#(me? a 3/brig shipper? no way)

[moreaugriffins]

has someone written a bbc ghosts/dr who crossover yet?

or more specifically a bbc ghosts/unit era classic who crossover yet

please

I need the dead repressed gay military man who pined for his best friend to watch an alive repressed bi military man pine over his best friend, whilst trying to solve some space/supernatural nonsense

[calcliffbas]

So, I know it’s probably been a while for you, but I was recently rereading your White Lotus Zuko series, and I noticed you mentioned being willing to elaborate on your reasons for sticking so close to canon. I’ll admit, the way you stuck close to the events of canon in basically every way was a source of some major frustration when I first read it, and even now, it’s something which unfortunately brings it from a 10/10 to a 9.5/10. Why did you choose to have Zuko’s different choices have ultimately no effect?

Ohhh yikes, I’ve been dreading this ask. The long and the short of it is under the cut:

The simple answer is that the White Lotus Zuko series only really came about because I'm a Zutara shipper who wanted to see what their relationship could have been like if Zuko was a good guy from the start. It really was that simple when I first began writing ‘No Reason You Can’t Do It’.

The longer answer is that I was still (am still?) a very new writer, really not all that confident in my ability to craft a plot and a narrative, and I was more interested in (and had more fun thinking about) the characters and their relationships than the plot. That’s what I liked most about writing Book 1 and Book 2, and one part of Book 3 I really enjoyed writing the climactic scene when Aang unlocks the Avatar State, because that’s when we see how much his friends have helped him on this particular take on his coming-of-age journey.

I could have had the story go differently, yes, but when I was writing this fanfic, I’d just left a job that I hated only to find myself in another job that I hated in the middle of a global pandemic, and I wanted to write something that brought me joy. And like I’ve said before, I didn’t want to write a canon-divergent series so much as a canon-adjacent series; I wrote the story for me, and I enjoyed the fact that sticking close to canon meant that I could try my hand at writing Azula, Mai and Ty Lee. Plus, I was able to bring in more Asian influences such as Zuko’s Japanese poetry or Iroh’s Korean proverbs, which was hands-down my favourite part of 'You Have To Stand Firm’.

I’m sorry to hear that you were frustrated by the way the series went, but I mean, if it’s canon-divergent AUs you want, I wouldn’t say Zuko’s choices had no effect. I wrote a 90k Zuko-centric prequel set in the 18 months between ‘Seventy-two to nil’ and ‘No Reason You Can’t Do It’, and I’m kind of fond of my Mai-centric spin-off, which was set up pretty nicely by the ripple effects of ‘You Have To Stand Firm’ and ‘Who Knows What Happens Next’.

Maybe once I’ve worked on some other stuff and real life slows down a bit, I might go back and write an alternate Book 3 where Zuko fights Azula in the Crystal Catacombs to allow Uncle, Katara and Aang to escape. When they get back to the Wani, Sokka and Suki are fully prepared to go back and break Zuko out. Just before they leave, Iroh hands Sokka a bag to give to Zuko. In full view of everyone, Sokka opens the bag and pulls out a Pai Sho set, a couple of boxes of ginseng, and a Blue Spirit mask. Annnnd that’s how Aang and Katara and the SWT warriors find out that Zuko’s the Blue Spirit. Great job, Sokka.

On the ship’s brig, Azula taunts Zuko by telling him that she’s heard rumours that pirates have sent a mercenary after the Avatar’s waterbender and the Blue Spirit after they sunk their ship. Once Sokka and Suki have broken Zuko out, they decide that it’s too dangerous to risk leading Azula straight back to the Wani, and instead decide to go across the Earth Kingdom as a distraction, a la Sokka and Zuko’s plan in Book 1. Whilst they’re looking for the Kyoshi Warriors, Combustion Man catches up to them - he’s after the Blue Spirit, and he thinks Sokka’s the waterbender!

Cue Aang learning the elements from Katara, Toph and Iroh, the older kids doing White Lotus things, and more ZK pining than ever. But would anyone read it after such a long hiatus? I probably wouldn’t.

[plushpinkfox]

an attack on rophie

so i posted this in the last ever after forum in response to all the rophie/raphie shippers and i think it’s actually a really funny post and i encourage you to please use it to combat any rophie shippers you see wandering the sge fandom :) i’m already on the hitlist of a bunch of rophie shippers on the website and i assume it’s in part because of this post. i did not edit this so it’s got some website references to forums but other than that please enjoy!

“hey y'all! it's my first post in the last ever after forum and i'm seeing a LOT of raphie shippers so i thought i'd give my opinion on this ship before i do my big "reviewing sge ships" post on the one true king forum. let's give everyone a reminder of what rafal looks like! in the last ever after, he is described as a lean boy with "hairless white skin, snug black breeches, his thick spiked hair the color of snow, his tight veined arms, his glacier-blue eyes" who doesn't look a day more than sixteen. cute, right? oh wait, that's actually NOT what rafal looks like. let's go to the back of the book, shall we? page 635! here we are: "He began to change. His face shriveled like rancid fruit; his thick white hair sloughed off in clumps over his mottled skull; his spine hunched with sickening crackles, jerking his body into ugly contortions. Liver spots rashed across decaying skin, his blue eyes clouding toxic gray, his muscled limbs shrinking to bony sticks. with each second, he grew older and older, thousands of years old, screams of rage tearing from inside of him, smoke spitting through his mummifying skin, until the School Master was unmasked at last, a naked corpse of blackened, hateful flesh." wow. that doesn't sound very handsome, right? not only is rafal THOUSANDS OF YEARS OLD (sophie is about... sixteen here? wonderful age difference), but he is literally not human. he is a mummified ugly evil spirit. not very fun for shipping, which is why i'm guessing people choose to describe the hot form instead of his true evil ugly form. if you're willing to ignore the "naked corpse of blackened, hateful flesh" part, maybe we can look at some other parts of the "wonderful" raphie relationship. gaslighting sophie into believing that agatha wants to kill her? check! (see pages 441-442 of the last ever after, where rafal convinces sophie that agatha has used her wish-granting ability to make sure tedros stayed in love with agatha instead of sophie) encouraging her to kill her other friends? check! (see pages 449-451 of the last ever after, where rafal has captured her friends after convincing her that the world is against her, and letting her make the decision to kill them even though he knows he is manipulating her. manipulating her into ending the balance between good and evil, putting the entire woods in danger? check! (see THE ENTIRETY OF THE LAST EVER AFTER) //content warning for //a*b*u*s*e// below this line!!!// if that's not enough to convince you yet, then let's go to the website "https://au.reachout.com/articles/signs-of-an-abusive-relationship" and go through some of the signs there. i'm not going to respond to all of them because there's SO MANY but i will choose a select few that should get my point across. 1. "They check on you all the time to see where you are, what you're doing and who you're with. They try to control where you go and who you see, and get angry if you don't do what they say." well, rafal does both of these things! he makes sophie a teacher so everyone can keep an eye on her, and he literally made a schedule for her so he'd know where she is at all times. 2. "They accuse you of being unfaithful or of flirting. They isolate you from family and friends, often by behaving rudely to them." rafal states on page 235 that sophie needs to kill tedros and agatha "or he'll know whose side she's really on". sounds like he's accusing her of being unfaithful (i know in the context of the article unfaithful means cheating but i'm using it in the way it applies). and i think threatening to kill them is definitely behaving rudely. 3. "They threaten to use violence against you, your family, friends or a pet." again, he's threatened to kill agatha and tedros/threatened her so she will kill them. pretty *horrible* to me!! 4. "They push, shove, hit or grab you." let's see! on page 231, rafal grabs sophie's hand so she'll show him her finger without her permission. that meets the criteria! 5. "They harm you, your pets or your family members." here i can use an example OTHER than rafal trying to kill tedros and agatha. remember when he allowed lady lesso to get stabbed? or dangled the coven over the brig? or allowed nicholas to get killed in the chaos of battle? those all sound like harmful things to me! not only is raphie super gross and downright pedophilic, but it's an //a*b*u*s*i*v*e// relationship as well! so that's why i don't ship raphie, folks. look out for my "reviewing sge ships" post coming soon on the otk forum >:)”

[cassyblue]

☕ seven of nine (god if I got the numbers wrong I'll die bc I am too lazy to google it)

good news you got it right otherwise i would have texted you and been like, giselle, GISELLE. 

Ok so this is going to be kinda long because there are three points I am going to touch on: The way that Seven of Nine’s agency is depicted, The dynamic between Seven of Nine and Janeway, and Finally the romance written for seven of nine. 

1) Agency

Seven of Nine was assimilated in the borg collective when she was around 8 or 9. By the time that Voyager finds her, she is in her 20s. She has been in the collected for pretty much all her life. She is used as an representative for the borg queen when the crew of Voyager encounter her. Uh I think that’s right, The last time I watched voyager was in 2016. 

The Voyager crew, particularly Janeway, decide to rescue her from the borg collective without her say in the matter because you know she’s assimilated by the borg so surely she has no agency. Which is pretty much the same thing essentially since she is not given the choice by the crew of Voyager to join them or stay with the borg.  There is this focus on Seven reclaiming her humanity which I honestly fucking hate. 

So basically, the Crew of Voyager separates her from the collective and basically figures out how to deborg her which they do. All this time, in the brig Seven is begging for them not to do it because it hurts her. It is essentially torture for her to be unassimulated. It could kill her. But despite Seven’s cries of pain and begging for it to stop and for them to let her go, Janeway refuses. This is painted as some heroic act of saving this girl from the horrible horrible borg and teaching her to regain her humanity and culture. But it’s not that. It’s literally conversion therapy. 

They remove most of Seven of Nine’s external nonorganic parts and the only things they leave is literally the hand veins, the thing on the side of her face. Not only that but they put her in a cat suit that’s supposed to mimc the borg nonorganic parts that were removed so that Seven doesn’t get sick? This choice honestly can be blamed on Rick Berman because everything is LITERALLY his fault. Seven wasn’t given any choice of clothing to wear regularly basically. They completely take bodily agency from her in choosing how she presents physically. 

Seven is treated as a child in many occasions because she is learning to be human again. Despite the fact she is human and a capable being. It’s infuriating that they are basically trying to recondition her. 

Did the borg do wrong? Yes, they forcibly assimulated Seven of Nine as a child. Did the crew of Voyager do wrong? Abso-Fucking-lutely. Neither groups fucking gave Seven agency over her body.   The two episode arc was so upsetting that I cried during it because it was horrid and disgusting the way the writers treated the matter.

2) Seven of Nine and Janeway dynamics

Seven/Janeway shippers you are not going to like my thots in this section. One, I know that Seven of Nine and Janeway was an huge ship when the show was running and fans were lobbying the writers and RICK BERMAN THE EVIL for it to happen because you know in DS9 there was the girl kiss in reunion. But yeaaaah Rick Berman being the giant piece of poop from a dumpster he is, was like nope never happening. So that’s the context. It remains a popular ship. 

So here’s the thing. There is a huge power imbalance between Janeway and Seven that makes the ship really squicky for me. As you see above in the agency section, Janeway REFUSES to listen to Seven when she’s literally crying and sobbing and asking for them to stop the process. Janeway is so focused on this idea of saving this girl instead of fucking listening to the girl. Furthermore Janeway takes on this teacher / mother role for Seven. She gives Seven lessons on how to regain humanity. She is always acting as a guide or older more experienced source that knows best even if it is not the best for Seven. Seven quite honestly was her most vulnerable after the deborging and Janeway stepped in the teacher/mother role. Seven also turns to Janeway for emotional support which completely baffles me. Like this is the thing, I literally do not understand how Janeway and Seven have this positive relationship dynamic. Janeway literally ripped Seven away from her family and her life. It just ugh bad WRITING. 

3)Seven of Nine and Romance

Seven of Nine is probably one of the MOST sexualized star trek characters. The costume required Jerri Ryan to not only wear a skin tight suit, but also a corset (badly made at that), and stilletos. The costume took some time to get into and it caused Jerri Ryan back pain (because the corset was TOO TIGHT. They normally do not if they are probably fitted).  This once again Rick Berman’s fault. 

So first off we have the emh doctor being incredibly creepy to Seven of Nine because he has romantic hots for her. Seven has to tell him she only wants a friend but he doesn’t stop being creepy until a big fight between them. So That romance subplot sure doesn’t make any sense. 

Then there were the special borgs that could maintain individuality outside of the collective, there was one that Seven had a crush on. Honestly that part really wasn’t that badly written. 

Then the fucking final straw, the complete out of the blue, no previous writing support, pairing of Seven of Nine and Chakotay. Backgroun, Chakotay was Janeway’s love interest for the first couple seasons and it was quite good chemistry until I guess the writers just completely dropped it. And then the lobbying of the Seven/Janeway shippers got really intense toward the end of the show so you know what happened? Seven suddenly gets shoved with Chakotay which is the most what the FUCK out of all characters. Seven had never viewed Chakotay as an romantic interest or anything beyound colleague until the second to last episode of voyager when she starts to have like fantasies about him and turns out he is into her which like was never written in any of the other plots. It just was like WHAT THE FUCK where did this come from. Answer: Rick Berman cockblocking the femslashers. It was a bad decision and honestly made the finale arc disappointing. Like Star Trek ending arcs tend to be lackluster (don’t @ me tng, tos, and VOY fans). DS9 was probably the most decent one because at least it had followed the previously established relationships instead of bringing this out of the fuckin blue. 

So tdlr: Seven of Nine’s character was treated pretty crappy despite all the interesting angles that could have been pursued. I am hoping that the writer’s Star Trek Picard treat her character better, which may be a really good possibility since Patrick Stewart was heavily involved in the story writing. Historically he has stood up for his female colleagues when they had to deal with sexism from the producers (RICK BERMAN). However, If I hear Seven of Nine utter, “My husband Chakotay” I will literally drive to Rick Berman’s house and egg and tp it. 

Anyways I also have lots of parallels that can be talked about Seven of Nine, Breq, and Murderbot but I already probably wrote like a thousnad words at this point and its midnight and i have early morning work tomorrow.