Because You Love To Hate Me

Guys have the hots for you.

You have power over people.

You’re not Persephone.

You’re Hades.

FROM: GWEN

TO: ART

That’s what you like about me?

FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

No one would have messed with you the way Lance messed with me You’re not weak like me I want to be more like you

Hurry. People asking where you are.

FROM: GWEN

TO: ART

You don’t know me. I’m not strong. I’m not strong at all.

FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

Uhh definitely too much bubbly

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

I made a mistake

FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

Elaine says you’re in the bathroom

Do I need to come get you

FROM: GWEN

TO: ART

Just need a minute

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

I love you, Lance

I want to be with you

But I don’t know how to be with you and still be me FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

You locked the bathroom

Open the door

FROM: ELAINE

TO: GWEN

WTF???

Got them to delay crowning 5 mins





HURRY


FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

I’m yelling through the door

Can you hear me?

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

Lance . . . please . . .

FROM: LANCE

TO: GWEN

I’m here

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

What?

FROM: LANCE

TO: GWEN

Outside Camelot. Calling you but line keeps dropping Which tower are you in

FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

You okay in there?

Janitor’s getting me the key.

Please answer me.

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

Tower A. 2nd floor bathroom.

FROM: LANCE

TO: GWEN

Open the window. I’ll climb up and get you.

FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

Got the key.

FROM: LANCE

TO: GWEN

Hear me? I’m calling your name

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

Can’t hear or see you

Glass is thick and frosted on the inside

Where are you

FROM: LANCE

TO: GWEN

Don’t worry, I’m climbing up

Try opening it

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

I can’t. It’s jammed.

FROM: LANCE

TO: GWEN

Push harder.

FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

You dead-bolted the door! WTF.

Gwen, open it!

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

Art’s ramming against the door

FROM: LANCE

TO: GWEN

Gwen. You have to push harder.

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

I can’t do it.

I can’t just . . . leave.

FROM: LANCE

TO: GWEN

Why?

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

What about Art?

FROM: LANCE

TO: GWEN

Art has the whole world to love him. He always will.

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

What do we have?

FROM: LANCE

TO: GWEN

Our own screwed-up little kingdom with a broke-down palace where nothing can stop us from being together. And I will stay up here on this ledge, outside the window that you won’t open, while I text with one hand and hold on with the other until you get it through your thick skull. I love you, Gwen. Rich or poor; ugly or fair; young or old; inside and out.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

FROM: GWEN

TO: LANCE

Catch me if I fall

FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

They pushed me onstage.

I’m onstage, Gwen! In my crown!

FROM: GWEN

TO: ART

My beautiful Art

You’re right. I am Hades.

Kidnapping your Persephone.

But one day you’ll look back and see that only someone as pure as you could bring together two broken souls FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

What? Gwen, please

They’re announcing you

I need a queen!

FROM: GWEN

TO: ART

Long live Arthur

All Hail the King

FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

Gwen?

FROM: ART

TO: GWEN

Gwen!





SAMANTHA LANE’S VILLAIN CHALLENGE TO SOMAN CHAINANI:

A Modern-Day Mash-Up of the King Arthur Legend and Persephone-Hades Myth





THE BAD GIRL HALL OF FAME





BY SAMANTHA LANE





dreadpersephone

377 posts 100.8b followers 12 following

Persephone ? lover of pomegranates and winter

The choice was simple. I’d either be a maiden all my life, controlled by my overbearing mother, or I’d take an opportunity to escape to another world. Just didn’t expect to transform myself into a formidable queen, more feared than my husband! #sorrynotsorry



Comments

Samanthalane commented on your post: Coming-of-age tales and villain origins have a lot in common. Teens are fighting for their independence and against familial pressures. Villains are frequently fighting against societal and moral expectations in their origins. One of the reasons I love the Persephone myth is that she combines both. Though I do not view her as a villain, many do, as she is associated with death.

Villains’ backstories are all about opportunities and choices. Throughout, we are shown the various crossroads where they could have turned back and continued to live a life of good. We, the audience, are torn between wanting them to cross over to the dark side and hoping that maybe this time they won’t. Characters with agency are more complex, which is why I love them so much. Villains do horrible things, and we still root for them in spite of that. We are drawn to people who make mistakes, like us. Very few of us are stalwart and true 100 percent of the time. Villains represent what we cannot and will not do in real life.

As I see it, Persephone made a series of choices that led to her becoming one of the most feared goddesses in the pantheon, instead of continuing to live a simple life with her mother. In “Gwen and Art and Lance,” Gwen made the choice to be with someone who her high school society viewed as the wrong choice. Villainy is liberating.



bornwicked

788 posts 500k followers 3k following

The Wicked Witch of the West ? it’s not easy being green

Am I really so wicked? Or did the world paint me that way simply because I am different? And if I am wicked, was I born that way or made wicked by the world’s reaction to me?



Comments

Samanthalane commented on your post: The other route for villains is the view that they are simply victims of circumstance—that they have been tricked into becoming villains, by fate or by those around them. This question has been explored by modern retellings time and time again. Are some people just destined to become villains, and they don’t have a choice in the matter at all? Historically, fairy tales and myths took this route, depicting people as either good or evil for no reason. But modern society has turned away from the view of passive characters and wants characters to be active participants in their destiny.

In “Gwen and Art and Lance,” Gwen takes an active role in what unfolds. She manipulates the situation around her to suit her needs and doesn’t apologize for it. She isn’t simply along for the ride, but is in charge of the entire operation.



killersingers

186 posts 300k followers 0 following

The Sirens ? follow me into the sea

ONCE HANDMAIDENS, WE HAVE BEEN REBORN. NOW WE SERENADE YOU, TEMPTING YOU TO JOIN US.



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