#<-not really but I'm not being nice to tl him here am I

[lilithofpenandbook]

Something I think about is how irrelevant James truly is to Harry

James, who Harry wanted to be like, is literally nothing to Harry. He threw himself at the dark lord, yes, but that's all. Just throw, no thoughts.

Lily? Lily had the chance to live. She didn't take it. She chose death, for her son. She's the one who saved Harry. Not James.

And then Snape. Snape who wanted to die when Lily did. Who would have killed himself. But he didn't. Because he agreed to protect Lily's son Harry. He lived for that.

Lily who died for Harry. Snape who lived for Harry.

Lily gave Harry her death. Snape gave Harry his life.

James Potter may have been why Harry was born. Lily Evans and Severus Snape were why Harry lived.

And Lily and Snape, in a way, are united through the boy they sacrificed it all for. In a way, Harry is more Snape's than James'. James is more central to Snape's story as his main abuser, and Sirius' as the love of his life his best friend. In Harry's story? Just the man who impulsively threw himself at the Dark Lord.

But Lily and Snape? They're parts of Harry. Harry carries the love of his mother, the weight of her protection, and he was under Snape's protection even when he didn't know it. They're Harry's protectors. His guardian angels

[plant-dad-sulu]

I'm going to make my own post on why shatner's kirk is hard to draw because i'm a star trek fan and an artist and work in theatre/film and am insane, so here we go

For reference:

I've seen someone say before that he's hard to draw because the lighting changes his features too much to pin him down, but that's just not true. If that was the problem then no one in any tv show would be easy to draw and let me tell you it's hard to get nimoy and kelley wrong. The actual reason, in my opinion, is all the soft edges.

A lot of people who complain about him being difficult to draw -- myself among them -- work with lineart, and one thing lineart depends on is defined features. Shatner has obvious and recognizable features, but the combination of the softness of those features with the way they've done his makeup means that drawing those features makes them feel too severe and leaving them out makes him feel like some generic Man.

His lips, for example, are clearly there, he's got really nice lips, but because they have been made up to be essentially the same colour as the rest of his face it feels wrong to the artist's brain to draw them as thick as they really are. To leave them out entirely removes a defining feature that makes this Shatner™ and that creates a sort of paradox in which nothing really looks right.

It's the same with his eyebrows. As we can see in the photo, he has decently thick eyebrows, but while they are defined at the bottom they seem to blend in with his forehead at the top. Partly this is because he's on the edge of blond and partly it's because they've got some makeup in there (foundation or possibly just powder to keep him from being shiny). So we are faced with the same issue: to draw them defined would feel wrong and to draw them thinner would make this Not Shatner.

His nose, too, has very soft edges in a way that's hard to depict with lineart without making it feel more defined than it actually is. His nose bridge is fairly broad and isn't super pronounced, and his nostrils aren't particularly defined from the tip of his nose either, so no matter what lighting you get, the shadows will tend towards softer. Same with his cheekbones and jawline -- they are undeniably There but because of the gradualness of the curves, none of them are super defined leaving the artist with the question of "do i draw this in or do i shade it in or do i leave it unshaded and let the viewer extrapolate?" It doesn't help that he tends to smile tenderly, which doesn't create sharp lines in the face and doesn't create much change to the other soft features.

The most definable and easily depicted aspects of his face, in fact, are his eyes and his hairline. He's got partially hooded eyes that are decently defined by his eyelids, both of which are nice and easy features to draw, and they settle into nice dark shadows by his nose bridge. The only place, in fact, where his nose and eyebrows casts sharp shadows. His hairline is insanely recognizable. The roundness at the corners of his forehead combined with the widows peak make up for the relatively light colour of his hair up top. You put together his hairline and his eyes and it's the most obvious shatner you're going to get.

And because shatner is your typical 60's leading man, his face shape is simply not noteable. Nimoy has a long face and kelley has a very square/round one. Shatner's somewhere in between. He's got a nice silhouette and that's all. But there's a million actors out there with the same silhouette because it's attractive, and so if you don't get those defining features in there -- the ones that are so difficult to draw -- then he just winds up looking generic, and so your brain tells you that's Wrong.

tl;dr soft things are hard to draw, shatner is all soft angles

[fryday]

RE: Phil being quiet and Dan making the innuendos and winks, I actually think the opposite.

Phil said in his coming out video that he had been out and comfortable with himself for years and would have preferred to do a short video just talking from inside an actual closet lol

My interpretation is that he would have been ready and comfortable to be out as a couple this whole time but since Dan wasn't (isn't?), he deferred to Dan's comfort level. He let's Dan make the jokes because he gets to set the boundary.

I think the comment about doors was like, an agreed upon message. Almost like a press release statement lol I think they talked about it and decided that was the messaging. Especially since they referred to it in the mukbang 2 video.

Anyway that's just my interpretation. Hope that makes sense. I love scrolling through your theories! I'm the same age as Dan and I've been a phan since 2010 so it's nice to see the phantom come back more mature and kind that it was before.

(x) sorry for taking so long to respond to this! i think that is a really good interpretation of it, yes! one which i hadn't thought about at all

a counter-proposal re: how phil would've been happy with them being out as a couple long before, would be that phil is generally quite a private person and the stuff he shares with us on amazingphil, when he's acting purely on his own instinct and isn't interacting with/playing off of dan, is anecdotal but not necessarily revealing about himself as a person or his life. and i feel like he's quite professional in that way, that he shares what's pertinent to him doing his job well ie comedic stories, but doesn't go beyond that.

we also know that for the longest time he didn't actually feel the need to talk about his sexuality online at all because, as you said, he had already been out to some people in his life for a while by then and (a) thought that he was happy the way things were and (b) didn't really think it was a big thing that needed to be addressed on his public platform. but we know from COTY that part of why he was making it was so it could help people who might need it, and we know from his opinions in hindsight that actually coming out online DID make a difference in how free he felt after all. but perhaps, his relationship with dan was not something that could HELP people in any obvious way, and at that point it might have seemed irrelevant to him anyway from a freedom of expression standpoint because dan was hardly online/was hardly going to be online with him anyway. so he might not have felt the need even then to be transparent about them as a couple.

tl;dr - to me, phil comes across as a generally private person even if we're not talking about his relationship with dan, so he MIGHT not have found it relevant for them to be out as a couple before anyway.

but that's all speculation to do with the past! as things are now, if they actually have agreed to hard launch and are leading up to it, i totally see your POV and am inclined to agree with it! it seems to fit with what we know of them as people and as a pair, that phil would allow dan to set and push the limit as he's comfortable with it, because phil is the one who would be more chill/indifferent about it/what they share about it either way.

that was all just me thinking out loud though!! i don't have the answers, obviously, and i haven't kept up with dnp as closely in recent years as a lot of others around here have, so i'm def open to hearing other opinions :)

(also thank you! i love talking to people about their theories too. it's always v insightful and interesting! and i agree that the golden era of dnp and the phandom is now; overall i feel like there's a lot more to learn and gain from the experience of being here now vs before!)

[shopcat]

HI. this is the steve harrington autism post. source: i have the steve harrington style autism that makes me autistic about him

to preface this i would like to say i am working off of personal like interpretation and thru the lens of my own experience :0... also this is long lol <3 so, tl;dr, here are the autistic traits or things that are caused by autism i believe steve showcases, (except.. do read if you like <3):

sensory issues -> wearing only ever the same style of clothes, adjusting/touching his hair, (potentially) eating certain foods

stimming -> walking in place to think, fiddling with small objects, spinning/flipping/throwing objects to keep himself focussed or entertained, listening to music

scripting -> repeating phrases/words aloud and practicing what he's going to say, repeating the "plan" aloud

routine -> strict hair routine with specific steps, was in routine sports with strict rules/timing and enjoys them otherwise, driving robin to school every day without even knowing she couldn't bc it was routine, working jobs that require mindless but engaging tasks including organisation

poor grasp of social cues, especially with girls, and saying the "wrong" thing at the wrong time (including the 6 little nuggets speech, "he ate dustin's cat", confessing to robin, etc)

other people feeling like they have to tell him things he's "missed" socially (dustin telling him he likes robin, eddie telling him he likes nancy)

likes to set/follow rules and is upset when people deviate from them (i.e. max wanting to leave in s4)

out of-the-box/atypical/lateral thinking

delayed processing of thoughts/concepts/complicated subjects especially in high-intensity scenarios

picking up on small details (like background sounds in large areas or recognising something) that other people don't pick up on

fixating on certain things (hair, clothes/shoes, sports, etc)

high pain tolerance/sensory dysregulation (shaking off concussions/consistent, continued ability to function while severely injured)

inability to conceptualise his OWN mortality/safety and engaging in at risk situations with little thought other than instinct + making impulsive choices

developmental differences/delays (literally crawling backwards)

poor grades in school/not getting into college

trouble regulating emotion

poor self esteem due to feeling worthless :(

i also have adhd so i also keep this in mind a little and obv at the end of the day this is just my own interpretation + autism is a spectrum :) NOW. i will go into detail >:)

SOOO i'm not sure if steve was deliberately coded as autistic but i DO think they intentionally in one way or another coded him with a developmental disability of some kind!! which i will talk about first!!

this is shown particularly in season 2 in a couple different instances and continues into season 3 at undercurrent ..

we've discussed this a little before but i also think this is why when people like to just describe him as genuinely "dumb" it like hurts people's feelings 😭 my feelings... and that's not intentional ofc but while it is a personal insecurity of the character himself that is being ironically picked at, positively or not, by those who love him in fandom, it's also evident of something happening under the surface that people may be unaware of imo

i think he display a out of-the-box, atypical or lateral way of thinking combined with delayed processing in a way that is very typical to neurodivergent behaviour!! and more...

in season 2 we get a really nice little look into his psychology about it when nancy is reading his college admission essay (that he presumably asked her to do) and he's sitting there SO nervous and full of doubt and worked up about it he's like. basically twitching 😭

he says "it's crap i know" and nancy's like no it's not! and he's like "ugh it's not good..." sooo stressed out.. and nancy says it just needs some reorganising, which is INTERESTING!!! someone who is insecure in his own skills and inability to get his thoughts across in a succinct way + has good, complex ideas that translate poorly when he tries to explain it out loud or in text + a host of insecurities pre-rooted and explicitly about his own intellectual "failings" all = a very neurodivergent read of Steve Vs School i think

also, maybe a tangent, but: in that essay itself nancy says he starts by using one of his basketball games as a metaphor for his life, then he confuses the metaphor by comparing it to the war his grandfather was in. nancy says she doesn't see how they're connected and he's like "um. it connects because we both won" (i actually think she's being very sweet in this scene!! idg when ppl say she's mean here)

ik this wasn't the show's intention and just extrapolation but i find it really cool + interesting that there IS a war of some kind that steve could talk about that HE fought in, there is a description of high stakes combat where it's him VS them and he is the only one who now has to make this high stakes, risky choice, instead of playing it safe like he always does that relates directly to his life as a metaphor and he DOES feel connected to his grandfather in this sense...

but he can't actually talk about that. so it's basketball. and it's a slightly clunky metaphor that makes it seem like, trite, like oh silly steve, basketball isn't WAR. the essay itself is actually really well-written and evocative!! but to me signifies this inability to directly translate what he's thinking, hence it needs a little "rearranging", or maybe it's a little "all over the place" even

(also, that he crumpled up the entire essay and dismissed it entirely and fell back on nihilistic thinking and "i'll just work for my dad i guess". he already had cast disbelief upon his own ability to thrive because he feels he's not good enough :( )

his failing grades, which ended in not getting into college, tech or otherwise, is a big part of his post-highschool arc i think. to me it also shows sympathy to a problem many young neurodivergent (in every which way, btw) people face, including myself, and is potentially a really almost kind portrayal of the capability of a person not being wrapped up in their intellectual or i guess SCHOLASTIC endeavours and "achievements", and that you can be successful and "useful" to others in different ways :0

to call him dumb and really mean it (both in and out of show -_-) after all this is a certain kind of disservice i guess? like okay i think a little jokey joke is fine and also absolutely RELATING is fine (and another extension of another one of my points which is basically just "he's just like me fr" can actually = "he's JUST like me... like For Real". he's dumb in the way i'm dumb and we're both not actually dumb) but let's all be cool okayyyy

beyond school, i think he displays SOO many behaviours both characteristically and even like in his physicality that build to this beautiful conclusion... i think steve is this guy who was served up to be an initially one dimensional being who proved himself again and again to have a multitude of complexities beneath the surface :). i think his literal entire character arc is adjacent to the autistic experience LOL... perhaps...

he showcases a certain need and comfort in routine in a variety of ways, like:

being interested in sports both watching recreationally (which have timed matches and he HAS to be there on time, too) and as the hobby itself. sports are a high-routine activity with strict rules and rituals, before, after and during, as well as the extra work you have to put in otherwise!!

ESPECIALLY something like swimming, which is all about certain timing (and an individual-based sport as opposed to the team-based basketball) which he took for years!! (and actually got his cpr verification for, which you absolutely don't need to just like. be on the swim team. but it would be the "right" way to do it LOL) (also idk how it worked in 1980s fictional indiana but you need your verification a year in advance to actually do anything with it where i live!! which means he did it FROM freshman year)

driving robin to school every day, and then presumably picking her up for work sometimes too, despite not even knowing she COULDN'T drive herself because he was so dedicated to this routine (and friendship :D <3)

his hair routine!! it's SO specific (four puffs EXACTLY!!! no more no less... and when it's DAMP not WET) and i am honestly of the mind it's actually far more complex of a routine he even makes it out to be .. and i am willing to bet the multi step experience of it all is sooo long and has to be just as specific too. also extra points for it being something he does that aids in his own self-image and would make him feel like he's putting himself together.? so to speak

i think, in a way, that he owns about 9 pairs of shoes and most of them are white sports shoes with a colour accent + he's been shown to wear the colour accent that matches his outfit more often than not. which i spose is a certain kind of. ritual or routine or something.

he also shows a whole host of sensory issues/complexities/...things!!

he wears the same style of clothes like CONSTANTLY. almost everything he owns is either a soft sweater or a polo shirt, plus the same style of jacket he cycles through, all of which are well-worn (despite him being like, rich) :) the exception is that colourblock denim vest (which i think is the exception for him too because he just wanted to look like marty mcfly. which is so autistic)

i.e. wearing something that you know is comfortable over and over that doesn't give you a poor sensory experience, and continuing to buy the same style of clothing because you know it's safe to do so because he FEELS comfortable. super autistic trait. beloved prep trait as well i also just think he doesn't actually care what he wears but whatever

he also sometimes favours tight clothes and sometimes looser/baggier ones (think one day the s4 blue/white polo and jeans, the next a sweater and loose chinos) which indicates to me possible different sensory needs in the day by day...

he also wears a lot of undershirts, including with the scoops ahoy uniform (which could've been to avoid a POOR sensory experience)

he adjusts/runs his fingers through his hair and makes sure it's in a nice state at an almost compulsive level but it's also like an afterthought kind of. it could also just be a sensory thing to want to retouch his hair and play with it and follow through with the prior routine of it Looking Good + a grounding technique for sure

along with that he stims a LOT, including the thing where he has to twirl or throw ANYTHING in his hands up to and including -> a lighter, the baseball bat MIDFIGHT, a torch, a phone MIDFIGHT, his ice cream scooper, keys, his sailor hat, a banana, a random ball he found... he's also very fiddly and tends to sort of be happy sitting quietly and doing something over and over like that (this is also a trait with adhd :) )

the jobs he worked are relatively low intensity despite customer interaction and had him working with his hands plus at FV there's a lot of sorting/organisation. also "not my TAPES man" because he already sorted them and now it's ruined 😭

you tend to see him taking a little moment for himself in the background of scenes a lot, sometimes with robin as well!! he kind of just wanders off and does his own thing but in the wake of the high emotion, high adrenaline various combats in-show it makes sense, even more so if he just needs a little moment to himself to unwind

he walks/paces to think!!!

the reason he and robin only even threw up in season 3 is a) the stimulating lights he noticed that then b) over-stimulated them

this one's a little less obvious but he listens to the same kind of music and listens to it LOUDLY when he's stressed 😭 he also doesn't turn it off even if he like, technically should like on the way to fight monsters. i think he just likes music a lot tbh but also very autistic to me (and also a reason why he and eddie would be friends and/or kiss on the mouth)

one of the biggest things that sounds off to me is his social interactions :0 he is hailed as this like, ladies man but almost near constantly plummets to the earth in insane social blunder which personally i love actually (and it extends beyond these situations too!!). all the hottest boys are autistic...

i know that this is to show him just like, losing his charm...? and that he peaked in highschool or something and i do love his patheticness but it's also sooo autism. one of the reasons i actually think he's gay (lol) is his compulsive need to try and "land" a social interaction with a woman, then fail, while also not "feeling the spark" with the women he DID land and failing to see why (like his date at the basketball game). he's constantly seeking companionship but it feels like it's just out of his reach and he doesn't get it... sigh... and that it's definitely in part bc he feel he can't relate to them because HE'S so different i think. for whatever reason. multiple.

in season 3 the ENTIRE you rule/you suck board is like a beautiful shrine to this... he's honestly so funny . but like constantly awkwardly flirting and somehow saying the wrong thing every time whilst also not getting that they're Not responding to him until they like, leave, which is like. a statistical unlikelihood to me of times this can happen without something else going on in his little brain. i also like that he "invented" a makeout point bc that opens up the ability to just go um. let's go to skull rock. and the person would be like oh okay yes i am going to makeout with steve harrington.

beyond just girls or failed flirting or whatever a lot of his interactions with the kids or his other friends ping to me as having trouble with social cues and some accidental bluntness!! a FAVOURITE being -> "dart ate a cat?" "no. what? no." "what are you talking about? he ate mews" "who's mews?" "it's dustin's cat" "STEVE..." 😭😭 i love him. also him suggesting he could work his charm on the dean of the school and nancy being like... not that kind of charm.

oh another good moment for this is in the epilogue to season 3 actually like he's trying so hard to show he's seen Some movies (but only remembers the significant/stand out details) and then when robin's like can you give us a moment he's just like. Why. and does this funny little head shake movement. and robin does the steve -_- and he backs away kubrick staring... beautiful scene

he also falls victim i think to saying the wrong thing at the wrong time which is a lot of the time not necessarily his like FAULT ofc but suggests further little issues or . unalignmentd with social interaction. the entire 6 little nuggets speech to nancy to me is one of these situations (and maybe the convo in the woods with her?? idk) where he's kind of just talking and digging a hole and the other person is sort of just sitting there. it's also shown with like "like the germans?"

ALSO, a lot of the time people end up coming to him specifically and sort of like... telling him what to do/how HE feels?? and i think he just sort of goes along with it. in season 3 dustin tells him he has a crush on robin until he kind of talks himself into it and then he accidentally crash-fails for a second time by confessing to her at a sort of insane time as well (not that i think he actually had any feelings for her!!). and in season 4 eddie does the SAME with nancy which is almost spectacular.

alsoo while i think he struggles with certain social cues i also think he's very emotionally intelligent and he picks up on people's feelings easily which i guess someone could say it seems to counter? other autistic traits (silly) but to me i think. autistic people are aware of PLENTY of social cues sometimes the cue is just stupid -_- and i can read other people's emotions for sure in fact i'm almost like hyper attuned to it i just don't know how to RESPOND to it a lot of the time. whereas steve picks up on dustin's nerves at the snow ball and reassures him accordingly (and so cutely..), then picks up on robin's emotions after his confession and near-immediately course corrects after her confession in order to make her laugh!!! he was also really good with picking up on nancy's feelings and knowing exactly what to do about it/using forethought about it (like idk holding her hand when they were having sex or something to ease her nerves but also noticing she was upset at the library) when they were together at least 🤔

there are also a number of other various things very dear to me that i have no where else to include. LIKE:

his high pain tolerance!!! he's able to shake off torture, multiple concussions, various beatings with little to almost NO actual repercussions. in s4 it was actually really interesting how he was feeling bad enough to almost faint after the bats but once he was patched up he was "fine", and acted like he was fine for... the rest of the entire show. he did a backflip. high pain tolerance is an offshoot of a sensory dysregulation!!

specifically a lack of filter and moments where he goes "too far" especially when he's struggling with an emotional dysregulation of sorts, like with dustin in s4 or even with jonathan s1, but also like. the dumb faces he was making behind his date's back.

"when i was a baby, i crawled backwards"!!! autistic children can have different development i.e. their early CHILDHOOD development that can present itself in a variety of ways!! atypical to the norm crawling/walking is one of them (also matches up with robin taking 6 months longer to walk than other babies which she Also said to nancy and i think this is significant of something and i don't know what. maybe it's just funny. also stobin soulmates ofc).

to me, being the guy who mid plan debrief is the one saying "so let me get this straight" AND that he's the one asking the necessary questions to get everyone's minds (and in the 4th wall sense the literal plot) moving suggests that he both feels the need to want clarification of like, plans/instructions and what the situation is so everyone is caught up and he didn't get it wrong, and that just speaking it aloud helps cement it in his mind (which is also scripting as well i believe). also his ability to ask the RIGHT "wrong" questions suggests out of-the-box thinking as well (i would say both of these are also an adhd trait!)

his friendship with robin is honestly a point for me LOL. robin is an example of a character i do believe IS intentionally absolutely autistic coded, especially in season 4 but also 3, and his bond with her seems to be a personal one based in trust in each other and their own similarities... in season 4 when they're lamenting their love lives and say they should "just combine" is so important to me.. ugh

he's very particular and possessive about his belongings in an almost pedantic way (c'mon man not my SCOOPER! and wipe your feet before you get in my CAR and honestly even that he refuses to let max drive it fullstop, a little bit)

he also ate. SO many bananas at scoops i think for a time being it ended up being a safe food which literally happened to me as well. a very small thing but i like it

he scripts!! ie he repeats words and phrases aloud as a form of stimulation and getting himself to think or practices what he's going to say before things so he's "scripting" it (his "i'm sorry wtf am i sorry for" speech before he runs into dustin in s2)

he gets along better people who, by majority, aren't in his peer group i.e. the kids!!! and even robin and nancy were a little younger! he is very genuinely friends with the kids and it is Very Genuinely so sweet, but particularly with dustin too i found it sooo... <3

he also shows like these moments of high-intensity like silly child-like qualities of (autistic) joy LIKE when he sees dustin in scoops and they have their little lightsaber fight (which they. had practiced and made beforehand) that is just so sweet to me...

he picks up on things that other people don't!!! as the Normal Guy in a group of people he typically ends up settling in that role BUT he's multiple times picked up on small details that other people don't or DIDN'T notice, which is a neurodivergent trait!! he recognised the song in the russian recording, recalled where it came from like. right after + was the only one who heard dustin in the upside down + other things like noticing when someone's missing from a room

i also think he may be prone to like. i guess sensory overload/emotional dysregulation when he reacts what i think is appropriately to these HUGE scary scenarios but everyone else is like chill out and therefore it's inappropriate to them that he's losing his mind about it. but as time passes and he gets used to it all it lessens for sure (most evident in season 1) but there are moments where he struggles to reign in his truest reactions to things i think LOL. he is also just very dramatic tbf ☝️

his other vague neuroticisms but specifically commenting when things aren't Correct or Right or Safe including complaining about the sterility of the needle he was being injected with mid TORTURE

when he defaults to sports metaphors bc that's the easiest thing he can relate to in s2. god

100% of autistic people i talk to about this all go OH YEAH he's so autistic. tbh i think autistic people relating to a character can be enough of a diagnosis to me. peer diagnosis...

i just think so :)

in conclusion...

[kcrabb88]

Not to vent on main, but I do want to talk about this because I think it speaks to a bigger issue in fandom recently. So, there's been a small but noticeable trend recently of people coming onto Quinlan/Obi-Wan content that I make and either saying "I liked this except for the QuinObi and/or Quinlan himself" or commenting on something as to why it was QuinObi and not another more popular ship. This happened recently in a comment I got on a fic and also on a piece of QuinObi art that I paid for, among other things. First, that's a shitty thing to do. You don't come into comments and complain that it's not what you like. Second, I gotta say, I have not experienced having people who like super popular ships coming to me, whose ship is a rowboat, and complaining that my content, or content I paid to have created, isn't their ship in any fandom I've ever been in. You're right! It's my ship. I love them and will continue to write about them. If a few people have written QuinObi because of me (and they have! Which is so nice!) I'm still not rocking the fandom boat. I am not making a dent in the behemoth ships that are out there. I ran a QuinObi week which was so wonderful and I will do it again, but it's not going to suddenly steal writers away from other popular ships (also, multi-shipping exists!) I'm not a threat. Not that we should think of things that way, but it does start to come across like that when stuff like this happens, like I'm getting in the way of an agenda.

I've been in fandoms where I shipped a big ship and got complained to by someone shipping idk, I hesitate to call it a rival ship, but that's the only word I can think of. Still not nice, but coming to me about my SMALL SHIP is much more unexpected and much more unkind as far as fandom power dynamics go.

People have gotten truly aggressive about both fanon and popular ships. No one, whatever the fandom, is obligated to ship the popular ship you like. Not everyone is going to fit the mold of popular fandom trends, and they don't have to. They should be able to create what they like without being bothered about it. People seem to believe now that if you ship a pairing that you also hold an Approved slate of beliefs about every other character in fandom. That you follow what I've been calling a Fandom Map. Well, some people like to mix it up. Fandom isn't a hive mind and diversity of characters and pairings should be encouraged. I think it's ironic that I have to be extremely nervous to make a post critiquing a popular fandom trope but people can come to me and be rude about my way less popular shipping preferences. I’m not a fandom vending machine. If you don’t like one thing but enjoyed others tell me what you did like and leave the rest out. Or don’t read it. Crits like this aren’t even dislikes about story elements (and even those are more for Goodreads than Ao3) they’re crits about my personal taste.

(As to Star Wars fandom in particular, I continue to think it's really off that people are so weird about Quinlan generally, and dumb him down, among other crimes. You have to start to wonder why and when you wonder, the results of that wondering aren't great).

tl ; dr don't be a jerk. We're all here because we enjoy something.

[cinnamonest]

I know nothing about Persona let alone Goro Akechi but after reading the bsf and yan profile post I want to give this man a hug (and my tits). His story seems so sad ;-; and he's so pretty and for what?? 💢

Honestly, as much as I enjoy genshin I never truly found it to have any meaningful or extremely well written characters (which is not a bad thing, I just can't take them seriously when they all look like that lmao). All credit to making me think twice about them goes to writers and artists in the fandom. So the change in content feels soooooo nice. Made me appreciate your writing in another way

I've heard about Persona a LOT for years, but I didn't have a huge drive to play it until your liveposting (p.s I love the LP so much) and especially the posts with that one insane policeman guy who is a loser (affectionate, also giving him my pussy). Any recs? 😅

HE IS MY BABY BOY you're so right he is so pretty 😖😖😖 Akechi is genuinely an excellently written character, and Persona 5 Royal is one of the few games I think fully deserves to be so hyped as it is.

Tbh I think the problem genshin and similar games has is that there's so many characters, you have to essentially go out of your way to dig into lore to get anything beyond surface level from them. This happens a lot in series with lots of characters — like with Danganronpa for example, your experience of a lot of characters completely changes upon playing their free time events. A lot of genshin characters get very little screen time on the main story, so all their characterization is in their quests, lines, and character profile content. Which to be fair, with a game of this nature that's kinda the only way to really do it, so, I'm just glad they give us that extra content tbh. I've played some gachas that would introduce new characters but give very little beyond a design and name which is kinda sad when you want to know more about the lil guy you're playing with.

But AAAAAAAAAAAAAA thank you so much anon I am going to ramble here, but I'll put a tl;dr at the bottom!

Soooo if you want to get into Persona, I'd recommend the series in a certain order with some notes. There's 5 main entries in the series and a lot of spinoffs.

A word of advice in general with marathoning a game series: with any series it's a good idea to play in order of chronological and thus technological progression, especially if you intend to play the series back to back, otherwise going from a more recent game to an older one can damper your experience due to the decrease in graphical quality, gameplay smoothness, and general content quantity.

However for this series, the ideal order to play really depends on the factors of 1) which version of Persona 3 you choose to play, and 2) if you want to play Persona 1 & 2.

Regarding Persona 1 and 2: These are some of those games where your enjoyment will strongly depend on whether or not you're a person who is okay with some of the frustrations, limitations and slowness/jankiness common to old games (they came out between 1996-1999). I know some people don't mind or see it as a sort of vintage charm, while others get very frustrated with that — if you're the latter, I'd recommend saving yourself the frustration and skipping them, but if you like old games or have a high tolerance for jankiness, you could start here. I will also say that, even amongst the vintage/90s games fan crowd, P2 is definitely more popular and considered better than P1. It's also much better on the aforementioned issues.

Also, unless you have an original PlayStation or PSP, you'll have to emulate these.

Regarding Persona 3: there's several versions — the original came out in like 2006, then there was a remake version called P3 FES which added an epilogue (which is being added to the recent remake soon anyway), then a PSP remake called Persona 3 Portable (which has ports on modern consoles), then the most recent remake, Persona 3 Reload, came out just a few months ago in 2024.

Obviously the newest remake has vastly improved graphics and added lots of gameplay content. However, one of the biggest differences is that P3 Portable had the option to play as a female protagonist — this altered a lot of aspects of the game and is exclusive to that version (which has disappointed a lot of people hoping she'd be in the 2024 remake), so you can't play as her if you play Reload (unless, I believe, you play PC, there's a volunteer team currently making a mod for her).

Personally, I bought P3 Reload, and couldn't get into it, so I dropped it. Then I bought P3P on a whim and LOVE it so far. Getting to play as the girl protagonist makes a massive difference in my opinion, and more than compensates for the older graphics/gameplay. It's not just the romance routes either, her dialogue options, interactions, music, and overall vibe is different enough that it changes the feel of the story.

It really depends on what you value more — 2024-tier visual quality/gameplay and the epilogue, versus the Female Protagonist experience, so just pick which you prefer.

For the order thing, if you choose to play P3P (or the original/FES for whatever reason), I'd start here, but if you want to play Reload, I'd play it either last or just before P5 Royal.

Moving on, Persona 4: Golden and Persona 5: Royal are both the definitive editions of their respective games. They're remakes of the originals with a lot of added content, and unlike Persona 3, there's no reason to play the older versions over these. Notably their themes/vibes are kinda opposite of each other (big city world-scale societal rebellion versus small rural town murder mystery), I wouldn't say either story is better or worse, they're not really comparable and more a matter of personal taste.

As for the stories, admittedly if you've read my posts, you've essentially already been spoiled on the identity of the killers, but honestly it's still worth experiencing the story, there's multiple big plot twists before and after the reveals regarding Akechi/Adachi.

I would play Persona 5 Royal last, largely because it's widely considered the best entry to the series and is by far the longest. However if you only intend to play one game, it should definitely be P5 Royal. The only real flaw to P5 is it's much easier than previous games.

From here, there's a few more spinoff games, whether or not you want to play them really just depends on if you enjoy the genre. There's a bit of lore in some of them but nothing critical.

Dancing All Night/Starlight/Moonlight - dancing rhythm games

Arena Ultimax - fighting game, acts as an epilogue to P3&4

Persona Q 1&2

These are Nintendo DS spinoffs with chibi style art. I haven't played these and admittedly don't know much about them, I think they're dungeon crawler genre? It's popular for the aspect of which it involves the characters of the different main games, so you get to see them interact with each other.

The downside is that these games are oddly expensive, I think because there weren't too many copies. I intend to get them eventually.

Persona 5 Tactica/Strikers:

These are P5 spinoffs that put the cast in alternate stories, strikers is the closest to a true sequel from my understanding, tactica is more of a dungeon-crawler. I didn't get them because Akechi isn't in strikers and is just minor dlc for tactica.

The Phantom X

This is upcoming I believe, it's going to be a mobile game with a new cast.

The TL;DR of my advice:

- Play P2 only if you're into vintage gaming

- Play P1 only if you're REALLY into vintage gaming

- Play Persona 3 Portable if you really value the female protagonist/male character romance experience, otherwise play Persona 3 Reload

- If you play the original Persona 3, FES, or P3 Portable: start with that, then P4 Golden, then P5 Royal

- If you play Persona 3 Reload: play P4 Golden FIRST, then both P5 Royal and P3 Reload in either order.

- Play the spinoffs just based on what type of games you like, if any.

[lunar-years]

https://x.com/JRRnotTolkien/status/1827492547960434945?t=oFRRrF9CB-V8MfBWZZEyQg&s=08 not sure if you saw this but this is maybe more positive - like, a casting director wanted him to come in for something but learned from Phil's people that he may have this commitment. Of course, this means that if the article detail is correct, that's the Ted Lasso people actively being like "we aren't gonna bother with Jamie, sorry Phil" like them choosing not to renew, or seeing the authentic best path for Jamie as a star footballer would be sold to a bigger and more aspirational team. I get that this happens to players but I don't like the idea that it would be canon to do that in Roy's first season. Surely he would want to stay with Roy as manager and play in the Champions League under him. It would feel OOC for him to leave.

original tweet from two days ago:

today's amendment:

Especially considering the amendment tweet here I can't say this changes much for me one way or another. There's for sure a lot of contrasting information out there at the moment and it's really impossible for any of us to know for sure what's happening. At the moment I am trying to remain a bit hopeful that I'll be nicely surprised whilst also preparing to be letdown. Based on everything I've seen, the number of times these supposed scheduling conflicts have been mentioned by different sources makes me lean towards thinking (very unfortunately) that they are in fact real and Phil isn't going to be coming back as a regular, but could (and I would assume will) guest star. i really really REALLY hope i'm wrong (or that "guest star" in this capacity means he's just gonna be in 11 out of 12 episodes 🤪). Quite frankly if Phil couldn't make the proposed TL filming schedule work due to prior commitments, TL should've just changed the filming schedule. Like...damn! Literally just push it back a few months we've already waited this long. I think losing him as a regular is a massive mistake.

As for your second point, I very strongly doubt that the Ted Lasso people didn't want to option Phil to return tbh. Everything we've seen so far indicates the issues came from Phil's side. Besides that, I really don't think this show cares about realism anywhere near enough to write off a beloved main character just because that's what might happen if Jamie were a real footballer 😭 Jamie was arguably the most well-received character and arc of s3 for the show and they for sure would capitalize on that if they could (and writing him off is going to be really weird and undoubtedly effect the plans for other characters' s4 arcs as well, he was very intertwined with Roy's plot in particular in s3, plus they were still going with the ot3 love triangle thing, plus they introduced the recovery arc with his dad. I think they will probably have to scrap part of their s4 vision to work around losing him and that Sucks!

[tessenpai]

Kono Oto Tomare! Chapter 124 Scans and Rough TL

Disclaimer: Please DO NOT use this translation to make your own TL of the chapter!! The KOT TL group works very hard to give you the most accurate translation, that does as much justice to the original script as possible. This is a ROUGH translation. That means is faulty and there must be mistakes in certain places. This is just for impatient people like myself to get a grasp on what is going on in the chapter! You can REFERENCE my TL if you want to discuss the chapter but never USE it as it was your own.

Scans:

Page 1

Side text: Landing on the Northern Land...

Page 2

Side text: Seeking Love/Chika in the Summer/Natsu

Chapter Title: Ignorance is Bliss

Page 3

Isaki: Hold on, Takaoka-kun. Where are you going?

Tetsuki: Ah, I'm going to take the train from here. I will see you tomorrow, then.

Isaki: What are you talking about? I told you I rented a car, didn't I? Don't be shy.

Tetsuki: I'm not being shy, I'm just trying to protect myself.

Isaki: Hey, now.

Isaki: You're not pretending anymore, are you, Takaoka-kun?

Tetsuki: Aren't you the one having fun pretending to be dull, Isaki-san? Please stop it alrea-

Tetsuki: Ah. I'm sorr...

Page 4

Tetsuki: !! Uzuki!

Page 5

Uzuki: Takaoka-ku...

Isaki: Huh!!? Did you say "Uzuki" just now!?? That "Uzuki" I cannot forgive-

Isaki: ...

Isaki: "Uzuki"?

Uzuki: ...Yes

Isaki: The "Uzuki" that tormented Chika so much and also messed up my father's place...?

Page 6

Uzuki: ....

Uzuki: Yes...

Isaki: Is this the actual dude? I think even I could take him down!!?

Tetsuki: Well, the one who actually executed it was someone else...

Isaki: ...

Isaki: Ejem

Isaki: Nice meeting you. I'm Chika's aunt. It seems you brought my nephew a lot of grief. I was thinking about punching you after the National Competition was over.

Page 7

Isaki: Chika told me that he had invited you to listen to their performance. So you actually came.

Uzuki: ...I'm sorry. I am truly... regret... ful...

Isaki: I wasn't being sarcastic. After all, Chika was being serious when he invited you.

Uzuki: Eh? ....Ah....

Page 8

Isaki: You look pale. More like, you look like death. Do you even eat properly?

Uzuki: Eh...

Uzuki: !

Isaki: Have you eaten lunch?

Uzuki: I.... Have not

Isaki: I see. Us neither.

Tetsuki [thoughts]: Isaki-san, you are not planning to...

Isaki: Smiles

Page 9

Isaki: We are going.

Uzuki: Eh?

Isaki: Come on, start walking.

Uzuki: Um

Isaki: Takaoka-kun, you too. Quickly!

Tetsuki [thoughts]: Seriously....?

Mittsu: Fuaaaaaah

Kota: I'm starting to lose focus.

Page 10

Chika: You guys are pitiful. I'm still full of energy.

Sane: That's only you! You are the only one who is still lively!

Sane: We've already heard the performances of 23 schools, y'know?

Sane: Not even in class have I ever listened with that much concentration.

Takezou: Are you two okay? Is your first time at a competition, and with the volume of the sound...

Natsu: I'm tired, to be honest.

Atsumu: I'm having so much fun!!!

Atsumu: I thought all the performances were only koto, but there were high schools that had sangen* and shakuhachi**, too!

Chika: Ah! That was awesome-- I got so excited!!

Atsumu: Yes!!

3-baka: That's Yoshinaga, the heir of Chikaism, for you.

Mittsu: How many schools are left, by the way?

Sane: Let's see-- 1, 2... 9 schools.

Kota: That's an amazing number in just one day---

Page 11

Suzuka: It's not like is mandatory for you to listen to all of them, you know?

Akira: Guys, we have practice after we go back. It may be too much...

Mittsu: No... We've made it this far...

Keishi: Ahaha You don't have to be so stubborn-- Remember that the most important thing is your own condition.

Keishi: There are some schools that don't listen to other schools' performances so as to not be influenced by them in any way.

Keishi: I think a lot of them give themselves until the last minute to practice.

Keishi: But if you really want to stay and listen, that's no problem at all.

Sane: Uuugh...

Natsu: By the way, are there any strong schools within the remaining 9?

Page 12

Akira: Let's see...

Akira: Aah. If I remember correctly Chibana Girls High School is regularly a top school.

Sane: Chibana, Chibana... Ooooh dead last...

Natsu: Those are the girls that we saw in the hotel meal room, isn't that right?

Sane: Eh?

Natsu: They ones that seemed to be mad at you Senpais at the opening ceremony.

Sane: Those girls are from Chibana?

Natsu: They had CHIBANA written on their T-Shirts. And in the sign at their table.

Sane: You are so observant, dude---

Page 13

Natsu: As soon as they found out we were from Tokise, they changed their attitude real quick.

Natsu: I thought it would be funny if their performance sucked.

Sane: Woah. You are so bad, Momoya.

Natsu: I mean, I just got super annoyed.

Chika: Pats

Kota: Hugs

Natsu: What is this...

Takezou: For now, let's decide when Kurusu-san and Houzuki-san come back.

Sane: Right!

Page 14

Tomoe: Ugh.

Tomoe: Bleeeeegh

Chibana Student: Oooh maan. Come on, get a grip. You act so strong, but you're really nervous, aren't you?

Tomoe: Aaah shut up. This is just my constitution, my constitution!!

Chibana Student: Yeah yeah. There's not much time left anymore.

Satowa: Um, are you okay?

Hiro: Do you need us to call someone for you?

Tomoe: Ah, I'm okay--

Page 15

Tomoe: Ugh!!!

Tomoe[thoughts]: The girls from Tokise...!!

Hiro: !

Satowa: Ah.

Chibana Student: This girl gets like this before a performance. It's like a regular event.

Tomoe: Hey...

Chibana Student: You don't have to worry.

Tomoe: Blushes...

Tomoe: You don't have to say unnecessary things! I'm fine now!

Satowa & Hiro: ...

Hiro: The time just before a performance is nerve-wracking, isn't it?

Hiro: I'm the same.

Page 16

Tomoe: Eh...

Satowa: Ah, that's right.

Satowa: If you'd like, I've got some candy.

Satowa: Do you need some? To cleanse your palate...

Tomoe: Strawberry Milk...

Satowa: Ah! M- mint or citrus flavored would've been better, right? I'm sorry.

Satowa: Wh- When I get nervous or feel under the weather, these help me calm down.

Page 17

Tomoe: ...Thank you...

Tomoe: ...Thi- this candy.

Tomoe: I like it as well.

Page 18

Satowa: I'm glad.

Tomoe: Umm--- I- um-

Chibana Student 2: Tomoe!! How long are going to be chatting!? We are starting to move!!

Tomoe: I- I know!!

Tomoe: Thank you for this!

Satowa: Not at all.

Page 19

Hiro & Satowa: Good luck with the performance!!

Hiro: ...Hozuki-chan.

Hiro: Aren't those the candies Chika-kun always carries around...?

Page 20

Hiro: Sqeeeeal---

Hiro: Oh--- Gosh--- You are so cuuuute----

Hiro: I so totally get you. You start to like the same things the person you like does, right----

Satowa: Don't- Don't tell- Don't tell Kudou-

Hiro: Whaaaat---? I wonder, what should I do---?

Satowa: Hiro-senpaaai---

Page 21

Chibana Student: ...They were just

Chibana Student: Really good girls.

Tomoe: Yeah...

Tomoe[thoughts]: The first time I watched Tokise's viral video

Page 22

Tomoe [thoughts]: The club was in the middle of pushing for Nationals

Tomoe [thoughts]: While everyone was practicing hard and raising their spirits every day.

Video title: National Koto Club Member. The truth is revealed. Video discretion is advised.

Tomoe: ---Huh? What is this...?

User 1 Comment: This is the first time I hear about something like a "Koto club"

Reply to User 1: No fr. What's a koto club to begin with? Sorry lol

User 2 comment: If a club with a member like that can go to Nationals, then isn't the level in the mud? Lmao

Page 23

Tomoe [thoughts]: I was so mad.

Tomoe [thoughts]: Because of some random guy who doesn't know what he's doing…

Tomoe [thoughts]: The koto club

Tomoe [thoughts]: The national competition that we'd worked so hard to reach every year.

Tomoe [thoughts]: We were being made fun of by people who didn't know what they were talking about.

Tomoe [thoughts]: And they underestimated us.

Tomoe [thoughts]: Don't lump us together with the guy from that club...!

Tomoe [thoughts]: It was unforgivable.

Page 24

Tomoe's comment: I'm a member of a koto club. I don't want people like this to play. I don't want to be near them. They're a nuisance.

Tomoe [thoughts]: The thoughts and feelings that I spit out on social media spread quickly.

Tomoe [thoughts]: I received many messages of agreement.

Reply 1: What she said!

Reply 2: I'm also in a Koto Club! Well said---!

Reply 3: I missed the Nationals this year. And yet a club with a member like this... I'm so disappointed and frustrated.

Tomoe: ...!

Tomoe [thoughts]: They'll pay for that!! For sure!!

Tomoe [thoughts]: I will show you what a serious performance looks like!!

Page 25

Chibana Student: Well, I know it's a bit complicated, but let's concentrate on the performance ahead of us.

Chibana Student: What Tokise is really like... We will find out when we hear their performance.

Tomoe: You're right.

Page 26

Tetsuki & Uzuki: Uuuuuuuuugh

Isaki: You two are pathetic---

Isaki: I just ran a little.

Tetsuki: Isaki-san, your driving is not a matter of if you run or not

Isaki: What!?

Isaki: Whatever. Order whatever you like. This big sis here will treat you.

Page 27

Uzuki: No... I'm fine with just water...

Isaki: I said eat.

Tetsuki: Isaki-san

Isaki: You look so unhealthy. You don't eat enough on a regular basis, do you?

Uzuki: I don't... Have much of an appetite.

Uzuki: Food doesn't really... have a flavor.

Uzuki: I can't tolerate it.

Uzuki: ...I'm sorry.

Page 28

Isaki: Chika didn't eat any food when he first came to my house either.

Isaki: It was right after my father died. It was the same thing when the recent turmoil happened.

Isaki: When something happens, he loses his appetite. That child.

Isaki: It was like he lost his interest in life.

Isaki: You are the same. You give that impression.

Page 29

Uzuki: The same as Chika...

Isaki: Is not something to be happy about.

Isaki: Dammit...

Isaki: Listen, I don't care if you just order porridge or soup.

Isaki: Even if it's just a bite.

Isaki: You can leave it. You can spit it out. But first, eat.

Isaki: It takes a hell of a lot of strength to face what you've done and to live with it.

Page 30

Isaki: If you don't have that kind of resolution, you don't deserve to hear Chika and the rest's performance.

Isaki: Your face looks like death. This is not a joke.

Isaki: What Chika meant when he asked you to come. Think about it.

Page 31

Chika: ---I will stay until the very end, as planned.

Chika: I wanna listen for as long as I can.

Chika: I want to know.

Chika: You guys can go back first and rest---

Atsumu: I also want to listen!!

Satowa: That was our plan all along though?

Hiro: The ones who are tired can go back to the hotel, that's ok.

Page 32

Mittsu: ...Hey. Who is tired here?

Sane: I can't see them.

Kota: Our concentration power knows no limits--

3-baka: Let's goooo!!! To the very end---!!!

Atsumu: Stares...

3-baka: Let's get it. Hahahah.

Natsu: Sigh...

Suzuka: That is exactly what I thought would happen.

Akira: Right?

Chika: You don't have to force yourselves.

Sane: We are not-- Don't underestimate us.

Chika [memories]: No matter how much you cry or wail.

Page 33

Chika[memories]: The things you've done will never disappear.

Chika [memories]: The things we can do

Uzuki [thoughts]: Are probably things we can only do

Uzuki [thoughts]: Now, or

Page 34

Uzuki [thoughts]: From now on.

Tetsuki: --------

Isaki: Takaoka-kun, order whatever you like.

Page 35

Tetsuki: Fu Okay.

Side text: Only the accumulation of the present will make the "From now on (Future)"

---Kono Oto Tomare! will continue in the next issue---

[lewis-winters]

would love to hear more about the skinny/speirs confrontation 👀 (I'm sure other would too so feel free to answer publicly)

Ok I did not actually anticipate ppl being interested HAHAHAH but since ya'll asked nicely (@ep6bastogne and @hellofanidea mWAH to you too), here it is under the cut.

Ok so like. Understandably, people are more focused on Web and Lieb when it comes to the mountain top scene and that's perfectly fine. They're the ones I first thought about too. But then the more I watched that scene, the more I nyoomed in on two details: 1) It is implied that Speirs personally gave the order for Liebgott to go up there and deal with the officer, and 2) Skinny is the one who ends up pulling the trigger.

Which brings me to like. This fic I started planning in my head but couldn't quite write down because I am. Lazy. Anyway, it follows several plot points:

1) This is piggyback riding off my meta that Ron had ulterior motives to sending Liebgott up the mountain, which I have outlined in this post. TL;DR Ron used Lieb's anger (and to some extent, Web's too-- in my head, he heard about the incident with the baker in ep9, and he wanted to exploit that, not anticipating that Web's own self-preservation (of both his own person and morals) would get in the way) to do his dirty work, knowing that he wouldn't be questioned because of his position and because of said anger blindsiding all logic Lieb might have.

2) Skinny somehow knows this. He's more intuitive that people give him credit for. If Ron handpicked Lieb and Web because he knew, at least to some extent, that their anger would push them to do what he wants, then what the hell was Skinny doing there?

3) That question will haunt Skinny for awhile. Because why did Ron know, somehow, that Skinny would pull the trigger when either Lieb or Web could not? What anger and violence did Ron see in Skinny that made him think: "ah, yes, him; that's my killer of killers"? And most importantly, why did Skinny prove him right?

This is very much informed by how irl Skinny's PTSD was very much centered on the people he killed as a soldier (as opposed to people he lost). He's constantly cited in his writings and his letters that he felt unforgivable. So it isn't a massive leap for me to go yeah!! that boy killed an unarmed man (albeit a nazi, but I don't think even that could help him justify this) and then was later present when Web says "war's over, anyone would run" which no doubt would add to his already guilty conscience.

Add all of that together, and you have a recipe for a very traumatized lost boy wondering if maybe he's carrying a monster inside of him, and if maybe Ron could see it.

4) the answer, in the end, is that Ron couldn't see it. This was the dialogue I wrote first, and it has had me by the balls ever since:

"So why me? What did you see in me that was so twisted and cruel that you decided I should be up there, huh? Tell me!"

"... Nothing. I just needed a third man."

5) anyway. Ronald does, finally, admit to having used Lieb and Web to get what he wants. But Skinny doesn't care, because all he hears is that he's collateral damage. And that's not quite as comforting as Ron thinks it is.

soooooo. yeah.

**another plot point I have listed but couldn't really put anywhere in this weird ass list: there's also some cognitive dissonance sprinkled in there-- Skinny could justify Lieb and Web's reactions. He'd say Lieb has the right to do it. He'd also say Web's attempt at perserving himself as wise. it's important to note that Skinny went into this with the mindset that he was already unforgivable from the beginning. this just exacerbated it, but also gave him somebody who could probably answer his questions (i.e. am I really unforgivable? am I rreally a monster? am I a murderer? etc etc).

[ebonysplendor]

Parasite in Love Review 🦠

TL;DR: You're pretty much in a toxic, nonconsensual relationship with an even more toxic amoeba. Yes, an amoeba. That's it. That's the game

Game Link: https://night-asob u.itch.io/parasite-in-love

Notable Features: She/Her/Hers MC, Named MC, Yandere LI, partial voice acting Spiciness: 0/5 -- No explicit content LI Red Flags: 2/5 -- lack of consent, a lil hands on...but from the inside...?

Want to know more? Well, let's get into it!

Let me just start off by saying... I genuinely thought this game was going to be wack lol. Like, no lie.

First off, from the synopsis I had read on the page, I initially thought that it was going to be more of the hallucinations that we were experiencing versus the parasite itself.

That being said, when I booted up the game...it was mad boring. I'm not even gonna lie to y'all, I was 2 seconds from clicking that ish out and moving on to another visual novel that I had saved to play later; however, I was like "Well, it just started. Let me give it a fair chance because this is clearly only the intro" because let's be real for a second. An intro is kind've hard to write without making it so plain that the person playing just loses interest nor making it so that shit just starts popping off out of seemingly no where. So, with that in consideration, I pushed through. I got through the first, like, day and 3/4 of the second day. THAT'S when things started getting a little more interesting, and I was like "Okay! Here we go!". After that, it was pleasantly interesting!

It definitely had a slow start with all the "I did this, then I did this, and then after that I did this" blah, blah, blah, but once it truly started? Oh, it was on. With that, I think I've rambled enough about my personal experience. Let's talk about the game (with as little spoilers as possible, as always)

So, boom, we're -- well, actually Marlowe -- is taking a vacay by...going in the wilderness.

No shade, no tea to you if this is your style of vacationing. I support, but no way in hell am I partaking. Ain't no way I'm going to get away from indoor struggles by experiencing outdoor struggles, like nu uh. Then again, Marlowe isn't exactly out here roughing it. She has this really nice cabin that she rented out, and she's going to chill the week there.

Even though this is a horror themed game, she actually has pretty solid reception out here, so we're good! We can call for help should we need it, right? ...Right?

Anyways, she goes to take a swim in this lake, and I honestly get why she did that...but why did she do that? Literally the intro to the game was a news story on this brain-eating bacteria that resides in -- you guessed it -- freshwater lakes.

What did we just take a swim in? A freshwater lake. Lol you already know where this is headed.

Okay, now that I'm actually trying to type this out, I don't really know how to present this story without spoiling it, but I'm going to try my damnedest, so bear with me.

So, without spoiling it too much, basically what ends up happening is that Marlowe gets really sick, and the friendly neighborhood germ, who's actually a lil toxic sumbetch, falls in love with her.

...

I know, I know, I said the same thing lol. We -- and by we, I mean Marlowe -- got sick, and the brain-eating bacteria that I mentioned earlier has fallen in love with us. But hear me out! It actually gets super interesting from here, so stay with me!

From this point, it's this odd tug-o-war game of survival. We're trying to survive it, and it is essentially trying to survive us from trying to kill it. To it -- this amoeba that named himself Niall and goes by he/him/his pronouns -- Marlowe isn't a host, but a spouse, and it's trying to build this family with her from inside her. For him, her survival means his death, and for Marlowe, it's the literal opposite.

By the way, this is Niall. Our...husband.

Anyways

During this tug-o-war game, Marlowe gets a little feisty with Niall, and Niall literally keeps her in check without physically touching her. Remember, Niall is a literal brain-eating bacteria. He's very real, but he isn't a person like she's hallucinating -- he's a disease. He's a disease that's making her ill, and he makes her symptoms worse whenever he gets pissed at her. Holy. Shit. Now, that's a crazy concept.

In an attempt to not ruin more than I may already have, I'll just say at this point, it's either him or Marlowe. As with a majority of visual novels, how this ends is completely up to the choices you make.

Like always, I'm not gonna lie to y'all. This game was significantly better than what I was initially expecting.

Like I mentioned before, the beginning was just really mundane to me, and I thought it was going to be the same scenario as another game I'm planning on writing a review about, but thankfully, it did not continue in that manner. Now that I've completed the game, it reads more like a "Everything was going great until it wasn't" type of thing, and it wasn't as "boring" as I initially thought. Still boring, but not "I wish this coworker would stop talking to me about this thing I don't care about" boring.

Now, that what I didn't care for is out of the way, let's talk about what I did care for: the concept of the story.

I could go on and on about how absolutely GENIUS I thought the concept of this VN was. Admittedly, if I did that, this review would turn out way longer than I'd want, and it'd seem like rambling. That being said, I'll just say this: By far, out of all the VNs that I've read so far (and admittedly, I'm relatively new to all of this, but hear me out), this has been the most original and the most interesting one as far as the concept that was chosen, not to mention it was executed well.

During this VN, I actually got a "...Okay, this is actually terrifying if you think about it" feeling. Not to mention, the take of "We're the same but different" premise. Like, Marlowe and Niall wanted the same exact thing as far as lifestyle but from different aspects. Hers was more of a life milestone or value that she had, and his was for the sheer aspect of survival. That was what made him cling to her the way that he had. It wasn't even about her looks or from the typical "You were the only person that was ever nice to me" trope, but a "You have the same will to survive like I do". Like damn. Damn, damn, damn, damn, damn! A deadly bacteria falls in love with you because he sees similarities in the two of you and is under the impression that you understand and consent to what he's doing. That is such an insane concept, and damn do I want to talk about it more, but I won't because I'll start rambling it and ruin it.

Overall, I'd recommend giving this game a go! Honestly, to me, it's not the most interesting reading-wise, but if you stick with it for the concept, it's a pretty solid read! Not to mention there's some partial voice acting which is super cool! Be sure to leave your comments on the dev's page if you feel like they're doing a good job, and you want to give them that extra reassurance. Like mentioned at the top, here is the link to the game if you'd like to try it out yourself! I definitely think that you should if you want to experience something different from the norm.

Anyways! That's all from me! Drink water, don't be dumb, and hope to see you around! Until next time~!

Parasite in Love Game Link and Page

[zannolin]

loving the stranger things posting as someone going through a sudden random stranger things phase lol. i have a question: what makes byler an interesting dynamic for you? i'm not a big shipper person personally but i like to hear people's thoughts!

it's so funny i got here because i was suffering from cares too much disease about the karate kid and i needed something to distract me and then um. it did more than distract.

sidenote: coming back to say this got??? so long. so i'm sorry lol. i'm a chronic rambler.

i'll be honest i never actually shipped byler seriously until literally 2 months ago today. i sort of went "haha what if...?" back in 2022 mostly because my friend was into it and i really love mike as a character. oh mike wheeler the character that you are...i've loved him since 2016 lol and i loved him and will as a dynamic since i saw s2. i was so sold on their friendship, and then s3 and s4 were brutal for me to watch as someone who has grown apart from a lot of friends because of similar circumstances (moving, mostly, but also some relationships, and the inherent tragedy of growing up, and the fact that having a shitty family and being 15 can do a lot of damage to your relationships if you're not careful, etc) so like basically i then got More into them because i am obsessed with friendship estrangement plots. and i like both their characters. ("like" is such an understatement even in 2022 i was unhinged about michael wheeler)

frankly they're interesting to me as a ship for all the same reasons as they're interesting to me as a friendship: devotion, knowing someone better than you know yourself, the fear of loss, the fear of change, how easy vs how hard it is to grow up with someone, estrangement, feeling like you're a bad person and self-sabotaging, etc. the funny thing is i didn't even think will was gay or that there WAS (one-sided, anyway) byler until the literal van scene in s4 because i have that little faith in netflix lol, not to mention i used to be a mileven shipper. and then s3 happened which killed my interest in that and then s4 beat the dead horse from here to california. i realized for one thing mike being queer is really interesting to me and opens a lot of room for fun angles on his canonical character with comphet and internalized homophobia, etc, and it works very well with established canon. to me.

i'm honestlyyyy kind of surprised i got into it at all because besides the fact that i'm not a big shipper anymore, i'm RARELY a childhood friends to lovers fan because 1) it's often boring to me, i'm like but why do we need something Other than friendship?? (aro alert) and 2) i personally do not enjoy romance where it's like. you end up with the person you dated in high school? like it's jsut a me thing but i go aaaaaa when it's idk 12 year olds being like "i'm in love" no you're not you're twelve. i literally have DMs of me to my sister watching s4 where i was like michael why are you saying you loved eleven the day you met her, you were twelve and spent the entire season fucking obsessed with finding your best friend and kept dropping her the second she wasn't useful for that, like i love you but you were— what. (regardless of whether or not that bullshit turns out to be, you know, Actually canonically bullshit. that was my reaction lol). um i'm rambling sorry. anyway. they just happened to hit really good beats for me where it could go either way for me (platonic or romantic) and i wouldn't mind and i'm happy with both. but apparently my brain is like What If Romance when it comes to fic for them and i'm being a bit self-indulgent. i want will byers to have nice things and i want mike to not be stuck in the world's worst written relationship ever (to me).

actually the tl;dr is basically everything i like about mike as a character has to do with his plots concerning will, and everything i don't like about what they've been doing with him lately has to do with his relationship with el, so via potentially unintentional gay symbolism, the power of friendship estrangement plots + my love of friendship breakup/makeup scenarios, and my fascination with writing queer loneliness and mutual pining, AND that "good luck, babe" edit, i ended up here.

also finn wolfhard keeps making the most ridiculously intensely tender expressions during byler scenes and i'm a simple creature i see a man with big wet brown eyes and i go oh well mayyybe....

[deeply-unserious-fellow]

With Frozen 3 being a Thing that Is Happening, a couple of people(or maybe a lot idk) have started theorizing about what the plot could POSSIBLY be. I, personally, have nothing to offer in that regard. I think pretty much everything got wrapped up nicely in Frozen 2 and they well and truly do NOT need another installment, and also the plot of a 3rd movie in a Disney trilogy is usually WILDLY unpredictable. Aladdin 3 was about finding a golden hand on a magic turtle island with Aladdin's Hot Dad or whatever Karina Drawfee called him, Cinderella 3 was about motherfucking TIME TRAVEL, these things are fuckin wild. No, instead, I'm here to say what I think Frozen 3 SHOULDN'T be about, and that would be Anna getting powers of her own.

Okay, to be fair, I don't think they should introduce ANY human characters with powers in the 3rd movie. It would feel cheap and fan-service-y at best, and make the lore 8 MILLION times more complicated at worst. But, hypothetically speaking, I think I could potentially be okay with them introducing some other human elemental magic user to the story. Unless it's Anna.

Why am I so against the concept of Anna having powers? It would make more sense then if like... Kristoff had them or some shit. She's Elsa's sister, after all! Well, I hate the idea of Anna having powers because it undermines her as a character. The narrative has NEVER, not even ONCE, implied that Anna is any lesser then Elsa because she doesn't have powers. The only moment I can find that comes even remotely close to that is the fuckin... don't run into fire scene in Frozen 2, I guess, but even then that's really, really stretching it. Anna not having powers has never been a source of conflict. She's been put into situations that having powers would probably make somewhat easier, sure, but uh. Most characters end up in situations like that. Cool powers make fighting easier, but just because it would be easier doesn't mean it's the only solution. Anna not having powers doesn't actively make her life more difficult in any capacity.

All that to say, why retroactively give her them, then? They wouldn't add anything to her as a character, and would in fact take away from all the things she's accomplished in the past by making it seem like the Brand New Powers are putting her on equal footing with Elsa, when in reality, as far as the narrative is concerned, they've always been equals. All it would do is take away from the story, distract us from the parts of it that actually matter. Kinda like the Hans plot twist did in the first movie.

So, tl;dr is basically that there really shouldn't be any new elemental magic users in the next movie, but if there ARE then Anna definitely shouldn't be one of them because giving her powers undercuts everything we've seen her accomplish in the last two movies, and retroactively makes it seem like Anna and Elsa were never equals to eachother because Anna wasn't "special" enough.

[aita-blorbos]

WIBTA for killing my family?

I know that sounds bad, but stay with me here. I promise I have a good reason for this.

I already knew that I was the result of an affair, and that my father abandoned me at a young age, but until just recently I thought that my mother had done the same.

After becoming the Keeper of Time (don't ask; it's a very long story) and being able to learn the truth about my early childhood using this power, I learned that my mother did not, in fact, abandon me, and my father told her that I was stillborn. She died from grief, and my father ended up sending me to live with mortal peasants (for context, I am a demigod) to cover his tracks and hide his affair with my mother.

Obviously I was pretty pissed off when I discovered this, so I want to take revenge. The plan is to kill my father as revenge for what he did to me and my mother, and then kill his other sons as well (I never really cared for my half-brothers anyway). I will keep his wife alive, as I'm sure she knew about what had happened, and she will suffer through the loss of her children just as my mother had.

Is this going too far? I plan on killing my father regardless, but should I spare his sons and the feelings of his wife? As I've said, I never liked my brothers. They are far below me in terms of power and intellect, and they are much like my father. Besides, I wouldn't want to risk them attempting to avenge him. As for his wife, I do not know much about her or whether or not she'd deserve to die, but I just feel like leaving her alive would make things go full-circle nicely.

TL;DR: My father told my mother I was stillborn, left her to die of grief, and abandoned me at a young age, so I want to kill him and his sons as revenge, leaving his wife alive so she can feel my mother's pain. WIBTA for doing this?

[jamietarttsnorthernattitude]

I'm thinking thinky thoughts about your fics and how you have a wonderful sense of setting weight.

'Setting weight' being a term I made up for how much weight an author puts on the setting of a scene.

To use examples, Tolkien puts a massive amount of time and energy into his settings. On the other end of the spectrum (and I have thrown a dart at the wall here) I'd put Chuck Palahniuk. Oh, he has settings - office buildings, fight clubs, self help groups - but there's little physicality to those settings. They exist to paint a theme.

But in both cases, the author rarely connects the character to their setting. To its history or its meaning, yes, but not to the sensation of the character within the space.

So as I sat there, beginning to reread Not to Me, Not If It's You, I was struck by how lovely your sense of setting weight is. I think back to this opening image a lot. To Jamie, sitting alone on a bed in a hospital in Qatar, watching the World Cup on this small TV. The space Jamie inhabits here is very clear. You cannot dissect him from this setting and have the same meaning ring through

Take Apologies From My Tongue, And Never Yours. Colin and Jamie on the bus. What's so special about that, you may ask? They're on a bus. Characters be on the team bus all the time. Well, yes, but do they often feel like they're on a bus? It's small, but sometimes the setting really is just a passing mention of where a thing happens to take place.

Rage, Rage, Against the Dying of the Light takes place in a hospital, but more importantly (to me) it feels like a hospital. It feels like, even if the author isn't focused on writing about the setting, they're not forgetting that the setting exists. The room stays in the room with us. It's not an after thought.

The cab ride snippet you posted for the fic you're writing on, that also had an excellent sense of just... space. The space the characters inhabit. It's a sort of visual I can feel through the words. It feels real without overwhelming to a Tolkien-esque degree.

I don't feel like I've explained this right, but especially with your last few fics, it's something I've begun to really notice. Just. Setting weight. Good stuff. I know this is more technical appreciation than anything else, but I thought I'd share how much I enjoy this aspect of your writing <3

Thank you for these generous words and fuck you for making me FEEL ALL THE THINGS. (anyone outside of the TL fandom going to read that like damn girl, relax).

I’ve been thinking about this a normal amount (that's a lie I will cherish this until my dying day I want it used as my euology) but I still can't form words enough to do it justice, it's all shrimp emotions.

But seriously, thank you (which does not feel like enough) for your amazingly nice words and taking the time to send them and looking at my works. It's really an honour to have you read them and that they had any impact that you would remember them is absolutely flooring me.

And it's especially an honor because you are one of the authors I try to emulate with this particularly. There are so many amazing authors in this fandom that I learn from everyday and I while I look at your work with admiration for many, many aspects, I especially have tried to learn from your stories and their setting weight (wonderful term btw!).

Thank you so much for taking the time to share this with me, it's especially helpful when I'm struggling through the normal writer horrors. The imposter syndrome is real and especially because there are so many amazing writers here I often struggle comparing myself. The doubting voice in the back of my mind has been especially loud lately. I think there is no other land is the fic I have had the most interest about on here which is amazing and exciting but also fucking terrifying.

The mortifying ordeal of being known, am I right?

All of this rambling to say THANK YOU, for these wonderful, kind, thoughtful words but also THANK YOU for being you and inspiring me, for talking me through whatever story help I need, for giving me story ideas, for being the extremely supportive person you are, for your kudos, comments and bookmarks, for sharing my work or snippets, for sharing cat photos, for absolutely FEEDING me with your works and snippets (where I can be found laughing and/or crying on a regular basis), for sharing your thought provoking analysis.

But most importantly, thank you for your friendship. I am beyond blessed to have the wonderful people in this fandom but especially you. I do not miss all the support you spread through tumblr and ao3 and I have no doubt everywhere you go. You are a joy and I smile everytime I see your name (and esp after I realized you and @jamiesfootball were one in the wonderful same lmao).

Now stop being so nice to me ;)

[dissociationswagcompetition]

hello op i have never heard of blitzwing before but i am very curious, would you mind telling us about them? maybe if you're worried it would be unfair you can tell us about their competitor too?

okay okay so I'll allow myself ONE Blitzwing propaganda post, but I'll put it under the cut in case anyone wants to avoid my personal bias :3c

So Blitzwing is my wonderful special boy I love him a lot okay SO he's from Transformers, and is a Decepticon (aka the bad guys in most universes), and is something called a "triple changer". While most transformers have a robot mode and vehicle mode, triple changers get a robot mode and TWO vehicle modes. (Blitzy can turn into a plane OR a tank!)

So in most other Transformers media he's got a pretty basic personality, but the version featured here is specifically from Transformers Animated, where they did a really interesting twist on the "triple changer" trope,

So Blitzwing has three different "faceplates" that he switches between, and for the most part they're all referred to by just "Blitzwing", though they all have different appearances and nicknames of "Hothead" "Icy" and "Random", shown in order in this image:

So I'm sure you can already guess why people are nominating them, this is verrry plural energy. (especially since it's nice how there isn't any """original""" face, they're all treated as equally Blitzwing) The body is the same but the faces and personalities change.

Even if you don't view it as a full system like someone with DID, it still leans heavily into the dissociative spectrum; like I really really like interpreting his faceplates as being strong manifested coping mechanisms. Like I really enjoy Hothead being the "protector" mental state, so on and so forth. And yes I'm self projecting because I have a verrry similar coping mechanism, sue me.

It's definitely not PERFECT rep in canon, I know I was actually offput at first because I thought "Great another negative DID stereotype played off for laughs", a big thing they do is have Icy or Hothead say something, and then Random cut in with a witty one-liner and it's supposed to be a "haha laugh at the crazy bot" type of thing :/

But the fandom really turned me around by portraying him in a much better light, especially when others have taken him and acknowledged that his personalities probably manifested from a place of trauma and giving each of his faceplates a lot of depth and emotional value. I've read some really really good fics treating his faceplates with a lot of respect and really made me fall in love with the character!

It's also nice because even though far from perfect in canon, he subverts the evil trope in a sense. Yeah he's a villain, but he's a villain regardless of if he had 3 faceplates or not, he's not a villain BECAUSE of his identities. He doesn't have an """evil""" alter which is great. They're all assholes (affectionate)

tl;dr: He's funky and has 3 distinct personalities and I care them all so so much and also am biased because I have a fictional crush

[carmsgarms]

hi! I've seen you talking about your Astarion origin - I was debating playing one, but I've not done an origin yet. Is there comparatively a lot less voice lines? Because I feel like not being able to talk to him in camp etc, you'd loose HOURS of his content. Is it like using him to talk to NPC's, which you can kinda do on a different run, and he's just missing from camp?

I also struggle to see him as any kind of leader, especially in act 1 & 2, bless him 🤣 but that's another issue.

so, tl; dr, your results may vary but I am having more fun doing other origin stories. If you want to really dive into his inner turmoil, and if you're interested in seeing other characters have unique dialogs with him, at least give act 1 a shot and see how you feel. But I really missed not being able to just walk up to him in camp and hear him being a silly little guy who always has something to say.

long answer with some mild spoilers -

I'm going to be so honest, I didn't enjoy it. But I think it was my own fault. Him not being any kind of leader or having the ability to make his own decisions makes role-playing him hard, and you /do/ lose out on a big chunk of his voice lines and Neil's physical mocap acting. A lot of the physical movements you see are the standard tav reactions to things.

You can hear his overworld dialogs (("don't touch me" "ooh what's in here")) more often and some little quips that usually only tav would say, like some general observations about whats going on ((things like "well it looks like we have to do x to accomplish y" and those do have a fun little bit of Astarion flourish to them). There are some interesting astarion-only cutscenes (you actually do get to see him having nightmares about Cazzy in act 1) and you /do/ get some fun dialog choices that are unique to him as well as some unique responses from other characters, but I feel like you really lose out on seeing his growth in response to someone else's leadership.

I did enjoy act 1. I feel like I got the most unique options from it because you can choose when and how (and to whom) to reveal that you're a vampire spawn. Act 2 is where I started to feel like I was losing touch, especially because he doesn't have any sort of strong reaction with Araj besides being like "ew no."

Granted, I made a lot of choices that I don't think Astarion would make (like saving the grove and generally being a good person) because I wanted to romance Karlach and Halsin. I origianlly was romancing Gale and I kinda wish I had stuck with that route but I REALLY wanted my bloodbear moment. I think it would be more fun to do an evil run, or at least do your best to roleplay him and make choices you think he would make. Every choice I made felt wrong trying to make him nice. I think if I go back and be just a touch more evil it would be more enjoyable.

I have a lot of opinions about doing the Astarion origin run, but as I'm going through my evil durge run and seeing how many things you can do differently, I might give it another shot at some point. I am really enjoying my evil durge and my Karlach origin run (it's easy when you can just always pick the good and nice options lol)

Also! thanks so much for asking!! let me know if you have any other questions! I'm happy to continue to infodump about what my origin playthrough was like ^^