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Why is Sterling so sure everything will be ok with her parents if they found out about her an April? Sorry i found that odd. Just look what happened when she drank. She was kicked out the house. So you mean to tell me Sterling just thinks her parents will be like ok i suppose its ok. Its just oddly placed. What your take on it?

Well, I think the show gets that people, and teenagers in particular, make decisions that aren’t always the most logically sound. They don’t do a cost benefit analysis, it’s often I want this to be true, so I’m hoping it is. We do that all the time, how many decisions do we make that we know we’ll pay for later, but we’re just hoping it’ll magically work out, sleeping late, eating unhealthy, skipping a class, procrastinating on literally anything? It doesn’t make sense, it’s just the best option in the moment. April herself was falling into that in ep 8 and 9, she knew there was no way she could come out safely, but oh, she wanted it. 

But Sterling in particular has led a bit of a charmed life until the last ep. Like, okay, she breaks the rules (sleeping with Luke, drinking) and faces the consequences (school ostracization, mother kicking her out of the house), but the being kicked out of the house was about as gentle as possible, and when her mom found out about the sex it was a bonding moment and the drinking somehow fixed the school situation! So she’s actually come out on top. 

She WAS scared about what to do with April, as she told that lady in the throuple, April could tell her parents, but she went ahead and kissed her anyway because in the moment, she couldn’t do anything else. And then she (rightly) freaked for two seconds until even THAT somehow amazingly worked out, against all odds, as we well know. You surprise the most Christian high maintenance girl in school with a kiss, it’s lottery probability not having that backfire badly. 

There are some people who make high risk decisions again and again even when they turn out badly and they just spiral. This kid is rewarded again and again, like, I would have understood her optimism even if only half those things had worked out. She’ll think, oh, they’ll be fine, or at worst, I’ll spend a night out on the lawn, but honestly? She’s not thinking of the consequences at all, it’ll work out.

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Thoughts on when April is pretending to be friends with Sterling for the debate and the first thing she says to her is that she looks good ?

Ahaha, and then I tried to picture you as someone I love and respect? APRIL, why are you like this. She really was like, hello, fellow heterosexual girl, you look amazing! That’s what straight girls do, right, compliment each other on their looks to boost their confidence! And then unable to continue the charade for five seconds. 

Although there might have been a bit of truth in that, the way she looked her up and down… Honestly, Sterling did look good that day.

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Can I just say I’ve been listening non-stop to Slow Burn, I am sucker for shows using music for significant moments (and it is the perfect song for them). I am also suffering because I cannot stop remembering April’s face when Sterling played the song, she looked like she was in pain and on the verge of tears ?

Oh, I’m like that about songs too! Except I actually tend to not know any songs in general till I hear them on media so that’s my first and only association with them. I have this whole list of songs I just associate with f/f scenes. For Stepril it’s not just Slow Burn but that Hit It Hard song from ep 7 too, lol. 

But no doubt, Slow Burn is definitely their song, ughhh, including ep 10. :((( April’s face in that sceeeene, like, I think because we see so much of Sterling’s interiority and Maddie has such a ridiculously expressive face, in contrast we tend to picture April as someone more in charge, knowing what she’s doing, but her expression showed how she’s also just playing this as best as she can with what she has.

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What did you think of the scene of “I aim to please” “noted” and Sterling’s reaction afterwards?

Hee, well, okay, what do YOU think of it, anon? I honestly just giggle when I see it, it’s just so surprising and fun with all these layers. Like, on the one hand, they’re these super inexperienced Christian kids, right, doing their little Christian project, closeted, nothing can be put out in the open, but you also have Sterling explicitly so horny for April and it is PALPABLE. 

And like, the aim to please, she’s saying it half-joking but it’s literally what she is, this good kid people-pleaser of the highest order but it’s also this proud little acknowledgement of her efforts to win over April since the debate tournament, wear her down with sheer friendliness, and like, yay, progress! Progress because she wants to DATE her.

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But god.

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I don’t think any of us, Sterling included, expected that drawn out “Noooted”, it’s just April being her bossy, overbearing self, but it’s so unintentionally aligned with the way Sterling has been approaching this convo. I think she’s caught off guard by how much it played into her little fantasies, lol, because MAKE NO MISTAKE. This kid has been fantasizing about April and is not at all opposed to her bossy, overbearing side and it was just this odd little intersection of the two and she sharply looks over and swallows as she realizes that no, April didn’t really mean anything by it beyond their usual dynamic.

In a season filled with a lot of favorite moments for just this ship, this remains in my top few just for its sheer rewatchability value. The first time we’re here, it’s all nerves and anticipation and even worry for Sterling, rooting for her but afraid of how quickly she’s running into this. And there was some relief that there’s obviously some thawing on April’s part and even a BIT of optimism, but god, on rewatching, and knowing Aprli’s this super intense lesbian and that underneath this tentative little interaction they’re both canonically starting to see the other in a new light and developing raging crushes on each other, it’s just SO much fun

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So season 2 of tbh should totally happen.. Im here to run something by you. Am i the only one that thinks that April doesn’t have to be mad about Sterling turning her dad in.. I mean she didn’t lie to April. Also all this time April was a totally bitch to Sterling an Sterling didn’t use what knew not once against her. I think that those facts alone could be enough for her to instead of get mad want to understand that tho he is her father he also committed a crime an should be held accountable

Hmm, while it’s possible that April puts all those points together and is surprisingly understanding, aside from the fact that it’s a TV show that seeks heightened drama, there’s a difference, I think, between an impersonal response that only looks at the logic and facts versus one that reacts to the emotion of the situation. Given who this involves, it would be extremely natural for April’s initial reaction be to the betrayal of it all.

And that’s what it would be, it’s not just that it’s her dad, or that Sterling technically never lied, or even what their relationship was like when it all went down. She’d be mad that it was Sterling who did get extremely close to her, who she told all her secrets to, who kept this from her. It would hurt on THAT level. It doesn’t matter that she was mean to Sterling and Sterling didn’t use it against her, that doesn’t get her bonus points when it was Sterling who chased a friendship and then kissed her. She totally bared her soul to Sterling about it all! Who throughOUT the show, has expressed concern and sympathy because of her father’s situation, all the while she was the one who secretly caused it, like, this isn’t about the father, this is about April and Sterling. 

And in fact, if the show somehow does subvert some of the dramatic expectations and has Sterling tell April about it, that would very much change the equation, and April’s anger might be a one or two ep arc instead of half or full season.

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Have you read Devon’s interview and how she described April? I thought it was pretty spot on and loved how she answered the questions.

I loved itttttt. It was so good, so thoughtful! I loved all her answers, but two in particular, one about how the reveal about April’s sexuality wouldn’t suddenly make her a different (better) person, she was exactly who she was before, we just now knew she was gay. 

And the other answer with all her little headcanons of their earlier interactions and April being the one to kind of wake up to something in Sterling throughout too! I actually really love that interpretation, that it wasn’t some longstanding crush forever OR just happened suddenly in the moment of the kiss, but was happening during the same time we saw Sterling start her journey of exploring her sexuality in ep 1. I love getting these kinds of BTS insights into characters, especially one as closed off and complex as April. 

And even if these were things Devon discussed with Kathleen Jordan, the way she shows how she understood it is and is able to express it in an interview, pinpointing all these different moments, shows how much she’s made it her own.

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Why is no one talking about Bowser stoping everything to answer Blair’s calls.

Aww, I know! So sweet. It was super interesting in the scheme of things, the twins finally actually fighting and going to someone else for the first time and she chose Bowser! AND HE ANSWERED! In the middle of when he needed to be focused on the skip! And then when he was angry about it, at himself, he immediately answered again after when Sterling was kidnapped (without knowing she was) and did so much to help and comfort Blair. I feel like we’ll see a lot of them next season while the twins navigate everything.