arguably the 2 best on-screen friendships on Station 19 imo

seen from Switzerland
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arguably the 2 best on-screen friendships on Station 19 imo
T Sean ft. Thandy - Kamusango
Zambian Dancehall king and Baila Entertainment CEO, T Sean, has released his latest song, “Kamusango.” This is the ninth track from his “Destiny” project and features talented female singer and songwriter, Thandy. The song talks about a feeling you can’t stop having, wanting to keep it over and over for someone, and how it becomes a habit you can’t let go of it’s love. The song was produced by…
My mom fell asleep during the Downton Christmas special, so when she woke up she asked how it ended. I went through all the loose ends that were tied up and I said in my best dramatic voice that Tom had left (I miss him so much!), but Mom thought I was talking about Thomas and said ‘oh, with the new footman, what’s his name, Andy?’ and I’m still cackling over it because that would have been a mindblowing ending to the Christmas special. Ah, if only... But then there would be no more of Thomas, who's been my fave since forever.
rant incoming: Thomas "vs" Thandy et. al : the binary that has no business existing in the first place
the "but don't you want Thomas to be happy" argument in relation to who people "should" ship as if there's some moral obligation to ship something, is completely irrelevant, overused, and arbitrary
Thomas Barrow is a fictional character and it is completely reasonable to want him to have a story resolution that is narratively pleasing and provides on screen entertainment and chemistry
this isn't a reality show where we're voting for who a person ends up with in fact who people in the fandom ship Thomas basically has virtually no effect on what direction the actual canon story goes
continuing to ship Thomas with a character who's canonically left the show doesn't prevent this fictional character from "being happy" sure you can want to see a character being happy in their storyline but like my god is it really unreasonable to also want that happy ending to not be forced or dull either? Keep in mind we are still talking about a FICTIONAL. STORY. that we can analyze from a meta perspective as critical thinking audience members (for fuck's sake).
I realize that thommy shippers are intimidating as they're a very large and at times (probably not on purpose) overbearing part of the Thomas Barrow fandom but keep in mind that Thomas and Jimmy is the ship regardless of canon or non canon status that has occupied the most screen time and Jimmy is the character with the most development
Crowbarrow may have been canon and sure Thomas and the duke may have been in love and romancing eachother for months and months before the first episode but we get about 4 minutes in total of screen time of them and only one episode of the duke at all and never a mention of him since- there isn't much to work with that isn't completely fanon and headcanons where you might as well just be writing Thomas with an original character. Thomas and Edward also had one episode together and Edward is canonically dead and not dead because he had to be written off but his death is essential to his storyline so it's harder to rewrite his ending and write fic as if he'd never left- besides which we also get very little Edward screentime enough to establish his character ESPECIALLY because we only see Edward in the context of his own depression and trauma over his war experience which isn't actually an insight into his PERSONALITY and if Thomas and Edward HAD run off together their lives would be so different than the life we usually see Thomas in the context of that once again, any fiction with him essentially becomes original fiction with an original character.
The same is true of Andy- we've had two episodes with him. I haven't seen the christmas special yet but in the season finale even in that episode we get very little exposition of his character and he is a much less dynamic on screen presence than any of the characters I just mentioned (possibly BECAUSE he is meant to be in more than one episode but I will say this about Edward, Philip, and Jimmy- they all immediately had establishing character traits revealed in their words and actions within the first 5 minutes of their introduction basically that made them compelling if not necessarily KNOWN in their entirety- there's a lot of things you can say to describe Philip and Edward even though we have very litle screen time of them is what I mean)
So while thommy may be to those who don't ship it an almost oppressive force in the Thomas fandom by sheer numbers and focus it is extremely logical that it would be and quite frankly whining about it as if it's unfair when we've had 2 full seasons of Jimmy and not even one full episode of most of these other characters has always seemed extremely backwards and unreasonable to me.
Furthermore arm twisting tactics like saying that Thomas and Jimmy can't be happy together because Jimmy has left and acting as if therefore people HAVE TO ship Thomas and Andy if they want Thomas to be happy is pathetic, obnoxious, and flat out untrue.
Even if Thomas and Andy kiss on screen people have no OBLIGATION to like them together just because it makes Thomas, a fictional character who is being written purposefully or (hopefully not) carelessly, into a certain story "happy" this argument makes it seem like you have no awareness of a fourth wall and ability to discern and critique narrative from an audience perspective and so basically makes you look like a dumbass. If you find Thomas aesthetically pleasing or to have chemistry with any character in the show then ship them but I am so fucking sick of this high horse mentality that people are taking that they have Thomas's "best interests" at heart by shipping him with any new bloke that comes along just beacuse he's not Jimmy.
He's a fictional fucking character. You're not a "better fan" for shipping him with the person closest at hand and you have absolutely zero right to be going into other people's ask boxes and telling them they are less of a fan for not doing the same.