Agatha Protection Squad

Ali | ever | she/her | big gay | sge blog | mainly Tagatha and Nicophie | incorrect quotes, memes and moodboards

[evitachristine]

Anti-Hophie Rant

So I finally finished reading One True King, and this is what I have to say. It’s long. 

WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS!

Before I get into this, just a small warning: If Hophie is your OTP and embodiment of perfection, this text is not for you. I will not argue with anyone, alright?

To start this off, in my opinion OTK is the weakest of the series. It just feels like a connection between the last book and the fact that Tedros has to become the King. Some might argue that the second book was the worst, well, I disagree. It’s not just because Hophie happens here, but I kind of believe that when the internet spoiled to me that my hated ship was going to happen (because I had to wait until the book comes out in my country), I was expecting more from it. That I would actually be convinced it’s meant to be, which didn’t happen. Also the execution of some characters (Ahem…Merlin) was just…why. It seemed to me that there were a lot of other fan services in this book, apart from Hort and Sophie getting together, but more about that later. 

 I need to remember this for good, and next time I become a fan of something, I will avoid its fanbase. I do not mean to offend anyone, but a fanbase can really ruin a platform, especially when the platform is still developping and the fanbase is influencing it, which I believe did happen a lot with SGE. I will not deny that a fandom cannot improve such thing - that is definitely true as well - but sometimes the line between improving and ruining is slim, and if it doesn’t ruin the platform, then it might ruin a couple of fans’ experience of it. 

Now to the point of me hating Hophie.

As I mentioned in my previous post, and above. When I discovered the fandom and found out that people are shipping Hort and Sophie, I asked myself “But why? Sophie doesn’t like Hort.” and I kind of thought this was a joke or a meme ship. I always ship characters where both sides have at least a visible bit of attraction towards each other. Whether its friends to lovers or enemies to lovers. Hophie, until the last book and half, was not the case. It was a typical example of unrequited crush, Sophie once only used Hort to make Tedros jealous. But if my mind isn’t tricking me, she was always disgusted by him and even during their first encounter, he attempted to harass her! And the fact that “they were still kids back then” is not an excuse to me. 

Allow me to make a slight turn from SGE. When I was about 8-10, my mum took me to see an opera called Turandot. I will not bother you with opera, but long story short: A princess is very beautiful and a lot of men want to marry her. So she is giving everyone three questions, if they answer incorrectly, they are executed. Everyone are getting executed until a prince in disguise arrives and is in love with her, answers all questions correctly. Princess doesn’t want to marry him tho, so he asks her to guess his name and if she succeeds, he will gladly die. The princess doesn’t feel love at all and doesn’t want to fall in love. She believes she is a saint. Then in a dramatic duet the prince kisses her and ALL OF SUDDEN the princess falls in love with him. 

Whew. Sorry, I tried to make this as short as possible. I remember asking my mum after this: “Why is the girl always forced to love the boy?” Little me didn’t like this idea of a “magical kiss” already, lol. Mum’s answer was “Because it was written by a boy.”, but that’s not even my point here. Do you see the pattern? Girl keeps refusing guy but in the end he still gets her. THIS RIGHT HERE is the main reason why I hate Hophie. It reinforces the stereotype that if a guy is persistent enough, he will get the girl even if she said no a million times. 

Another note I’d like to say about this, and I’m going to receive hate for this opinion. I started book 1 when I was 16. Now I’m in my early twenties and I get that most SGE readers are still teenagers. The age of crushes, clumsy love experiments, etc. OK now I sound like a grandma. But I think this is where Hophie stems from. Everyone are seeing themselves in Hort. Your crush doesn’t like you back, his crush doesn’t like him back. Something like Éponine in Les Misérables. If Marius and Sophie both fall in love with the person who likes them, it’s like the crush of the fan does. Can we call this the Hort-Éponine complex? 

Aside from that, I believe that people who already experienced both sides of unrequited love (like yours truly grandma, right here), meaning Sophie’s side of it, are less likely to support such ships. 

I will now dive into the OTK “resolution” of this pairing. First let me just say, this book made me, if not hate, then at least strongly dislike Hort’s character. The first half of the book and even a some time after before he finally gets with Sophie, his character is disgusting to me. He is so obsessed with her, even while he’s still dating Nicola. As in my previous post, it’s like a huge part of his character is only “I LOVE SOPHIE”. While he’s still with Nicola, he never fails to mention “his FRIEND Sophie”. I will now paraphrase because I read a translation, not the original, but even when Hort’s singing to the guards to distract them so Agatha and Tedros can sneak into the Library, he sings something along the lines “Girlfriend Nikki and friend Soph”. I’m not sure if this was meant to convince the reader that Sophie ending up with Hort is a good idea, but with me, it did the exact opposite. 

In general, their “romance” feels extremely rushed to me. Compared to Sophie’s previous love interests, regardless of who they were as people, these two have zero chemistry. It seems as if Sophie decided to settle because there was no other guy for her. And the description of her suddenly being in love with him, as mentioned above, is another of those “magical kiss” stories. It is hardly believable and kind of… shallow. 

There even were several moments when Rafal was mentioned. In COT, when the protagonists wanted to flee Camelot but Sophie decided to stay, she saw Hort flying to her and she mistook him for Rafal. Goodness. Even in OTK there were a few moments when it seemed that Sophie still has issues from that relationship. Very few, but they were there. 

Therefore I refuse to believe that the reason for this was anything other than to satisfy the majority of the fandom. In addition, the entire book feels like one huge “fan service”, as other ships are “sailing” as well. We have Hestadil and Bogden/Willam, but these two are at least believable. Hestadil started, even tho inconspicously, two books ago, and it resolved naturally. And beforehand they were close friends, so there’s that. As for the boys, they were side characters, so we can only think that all resolved while they were off the scene. 

To sum it up, I thought of three different endings I’d prefer for Sophie. 

On the first place, this was mentioned several times by other people, is that she should have stayed on her own. That happened in TLEA, but this time, really. I hated that OTK made it seem that she really needs a partner. Yes, love, but heck… is romantic love the only thing that is out there? How about friendship? Content with oneself? Pursuing hobbies that you love? Freedom? Come on. Awesome characters that end up single AND ARE HAPPY should have more representation. And I think Sophie would have been amazing like that. 

On the second place I have two things. First, Sophie with a girl. Only I’m not sure who. Maybe Nicola, or Betty if she survived. Or maybe, people might hate me for this, but… Dot? I don’t ship it but I think it could have been cute. Maybe they would start off getting closer as friends and the rest would be left up to the reader’s imagination.

The other preferable ending I have at second place was originally on the third place, but some weird nostalgia overcame me when reading OTK and I had to move it up. People will hate me. But if Sophie should end up with a guy, it should have been Rhian. Yes, I know what you are thinking right now. But think about it. That guy really believed he was Arthur’s son. Imagine if he found out the truth. Something tells me it would be really hard for him at first, but in the end, if he found out that Japeth really only wants Aric, he could’ve joined the protagonists. In my opinion Sophie had the best dynamic with him, before it all spiralled downwards with snakes etc. Maybe he could pretend to help his twin but in the end… I believe I read something like this somewhere on Tumblr as well. Also this kind of feels as if it could have been Soman’s original plan before he turned to pleasing the fans. Or maybe I’m just fantasising too much.  Regardless of how much you’re cursing me right now, I believe Rhian deserved better and shouldn’t have died. After all, he was the better twin. 

As for Hort, well, before OTK I didn’t really care for his character, I didn’t dislike him but he wasn’t my favourite. I simply wished him well hoping he’ll get over Sophie so he can be happy, either with Nicola/someone else, or on his own. After the last book made me resent him, I’m not sure. He could have died, but I know that is cruel. 

He could have been slowly realising that he doesn’t need Sophie, his love would fade away, maybe Nicola could break up with him in the process, then they would get back together, at a natural pace, realisation, etc. Or they wouldn’t, or they wouldn’t break up at all, just separate on different missions, and then reunite and realise they were truly meant to be together all along. 

Whew, if you made it here, congratulations. If you read this as a Hophie shipper, I’m not taking away your opinion. I just needed to let this out. Hope we can respect each other. 

…But I still kinda wish we could get another version of OTK where Hophie doesn’t happen. 

[whitepeopletwitter]

[meetnategreen]

In 2016, over 75,000 mail-in ballots were left uncounted and discarded because they were received after  mail-in voting deadlines, which all vary by state, according to CBS news. 

Some states like California allow you to check with the Registrar of Voters on-line to verify both if a ballot has issued and if it was received to help prevent voting errors.

Remember, the most common forms of voter fraud are 1) gerrymandering, 2) voter suppression and 3) foreign participation through both lobbying and online misinformation. 

[someweirdjew]

OCTOBER 13. IT’S BEING DELIBERATELY SLOWED. OCTOBER 13.

[museumnelson]

Also know that in most states you can also drop it off either at a polling place or the county elections office too

[atypical-snowman]

The postal service is being deliberately slowed.

[deavydealer-deactivated20260306]

i’m not american but i’m still reblogging this

[official-lucifers-child]

please please please everyone who can vote make sure you’re registered and check when your ballot needs to be in. they are deliberately slowing things down so be careful and cautious about this, play it safe.

[finalgirlagatha]

@soman i just want to talk 

[finalgirlagatha]

Nicola: Please revoke your no swearing rule.

Sophie: Why?

Hort, from the other room: Well that just DILLS my pickle!

[transexualheart-1]

Hort should’ve gotten over Sophie. (OTK spoilers)

So - I don’t have strong feelings on Hort. I want to like him, but his writing makes it really hard. Like I think he was close to being a good character but then Soman goes and makes him get drunk and be horrible to Agatha or emotionally cheat on Nicola. So how I think his arc should’ve gone:

(Note: I haven’t read TLEA or QFG in a while so this might not be great sorry. I’ll probably edit it later)

Books one and two: stays pretty much the same as canon. He’s fine as comic relief.

Book three: he can excel at New Evil, but not to try to win over or impress Sophie(was that his motivation? I can’t remember sorry), just to prove to himself and others that he is worthy of respect. I also don’t think he should get buff or whatever to make him attractive to Sophie, she should gain slightly more respect for him but still think of him as weaselly Hort. He is s t a r t i n g to get over her.

Fourth book: he fully gets over Sophie, proves himself a little bit. Whether he gets with Nicola or stays single I don’t really care. But sometime in this book or early book five he has to become confident and secure in himself.

Book five: he does all the same stuff, proves himself to Sophie, but at this point Hort doesn’t really care. (He still cares for Sophie but in a sort of neutral way. He’s moved on from her, and is confident enough in himself to not need her approval.) Sophie cares, though. Hort has become a true friend rather that a tool/annoyance.

Book six: Pick your ending

if Hort and Nic date and you want Hophie to happen, Hicola breaks up early on in this book. Hort and Sophie become really close and eventually realise they still love one another. Hort doesn’t need to die in a classic episode of Disney Sequel Fakeout Deaths™ .

If you are a Hophie fan but don’t want Hicola it’s basically the same but with no Hicola break up.

I personally much prefer Sophie’s ending in TLEA, so I’m not a fan of endgame Hophie. Imo the best ending would’ve been Sophie maybe deciding to take up the coven’s quest to find a new school master? Since it turns out she isn’t fit for Dean, but still is invested in the future of Evil and the balance and wants to do her part (I literally just thought of that as I was typing this but I actually really like it? Kinda?). And she’s surrounded by amazing friends and finally for real realises that she can be happy and loved without a romantic partner. (I really don’t like the idea it seems to end on that only having platonic love = alone, forgotten and left out.)

These amazing friends can include Hort, in which case no Fakeout Death™, or Hort can actually die and Sophie realises all he taught her and what a good friend she had in him without noticing(which would actually work in my version since he’s not nearly so much of an emo creep).

This is longer than I expected but I think it turned out okay? Let me know what you think

[pumpkinpaperweight]

sadly I cannot draw but inspired by @baetrixv and Noam's reversed AU I just want everyone to just think abt Tedros and Agatha swapping places, so Agatha was the heir to the throne of Camelot and Tedros was some random who lived in a graveyard. Like fundamentally they wouldn't change but no one would trust Tedros's charm bc everyone reckons he's evil, and Agatha's surliness would be percieved as like, stoic and brooding. And Agatha could have a sword. And the princely outfit.

[quillelily]

Evil? Agatha

alternate title: Quality gradually decreasing per panel– but internet making it even worse

[slavicafire]

“hi, I’m not from the US” ask set

given how Americanized this site is, it’s important to celebrate all our countries and nationalities - with all their quirks and vices and ridiculousness, and all that might seem strange to outsiders.

1. favourite place in your country?

2. do you prefer spending your holidays in your country or travel abroad?

3. does your country have access to sea?

4. favourite dish specific for your country?

5. favourite song in your native language?

6. most hated song in your native language?

7. three words from your native language that you like the most?

8. do you get confused with other nationalities? if so, which ones and by whom?

9. which of your neighbouring countries would you like to visit most/know best?

10. most enjoyable swear word in your native language?

11. favourite native writer/poet?

12. what do you think about English translations of your favourite native prose/poem?

13. does your country (or family) have any specific superstitions or traditions that might seem strange to outsiders?

14. do you enjoy your country’s cinema and/or TV?

15. a saying, joke, or hermetic meme that only people from your country will get?

16. which stereotype about your country you hate the most and which one you somewhat agree with?

17. are you interested in your country’s history?

18. do you speak with a dialect of your native language?

19. do you like your country’s flag and/or emblem? what about the national anthem?

20. which sport is The Sport in your country?

21. if you could send two things from your country into space, what would they be?

22. what makes you proud about your country? what makes you ashamed?

23. which alcoholic beverage is the favoured one in your country?

24. what other nation is joked about most often in your country?

25. would you like to come from another place, be born in another country?

26. does your nationality get portrayed in Hollywood/American media? what do you think about the portrayal?

27. favourite national celebrity?

28. does your country have a lot of lakes, mountains, rivers? do you have favourites?

29. does your region/city have a beef with another place in your country?

30. do you have people of different nationalities in your family?

[luxray1206]

Inshidoney, west cork ❤

Abroad bc I like new things but I also love going to Inshidoney, west cork ❤

Yes

Poxty, like a potato pancake

Trasna na dtonta

A mhathairín an ligfidh tú don aonaigh mé

Oideachas (Idd-ok-iss) sleamhnán (sh-lou-nawn) puiscín (pwish-keen). Off the top of my head

English 😡 by almost everyone

France

Dún do chlab

Eoin Colfer

Rlly, rlly bad, no rhythm lyrics all over the place

Leaving children in pubs unsupervised? It happens a lot here

No

Leigh anois go cuaramigh, ar do shcrúdpáipéar na cheisteanna a gabhann le cuid aaaa

Leprechauns, alcoholics

Kind of, but not really. I dont like history as a whole

Maybe?? Idk. English is my first language so probably not

Yes, yes and yes. Dont like the christianity behind the shamrock though

Gaa football

Irish dictionary and a tin whistle

That we fought for independence. That we’re kinda pushovers now (or the government at least)

Guiness

America/England

France

Yes. Its hilariously awful

Miggledy

Yes. Not really

My village has major beef with the neighbouring town

English and polish

[the-almost-queen]

wait,,,, fellow corkonian,,,, hiie!!!! ✌🏻✌🏻

[slavicafire]

“hi, I’m not from the US” ask set

given how Americanized this site is, it’s important to celebrate all our countries and nationalities - with all their quirks and vices and ridiculousness, and all that might seem strange to outsiders.

1. favourite place in your country?

2. do you prefer spending your holidays in your country or travel abroad?

3. does your country have access to sea?

4. favourite dish specific for your country?

5. favourite song in your native language?

6. most hated song in your native language?

7. three words from your native language that you like the most?

8. do you get confused with other nationalities? if so, which ones and by whom?

9. which of your neighbouring countries would you like to visit most/know best?

10. most enjoyable swear word in your native language?

11. favourite native writer/poet?

12. what do you think about English translations of your favourite native prose/poem?

13. does your country (or family) have any specific superstitions or traditions that might seem strange to outsiders?

14. do you enjoy your country’s cinema and/or TV?

15. a saying, joke, or hermetic meme that only people from your country will get?

16. which stereotype about your country you hate the most and which one you somewhat agree with?

17. are you interested in your country’s history?

18. do you speak with a dialect of your native language?

19. do you like your country’s flag and/or emblem? what about the national anthem?

20. which sport is The Sport in your country?

21. if you could send two things from your country into space, what would they be?

22. what makes you proud about your country? what makes you ashamed?

23. which alcoholic beverage is the favoured one in your country?

24. what other nation is joked about most often in your country?

25. would you like to come from another place, be born in another country?

26. does your nationality get portrayed in Hollywood/American media? what do you think about the portrayal?

27. favourite national celebrity?

28. does your country have a lot of lakes, mountains, rivers? do you have favourites?

29. does your region/city have a beef with another place in your country?

30. do you have people of different nationalities in your family?

[cosmoshunger]

Sophie: She has to die.

Agatha: Who?

Sophie: *glaring at Nicola from a distance* I don’t know how to flirt with her, so she has to die.

[professional-sophie-stan]

I said what I said

[professional-sophie-stan]

haven't finished otk yet, maybe things change?

anyways soman, do better😤

[pumpkinpaperweight]

Things people need to accept about the SGE movie before it comes out:

it will not be an exact replica of the book. that’s not a thing that happens. everyone always wants there to be a perfect book to film adaptation… it’s not realistic. you can’t make a film out of the book exactly as it is, because that’s… just not how it works. books tell you what’s going on, but films have to show you, so immediately they need to change stuff. and they WILL take stuff out, maybe even stuff that you really like, because it might slow down the story or be unnecessary or even be too expensive. that does not immediately mean the film is bad, it just means it’s slightly different

the actors will not look exactly like the characters. whether they add diversity or not (and I very much hope they will bc I like the idea of casting Tedros as a black or mixed race guy and of agatha being asian) it’s still impossible to find a real life doppelganger of the illustrations. and everyone has a different interpretation anyway. if the real cast is a rerun of the QFG countdown (”thought he was blond...” “Umm I thought she’d be like way more pretty I mean she was Sophie’s competition so……?” “___ doesn’t look like that bc in page 273 of this specific book it said–” ) I will start replying to people and starting fights. leave the poor actors alone. you’re allowed to have an opinion but like… be polite?????? and if you just HAVE to be mean don’t say it where the actors can see it? yes those first two examples were real comments 

What the qfg comments told me is that if anyone is even a SMIDGE different to the book everyone will freak. chill. it’s not that important. I’m particularly worried about who they cast for tedros bc a) last time was a farce (kyle bro I’m sorry you deserved better I thought u were good) and I think he’s being held to a too high a standard. they will cast a normal nice looking dude and he will probably be relatively good looking bc magic fairytale princes w abs at 15 do not exist

they might age them up. I mean, for starters, they weren’t even 12 in the first place (soman has said this many, many times, and they were 15 in a first draft) but I think people need to get accustomed to the idea of a late teenage cast NOW or else they’re going to be severely disappointed if they’re not 12 or something. even the QFG countdown cast were 16/17/18/19 year olds. I talked more about this in my last post but I just think people need to like seriously consider that they might be older than they were expecting (or younger! if they cast them very young I’ll probably be irritated but you know, we need to give everything the benefit of the doubt)

I’ve already been kinda surprised by how rudely and in what bad faith the website kids took the lack of open casting, so I’d rather everyone tried to be as understanding and realistic as possible for the rest of the process bc…. god. It’s not that hard to chill out a bit. Overall, the film is probs going to have a few things you won’t like, so it might be best to anticipate them now rather than getting overzealous in the comments when stuff does finally get announced. 

[pumpkinpaperweight]

So I saw ur post abt Hort,,,,, and the tags,,,,, and Id love to see the meaner points you had to make mostly bc that post was 100000% correct and Id love to hear more of your thoughts on the matter

GOD LMAO UM-- honestly the meanest point I was gonna make was that the reason Soman made Hort like that is bc he doesn't know how to fathom an attractive boy that's NOT like that, bc all of... uh, Sophie's love interests r dickheads w abs bc Soman thinks that's what's hot and Sophie is basically his self-insert. Also we all know that Hort is Soman's second favourite character so it's no wonder we got a deluge of "omg he's so sweet" bs even tho he doesn't particularly show it, but then he kinda just abandoned Agatha and Tedros (especially Agatha) as it suited him. Like you just gotta look at who gets the witty quips/big speeches/cool moments they are to know who he likes best hhhh.

Also I said "no Hort is not an incel", but like. Can he stop acting like one then. As I said to @devourer--of--books I'm tempted to rewrite the single scene from Fatima Finds A Friend where Hort suggests they should kill Agatha, and change nothing except for the second it gets suggested Tedros starts trying to beat the shit outta Hort. I don't think he even reacted in the book, bc, as above,✧*。SOPHIE ✧*。had to come and intervene with a witty, witty line about Hort being undesirable. (Make your mind up Soman). But yeah Tedros trying to hit Hort with some stick he found on the floor or something... it would be a moment most pleasing to me.

[acciostorian]

tedros: come one guys, this isn’t the end!

hester, who’s already planned out where they coffins will go and what they will look like: is it not?

[crippledfaggot]

not to beg again..

but i just received my first check since ive come back to work since "recovering" from COVID and its REAL small. my partner is still out of work, still doesnt have health insurance, and we still have immigration issues to deal with. on Wed i go back to my GP because my breathing is all rattly, i have a new cough, and my shortness of breath is REAL bad and on top of that im bleeding hours at work even tho im supposed to be full time.

i am also still raising money to make sure that in the next few months we can go get @dresdenthemaenad from their mom's place and move them here to CA. about 2 weeks ago we shipped all of their stuff from their sister's in Maryland, so now we just need to go get D and Kiba themselves!

tldr: we're just 3 trans faggots needin a little help rn 🥺

since i dont wanna share my deadname everywhere my partner's paylinks are:

Venmo: @L-cuervo

Cash App: $SPadfoot

PayPal: [email protected]

and you can also donate to D's GoFundMe

thank you and here's my beautiful son:

[crippledfaggot]

i went to the ER yesterday and found out ive got a post covid spot of pneumonia on my left lung and acute bronchitis and am being forced to stay home from work for two days. please, any donations would really help us out.

[crippledfaggot]

the ER fucked up and didnt inform me that im again (still?) COVID posi. they sent me home w a note saying i could go back to work yesterday and then called me today and told me that oops im posi and need to quarantine for two weeks again (the nurse literally said oops when she found out i hadnt been called). i will not be paid during this time and we really really need help. im also still dealing w the pneumonia and bronchitis and will need funds towards medications for that.

venmo, cashapp, and paypal links above or if youre more comfy w GoFundMe, then please donate to @dresdenthemaenad 's fundraiser that is linked above as well.

[parvain]

I have no idea if I did the right thing, but it took me three days to do it all. I just realized that I didn’t develop a good relationship between the characters, even though I had a lot of personalities in the original plan, so should I expect the second part? Honestly, I can’t predict anything. If you want, you can use the images without my notes.