side they had the connection from the YTNW. 

Mickey... The lack of foundation is mostly an unfortunate side effect of RTD’s time coming to an end. He didn’t have space to really expand on that. I’m not sure if they had an episode together on Torchwood?

I will say that I feel like he’s a good fit in her life. He knows about all of her life and can handle it. She couldn’t tell Tom the truth about everything she did. 

Plus, Mickey has the unique position of also being ignored by the Doctor in favour of Rose Tyler. He knows exactly what it’s like to be second place in that triangle. I think they’d both moved past their resentment by the time they met, but that is a significant point of comparison that I feel gets ignored.