[ SECRET POST #4920 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #4920 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 11 secrets from Secret Submission Post #704.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[philstar22]

Cole/Phoebe was my Charmed OTP. And the thing is, during the whole arc with the forced marriage, that wasn't actually Cole. He was possessed by the Source. The show later tries to retcon that and have Cole be responsible and that has always pissed me off. Later on he won't take Phoebe's no on getting back together for an answer. But a big chunk of their issues happen while he was possessed.

[(Anonymous)]

They kind of lost me with that arc, to be honest. It wasn't too long after that I stopped watching.

[philstar22]

I watched to the end the first time around. On rewatches I always skip that arc and then stop watching about halfway through season 7 because by that point all the sisters become so self-centered and unlikable that the show was unwatchable again.

Im OP

[(Anonymous)]

But a big chunk of their issues happen while he was possessed.
I happen to disagree entirely. Their issue was that Cole had only one motivation to be a good person and that was Phoebe, which was wildly unfair to Phoebe even if it was useful during the Source fiasco, and Phoebe had an affinity for selfishness/darkness that Cole exacerbated and those two things existed from the the start of the relationship to the bitter end. A lot of the toxicity of their relationship for me is started pre-Source. There was no period where Cole's intense anxiety that he would lose Phoebe (which demonstrated itself in unfortunately paternalistic behavior) and her deep certainty that he was pretty easily goaded into dark or dangerous magic and fear of that didn't cloud their relationship pre-Source. And that is their major clash post-source, although I don't think they would have been as indelible about it if it weren't for Phoebe's abuse and manipulation by the Seer and Source. Also, it was telling to me that Barbas had to goad Cole into stripping his powers for Phoebe, when that should have been the first thing he wanted when she told him repeatedly that that's what she was afraid of or that the first thing he asked her in the Wasteland was to get him out using dark magic, neither of which was Source motivated. I think that's only so much the writers trying to get McMahon off to Nip/Tuck, and I think that is Cole's characterization pre-Source. It's heavily implied that part of the reason he's so easily manipulated into taking the hollow was because he didn't like feeling Phoebe needed to protect him and that he couldn't reciprocate. And when he had power and was trying to be good pre-Source, he still couldn't help using his powers to kill, even if it was a bad dude.


But I think it's fic-fixable tho because I agree that there was a lot of external interference from a number of places so I think I could contrive their way to a fix without contravening the actual desires of either one, and that small bit of time where they sleuthed together was sooooooooo great, whereas Leo and Piper were just a true life clash.