u/KingOfTheGrandLine

so i was rewatching The Martian last night (for like the 10th time, no judgment) and it hit me. Ridley Scott has NEVER won an Oscar. man is 88. still cooking. and the Academy just keeps fumbling.

look at the resume. Blade Runner basically invented the look of every sci-fi movie made after 1982. Gladiator won Best Picture and somehow Ridley didn't win Best Director that year, which i still don't understand. Kingdom of Heaven (the director's cut, the theatrical doesn't exist to me) is one of the most slept-on epics ever. American Gangster has Denzel AND Russell Crowe both at peak and Ridley just casually conducting that. and The Martian is my personal goat. matt damon doing math on potatoes shouldn't work and yet.

that's not even getting into Alien, Black Rain, The Last Duel. the man has been carrying cinema for almost 50 years.

and yeah, the Academy has a whole pattern of this. Scorsese had to wait until The Departed. Kubrick never won one. apparently Ridley is next on that list of "we'll regret this later."

just give him the honorary one. he's earned it ten times over. every movie he makes ends up being somebody's favorite film and y'all act like he doesn't exist on nomination day.

GOAT behavior. that's all i'm saying.

See you at the movies! 

We were together for 10 years. Met in college. Same batch, different worlds apparently. She's from a different caste, I'm a Telugu Brahmin, and somewhere in my parents' heads that was the whole story.

We weren't naive. We knew it would be a fight. So we waited, built something real, thought maybe time would soften things. It didn't.

When I finally told my mother, it went bad fast. Not just disapproval. Actual abuse. Curses. She called the girl I love "lower caste" like it explained everything. My mom threatened to pack her bags and leave. The whole thing turned into this suffocating, hostile nightmare and I was the only one in the house to deal with it. No siblings. No one to break the tension or take my side even a little.

I stayed in it longer than I should have. Kept hoping something would shift. It didn't.

Eventually I made the worst decision of my life. I walked away from her. Not because I stopped loving her. Because I couldn't ask her to walk into that house and call it a home. She deserved better than a family that would treat her like she was less-than from day one. I didn't want her to feel unsafe in a place that's supposed to be hers too.

So I chose her peace over being with her. I don't know if that was noble or just stupid.

It's been a while and I still can't shake it. I think about her constantly. I don't regret protecting her from that environment, but god it hurts knowing the reason we're not together has nothing to do with us. We were fine. We were good. The problem was never us.

Caste is such a rot. It doesn't just ruin marriages, it ruins people who never even got the chance.