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May 17, 2020

I am so pissed at station19 i think we all understand like you said that these shows thrive on drama and there is basically no endgame, but using that stupid trope again from Shonda and her team is beyond stupid. these people need to get called out to hell and back for their homophobia, have them fight hell break up but why go there?

Sorry for not answering this earlier! Since you sent it, a whole week’s passed and the finale’s aired, but still, I did want to specifically the accusation of homophobia. I can see both sides of that. On the one hand, I didn’t take it that way because this just what these shows do, with everyone. And Maya is bi, she might cheat with a woman OR a man, that’s not the issue.

But as much as I can believe that, for once, this is a show where Maya might have slept with some random woman in a bar just to hurt Carina, while THAT is “equal” to how they handle all their stories, they didn’t actually do that, and Carina and Maya’s screentime and story until now has always been somewhat limited compared to the others. As Danielle pointed out in the live, we’ve literally never seen Carina talk to any of the other firefighters, and she gets the benefit of being a Grey’s character! Even putting aside Andy’s exceptional main character treatment, Ripley and Emmett and Grant and JJ, firefighter or not, all have hung around and at least talked to other characters.

Not to mention, even if this wasn’t a homophobic trope specifically, an argument for it being biphobic could be made, since once again they have a bi character cheating. It’s not equal treatment if the characters aren’t in equal situations. It’s understandable if you’re put off by the show now.

May 12, 2020

I don’t know if you watched private practice but the Maya Carina stuff reminds me of the Charlotte Cooper stuff. Charlotte self sabotaged like Maya. In one scene Charlotte busts into cooper’s office and just blurts out that she cheated on him to purposely hurt him and then tries to walk away. Cooper stops her and says “you can’t just say that and walk away. You purposely did this so I would have to break up with you but it won’t work” and says that this is the last mistake she’s allowed to make

And another anon:

After the last Station 19 episode, Maya and Carina are now kind of reminding me of another Shondaland couple: Cooper and Charlotte from Private Practice. Cooper and Carina are the “kind and caring” characters while Maya and Charlotte are the “broken” ones. Fingers crossed that Maya and Carina will have the same conclusion to the relationship.

Oh, huh. I know very little about Private Practice and in fact had completely forgotten it existed, so I kept on thinking it was just Grey’s and S19 (and the last spinoff, my favorite, where Cristina Yang goes to Europe to work for MI6 and falls in love with a Russian assassin) and was still like, this franchise is super messy, we can’t have high expectations. I’d forgotten this whole new set of messy data points.

Um, hmm, the fact that they already did self-sabotage through self-sabotage and had the cheated on party not break up doesn’t give me hope for that here, since they most likely won’t repeat a plot. Although obviously what happens from here on isn’t even so much on Carina as it is Maya getting some goddamned help and making amends. In terms of an ending, it IS encouraging that it isn’t seen as a long-term relationship-ender and at the moment, I think it’s wide open what could happen.

And another anon:

All those couples were still endgame despite all the problems. Merder only wasn’t because derek died, Arizona ended up going to new york for callie, mark lexie again couldn’t bc of death, but there’s always still an endgame for the most part. I dont see the show putting their characters longterm with someone who isnt a regular. Love to be wrong so we’ll see. Hopefully they dont throw away the chemistry

Heh, I don’t know if you can use “only” when the person dies. Although, I do get your point, but still, those couples all went through just as much mess as Carina and Maya. Or more to the point, I don’t really see Maya and Jack being treated that way, at no point during the weeks until this did we see Jack being jealous or even reacting to Maya and Carina, he’s been far more about Andy, and even with that “I know you better than anyone” line the whole conversation was to get them to sleep together so Maya could throw that in Carina’s face and that’s what we ended on. I think it’s up in the air, tbh, no endgame locked in for either of them and maybe not even a super concrete plot for a next season that looks very distant right now.

May 9, 2020

Disappointed but not surprised with S19. I’m aware that it’s basically a soap and having watched Greys I know what they’re like with sex but can’t lie it stings, especially with a wlw ship. I hate when shows use this plot in general it’s boring and obvious. Instead of this, it would have been so interesting to see Maya acting in or even just really go at it with Carina(not Jack like, wtf) and tie in proper Carina backstory and address Maya’s instinct of pushing people away when she’s pissed.

No, yeah, I get it completely. After a day to think on it, I think I can articulate why exactly I was so disappointed:

It was a freaking shock! It wasn’t foreshadowed at all, it didn’t even occur to me to worry about it, the way they’d written Carina and Maya and even Jack in the last couple of months didn’t at all imply there’d be this intersection.
As you said, no matter how many times it’s reiterated how common a trope this is in this franchise, there are just historical connotations when it’s to ruin a wlw ship. Even if not intended in the same way to get rid of this relationship, I can guarantee that many of us were immediately shoved back to when that’s what would happen, f/f relationships deliberately sidelined and diminished after a token appearance.
That Maya’s bi doesn’t change that. To quote my friend in a discussion we were having: “It’s tough, right, because bi characters obviously like both men and women and their choice to cheat can be indiscriminate–but it’s not as if like, that nullifies the gendered context beyond the show, in terms of media history and perception and tropes.” And in fact, it just swings into the cheating bisexual trope. Ironically, I was trying to offer counterexamples to my friend of straight Grey’s characters that cheated and brought up Teddy and then remembered they’d suddenly revealed she was bi too, so now both shows’ latest cheaters are bi.
They’re going somewhere so deep without any intention of really exploring it. This has always been one-sided and Maya’s story, which, again and again, we’ve acknowledged and accepted it, it’s her show, her arc, but they’ve now made this into a big thing for BOTH of them, such a deep betrayal of Carina, but we still won’t see Carina’s side of it. Like you said, instead of making this final conflict something core to them, involving Carina backstory, they did this instead.
Honestly, I resent them for taking this fun little ship and draining the life from it this quickly. In one move they’ve ensured the remaining fans approach it with wariness and take it off rec lists.

May 9, 2020

Don’t even watch Greys but I wish they got to air all their episodes. Feels like ABC went: ‘oh no Greys? Cool… eff them up Station 19, add some spice’ ?. It was so ridiculous in all ways (junkie,gun,CARCARSH???) I had to pause and laugh at times. I do love Maya but if they make Carina stay without MAJOR action on Maya’s part it’ll be so icky. Her expression/sob at the end with Maya was so shocked/sad :( . Agree that maybe we saw more of Carina’s plot on Greys but guess we’ll never know.

Yes, I would have loved to know if there had been any Maya/Carina on Grey’s that we didn’t get a chance to see.

It was SO ridiculous. I laughed out loud twice this ep. First, because, like a fool, I was delighted when Andy started going on about her dad and Maya had just left her bed and then kitchen from being forced to think about her dad and it was just a funny, well-done way to tie the two stories together and show Maya how inescapable it all was. The second time was when the thief ran away after getting one man killed, shooting another, gleefully robbing the ambulance, and then getting hit by a car and the PRT crew were just like “…”

I think I’m still on the ship but it really does depend on what happens next and ab-soh-LUTELY, Maya has to put in major effort here. Carina has taken enou–MORE than enough, even before that heartbreaking final scene. Stefania did really well there, though, kudos. (And tbh, for such a sweet person on IG, Danielle does well at coming across as this aggressive hardass.)