u/StarChild413

So yeah, I was mad at the cliffhanger but the anxiety really kicked into high gear once I saw that TVInsider article about what would have happened in S3 as there's a part of me that's afraid that that alone means we're too late as why share the details if we still could yet find a way to see them. However a part of me remembers what happened with the cancellation of So Help Me Todd (which Brilliant Minds's situation shares striking similarities to) and when that show's creator did his interview/article thingie about what would have happened he did it for all five of the seven-planned-seasons-of-the-show that never got to air not just one season. Therefore there's a part of me that wonders if the article was partially just to defuse the cliffhanger tension and therefore if the show might still have a chance. I'm sorry I've been this vehement but this show is very special to me and my anxiety-ridden brain is not gonna feel satisfied with either just the broad-strokes of the article (the little moments are what make this show special) or the overambiguity and overindividuality (thus meaning it's harder to get fandom to cohere on a story) of relying on fanfiction.

So I want to still fight for this show because I hope I'm not too late but I don't know what ideas would work that I haven't already tried

I've got the potential-bug again (this time on r/AITA) where when I try to post on a sub I hit the submit button and the submit page just refreshes to itself and neither posts my post or gives an error message. What's up?

And what I mean by that is not just the very very thematically parallel plot (both in the show-getting-on-soapbox and the fantasy stuff that seemed like a love letter to not just its fandom but fandom itself) but all the things this episode showed us that a season 3 could give us more of, from big plot things like relationships moving on or THAT TWIST (I swear this has been the year of me falling in love with Sarah Steele through her characters) to little things like more "AU bullshit" (I understand the thematic importance of them not being there but I kinda wish "Ericka The Knowledgeable", "Dana The Heartfelt", and "Charlie The Redeemer [interesting not The Redeemed, maybe that could hold implications for his future]" had been there helping Wolf help the guy fight through this as that would have been cool) or autistic!Wolf becoming canon or Charlie actually feeling like a good-guy-part-of-the-team-proper or even just them having to go to a Renaissance Faire for some reason and Dana actually getting to rock that kind of outfit (and maybe Sofia with them too??? I swear I've thought for a while Dana and Wolf have sibling energy, wasn't expecting her to strike a spark with his half-sister and I want to see more than just one full episode and a bit of that happening).

Now as I see everything from fall TV schedules to that one post delivering some kind of "post-mortem" (when regardless of if the series would end when it does or could be saved, the season hasn't even fucking ended) analysis of the show and how it's "getting cancelled because it's right" (in a way that made my similar-neurodivergencies-to-Dana's fear it getting saved proves it wrong), I'm desperately trying to fight as hard for this show as Dana and Carol were for the Hudson Oaks people and Wolf was for the patient guy this episode but the aforementioned neurodivergencies keep making every bit of negativity I see about its chances (be it realism or cynicism) pseudo-catching in the sense of "you never know they might be right" when I don't know the truth and would like to believe it has a shot of getting saved somewhere because the world needs it but I don't know what to fucking do.

And I know I've been making a lot of these posts in kind of a colloquially-manic frenzy ever since the announcement of even the move of the back six to the summer but this show has come mean more to me than I could say without a fucking essay-if-not-video-essay in even a relatively small number of episodes, even more than So Help Me Todd which was a cancelled show under eerily similar circumstances that I keep being afraid my efforts to save Brilliant Minds would have to outdo to actually save it because SHMT didn't get saved. I know some people might tell me to just let this go but the only ways I would really be happy to just leave this at the satisfying-end-to-S2 NBC promised for next week without feeling guilt comparable to what I still feel for So Help Me Todd (I feel responsible because I didn't do enough) would be under the following conditions; A. another network procedural gives us a slow-burn gay couple among its main characters, B. another network procedural (albeit not necessarily the same one either as each other or as point A) gives us gay neurodivergent characters of similar character archetypes to Wolf and Dana as between all the things Dana feels like she's got, Wolf's autism-coding, and even Nico's ADHD-coding but less so and me being pansexual with AuDHD and anxiety I have never felt so seen in my freaking life and C. the only way I'd be happy with Brilliant Minds ending with just a bit of real!Sofia would be if that meant Sarah Steele was now free to play Marissa Gold on more episodes of Elsbeth (even if those wouldn't include some implied-crossover revelation of her mom having a second family with a doctor from the Bronx iykwim) as as I said characters have similar energy and I am kinda in love (as much as one can be for multiple characters an actress plays without being parasocially weird about the actress, insert joke about how crush makes sense if I see myself that much in Dana). So seeing as those would be unlikely to all happen even though you never know I feel like I have to fight for this one-of-a-kind amazing magical show to be able to continue its story somewhere in a world that needs it especially once someone brought up the idea that the cancellation was for ideological reasons not just Weird Studio Shit.

So TL;DR this episode demonstrates why this show means so freaking much to me and why it should be picked up somewhere to have all this story setup pay off but I don't know how to fight for it most effectively (especially as I have the SHMT parallels hanging over my head afraid either I have to do more than I did for that show (which included things like a petition with 43k signatures and counting) to have it stand more of a chance or the more I do for Brilliant Minds what I did for So Help Me Todd the more I'm linking their fates and meaning we can't save this because we can't save that) and every naysayer whether or not they're actually being cynical is making me feel like I'm running out of time at minimum if not banging my head against a brick wall and again wondering if this is what Wolf feels like (and fearing my magical-thinking-in-the-colloquial-sense means invoking Wolf means I can't save the show because if it stops that breaks the parallel) as the world fucking needs this goddamnit!

So this show and my determination to save it has so stuck in my brain that when I heard the news about Lil Nas X's bipolar diagnosis, my first thought is since (esp. assuming that's what Wolf has) he is black, gay and bipolar, all minorities the show represents, if someone could find the right chain of knowing people who know people to be able to indirectly get to him and tip him off about the show's existence, think of the publicity it could get if he watches and likes it. But it wouldn't be presented as a publicity stunt, from what I know of him (or at least his public persona) I genuinely think he'd like the show (e.g. he's at least some degree of geek/fan-of-the-fantastical and the representation would help him feel not alone and he might find a kindred spirit in other ways in Nurse Silva)

So yeah only if he wants to of course (which is why I said if he watches and likes it) but I feel like this show could help him as much as he could help it so someone should try to as I said find the right chain to pass the info about it up to him

yeah yeah I know AI very polarizing but this isn't making it make the movie or show based on a given book, this is it helping (either through finding big names to actually cast or at least ones to say you're looking for a [so and so] type if you're open to unknowns) solve a common problem when books get adapted for the screen where characters don't look like the book describes them and people get super pissed