JACK LOWDEN As River Cartwright In Slow Horses (Season 2)

The fandom is definitely sleeping on this knowledge. Every serious runner I know is ready to gnaw their own arm off after max three days without vigorous exercise.

i don’t think we’ve addressed that langdon runs marathons and takes 13 minutes in an ice bath yet. that’s fucking crazy. it also shows us how devastating a back injury would’ve been for him if he went from running marathons to not being able to run at all. kill one healthy coping mechanism and an unhealthy one develops in its place maybe.

Jack Lowden perfects the triple take - The Graham Norton Show

All of this. I am so obsessed with imagining their relationship before the series starts.

Also, River is all about River in a lot of ways. And he's sad about Spider's death because it's not only the final death of what their *relationship* once was, it's also a symbol of him losing who *he* once was. Or who he thought he was going to be.

I think that the insane yearning and obsession they have for each other is driven a lot by how needy they both are for a certain kind of success and recognition. They recognize each other as fellow travellers. They also have those feelings you have when you have a crush on someone and it's kind of about how you think that person has something amazing about them that makes you want to bask in their aura but also you kind of resent them because you're envious of their sparkle.

The seething disdain they feel for each other after the Falling Out is a reflection of their disappointment in how the other has failed to live up to the (still nascent) image they projected and the grimy mirror that holds up to their own respective reflections.

Instead of Britain's most dangerous field asset, River is a fuck up who can't follow basic instructions (for his surveillance assignment - hence Stanstead/King's Cross). Instead of an astute political operative climbing the ranks and pulling strings behind the scenes, James is babysitting a bunch of filing cabinets and only gets trotted out when some woman with actual power needs a biddable warm body for her own purposes. They both suck and they hate looking at the other man and being reminded of the abjectness of failure, of falling short, of being so desperately close but so far. It's embarrassing watching the other one hanging from the cliff by his fingernails while he puts on a show like he's still climbing the mountain.

I think the saddest thing about their relationship is that these boys never even really knew each other. And they couldn't because they didn't even know themselves. They were too young and trying too desperately to outrun themselves and become perfect, unassailable, lovable.

They're both so deeply lonely. And then Spider dies and River is even more alone. They ended up hating each other but James also understood what it was like to live with that black hole in the centre of himself and there was a type of company in that, even after the love was gone.

river and spider are just such a tragedy to me. the way they both (in the books) are just. constantly wistfully thinking about Back When They Were Friends… and it’s about more than just their friendship in a lot of ways, it’s that Back Then was when they still had bright unbounded futures, back when they thought they’d wander straight into influential spots at the service and be bestest friends forever while they changed the world and got everything they ever wanted.

and like. the thing is, that is already gone. they’re never getting that back. even if they somehow put all their bitterness and history aside and became close again, it wouldn’t be the same as before… they’ll never get that youthful optimism that (in my head at least) defined their pre-series relationship back. that version of their friendship is gone forever already.

but then spider dies and, well. now it’s really really gone. now even the hope of a “different from before but close enough to what they had once” reunion is gone.

just. agh. this idea of like. that, that version of their relationship, the version that they miss, is already dead and buried before the series starts and there’s no getting it back. there’s already no getting it back. but they still keep hoping (or at least, river keeps hoping, though i think spider does too) that it somehow, against all rules of logic, WILL come back anyway. until spider dies and river has to face that that hope, while impossible before anyway, it now for real actually impossible impossible…

heartbreaking, man. they’re such a tragedy.

A random River collection.

Jack Lowden as River Cartwright Slow Horses – S01E04 – Visiting Hours

Im gonna lose it over the way people are so prescriptive about shipping

"Why are you focusing on romance when the show doesn't --" because I want to, i dont need the show to do anything, im not trying to get into the writers room im on ao3, you don't have to panic because i'm engaging with media different than you

"You cant ship them together because [something in canon]" what on gods green earth would be the point of fanfic if all it did was respect canon?

"That's never going to be canon" okay! I dont need it to be! Once again, hence the fanfic! 99.9% of things ive shipped in my life were not canon and had no chance of becoming canon and tbh that makes it more fun for me

"Stop shipping [pairing] theyre obviously platonic" or "why are people shipping A and B when A and C is right there?" This isn't a competition, i'm not trying to prove anything to you, im shipping the characters who make my heart pang and if you dont share that perspective we're all going to be okay

הנני הנני

a Dr. Michael "Robby" Robinavitch mix

You Want It Darker - Leonard Cohen Tickle Me Pink - Johnny Flynn Oh My Heart - R.E.M. Sisyphus - Andrew Bird Love Love Love - The Mountain Goats There Is A Place - Silver Jews Think You Can Wait - The National Heart of Gold - Neil Young Day Is Done - Nick Drake

[Listen of Spotify]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Slow Horses (TV), Slough House - Mick Herron Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Sidonie "Sid" Baker/River Cartwright Characters: River Cartwright, Sidonie "Sid" Baker Additional Tags: Fake/Pretend Relationship, OCs (secondary characters), Co-workers to lovers, One Night Stands Summary:

Sid asks River to be her date to fool her friends into thinking she's moved on from a bad break up. In a surprise to no one who's ever read a romance novel, the only one she's fooling is herself.

(I think maybe you could consider this fluff if you're willing to overlook the teensy tiny ethical violation of banging someone you have under surveillance.)

Workplace sexual harassment!

Bonus frowny face;

Would you believe me if I told you this occurred to me about 5 minutes after my previous post and I was like "Oh. DUH."

The whiplash i get from seeing season one feotus zygote river- bro was a little stream a canal at best- and season two's I'm just a little lad who loves berries and cream river with the nerdy specs and sneakers

AND FRICKIN DAD BOD RIVER IN SEASON THREE? WHOS A LITTLE ROUGH AROUND THE EDGES AND MEAN LOOKING?

like i understand that season one and two were filmed one after the other and in the break before season three jack lowden had to play a- lmao- 'jacked' up mafia gangster in a biopic tv show BUT STILL

In the slow horses universe, what'dya guys think happened to him in the interim? Looking like he drank depresso expresso no milk extra salt every morning ass character development