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"Oh, I need a TV show that fits these very specific rules and also it can't be too sad! Not too bleak! I need a happy ending! I am a delicate flower!!" And then I went and watched Oz.

I suppose this impulse was born of some deep-rooted perversity, and also because I'd just finished Homicide and I watched season 1 of The Wire years ago so now I wanted to see what the worse half of the H:LotS team had gone on to do (verdict: David Simon was responsible for all the best parts of Homicide, but Fontana clearly does much better--at least for a while--with a free hand to go completely and gloriously batshit), and also I wanted to see if these emotional rules really were still in effect. The experiment was contaminated, however, because I cheated by reading all six seasons of episode summaries to brace myself before I even started to watch, then liberally skipped the absolute worst stuff (like the last four episodes entirely, and also large chunks of season one). But in general I think that this show manages to be so horrible and so miserable and bleak and doomed for everyone involved that it somehow comes out the other side and doesn't bother me at all. Plus it helps a lot that the "everything is shit for everyone forever" factor serves a political/aesthetic point that I think is brilliantly made (with a few glaring missteps, and also jesus christ it's horrific about women, but in general, man, I could write fucking essays about this show, proper academic ones with lots of research and footnotes and semicolons).

Anyway I announce this only because I may post a story soon (or may not, but it's going pretty well and fast), and I feel like I have to explain myself, because honestly. After all that fuss and nonsense. I do plan to watch Friday Night Lights, though! And Sungkyunkwan Scandal. Just possibly not for a few weeks, because it is well past time for a TV break.

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Oh hai. I wanted to mention to you that ages after reading your post about Tony Stark and how it's not the great big stressors that break you, it's the little petty things, it still comes to mind on stressful days. And even sort of helps, in that at least I'm not the only one who finally bursts into hysterical tears because I can't hear the answering machine message through the traffic (long story.)

aw, I'm glad my drunken ramblings about some other, fictional guy's drunken ramblings are helpful in any way. it's totally true, the little stuff is the only stuff that ever gets me. big stuff feels legitimate and rational and not infuriating in the same way. I suspect this is true of most people tbh.

You are waaaay braver than me, I could not do Oz.

Well, strictly speaking, I haven't quite done Oz, because I still haven't watched most of the parts I skipped because they were too unbearable. I know my limits! ...I still watched all kinds of terrible shit, though. But I spoiled myself for all of it first, which helped a lot.

Which is not to say anyone should try to watch it if they don't like terrible terrible shit happening to the characters they love, all the time, forever. Because that's pretty much what it is. But it's so GOOD. Also it has multiple queer characters (not counting all the rape, obviously), and apparently I will put myself through a LOT for that.

I've heard it's amaaaazing, and there's some fic for it that I love, but yeah. Terrible shit all the time isn't great for me. :(