I read a post I wholeheartedly agreed with that talked about a ship you like not being endgame.
Sometimes people assume that you don't like the development of a new couple in a show because you're upset that your ship broke up, when that's not necessarily true.
I'm upset at the fact that Portwell broke up because they didn't even give them a chance to begin with, they erased a season of development to make another ship happen. I like plenty of ships that weren't endgame, and I'm not upset over it not being endgame because that's not the issue. Mercedes and Sam from Glee, for example. They tried, and showed it didn't work, so they weren't endgame, and that's totally fine, I'm not salty about that at all.
The problem with Portwell is that it feels they didn't even get to develop or deepen the underlying issues they had. They, instead, made a cheap storyline with jealousy, and getting a third party involved, because that's easier to write than to develop an actual reason why they would need to break up, or why that would be best.
I think the fact that they were about to be in different stages of life should've been the foundation to the idea that they needed to break up. That's incredibly valid criticism I've seen anti pws make. Yes, they were on different stages of their life, but I, for one, still ship them because even though they were on different stages, they were exactly what the other needed at that precise stage that they were in. The present. That doesn't mean their relationship was meant to last forever, but that at least they were something the other needed at that point in time. Instead of building on that, or on other things that should be addressed, it was barely touched on as an excuse Gina used to break up without actually showing the audience why that was relevant at all.
I wouldn't be upset at Portwell not being endgame if they would've at least given them a chance. As a shipper, it's frustrating to see your ship fall apart over easily fixable things because the writers decided they wanted another relationship to take place right after. Gina literally says they weren't given a chance, word for word, "can it really be over if it never really got a chance to start?"
It wasn't them as characters that didn't get a chance to thrive, because they had been together for months at that point in the story. It refers, imo, to the writers who didn't give the couple a chance to thrive on screen in front of the audience; we weren't given good reason to accept their breakup as "the best" for both characters, because the relationship was doomed from 3.01.
So no, I'm not salty at the fact that Portwell isn't endgame. I'm salty at the fact that the writers didn't even give them the chance to make things work, even if it was for a little while, and threw out their S2 development to have petty reasons to break up in S3.
elainiisms