#AND SORRY FOR LACKING CONTENT THAT THIS BLOG WAS SUPPOSED TO BE AT FIRST

[3v3rl4stingbr4in]

Wow, Mhin! How come your mom if you even have one that is, allows you to have two partners! ( At least, both would do something stupid to bring you back from the dead. )

Count this a very, very late birthday art to Mhin and indulging into Mhinralix or Crowdarkmist.

[whumpsday]

Caught

Whump & Giant/tiny Oneshot - Writing masterlist

find my G/t blog here: @smallsday

content: whump, g/t, tiny whump, trapped under rubble, crushed limbs, begging, fear, broken bones

Whumpmas in July Day 12: Caught GT July Day 13: Betwixt Whumperless Whump Day 12: Trapped under rubble / I can't move my legs

combining three different creation events for this one!! since i'm posting this to both my accounts, for non-g/t people who don't know, borrowers are a species of tiny people who secretly live in humans' houses and survive by stealing bits of food and supplies.

-

It had to be someone, eventually.

Cotton just barely kept himself from crying out as the pile of books he’d been climbing toppled over. He tried to grab at his grappling hook, but it was slack. The lack of resistance sent blood rushing through his ears as he fell.

He hit the ground first, and it wasn’t a good thing. The impact was bad enough from a few feet up, but borrowers were sturdy, and he had enough reserves to make it until his family’s next visit. But he certainly wasn’t sturdy enough for what came next.

The tower fell the same way he did, burying him in literature. A hardcover landed harshly on his legs, pinning him to the floor with a crunch he could no longer keep quiet through. Cotton wailed, but more books kept falling, burying him in a dark tomb he was helpless to escape from.

When the only sound that remained was his own crying, Cotton realized that he was still alive.

He tried to wiggle out, but he was utterly caught between the books and the floor, and he couldn’t move his legs. Every time he even tried to drag himself out by the arms, it sent a new wave of agony through him so bad that he had to stop.

Cotton laid there under the rubble and wept, until the worst of the pain subsided and he couldn’t feel his legs at all.

He tried again now that he could bear to, but it was useless. He wasn’t strong enough. A single book was twice his height, and he was buried under countless.

Which meant the human would find him.

The human would get home, see their books strewn about, and find him as they cleaned up. Whether they realized he was aiming to steal away food from their desk or not, they would find him. And he’d be powerless to stop… whatever they decided to do with him. Even more powerless than usual.

He couldn’t be seen. He couldn’t. Mom and Dad and his little siblings lived in the apartment right next door, and it wouldn’t take a human long to start to question where he came from. Every borrower would be in danger if he was found. But Mom and Dad weren’t visiting until next week, and the human would be home today.

It was hours before he heard footsteps, the telltale click of the front door’s lock. Cotton’s heart hammered in his chest.

“Shit,” the human–Özdal, that was their name–muttered, increasingly-loud steps booming over. “I really need to get another bookshelf.”

This was it. He could either make himself known, or wait to be found.

“H-help.”

Özdal froze. “Who said that?”

Cotton shuddered. “Please help. Under the–the books.”

There was only a moment’s hesitation before he heard shuffling up top, books being lifted. “Yeah! Yeah. Holy shit.”

More and more were lifted, the suffocating darkness giving way to the warm light of the apartment and removing the weight on his legs. An enormous figure loomed above him: he’d never been this close to a human before. He wasn’t supposed to ever be this close to a human.

“Oh my god.” Özdal staggered back, a hand over their mouth.

Cotton whimpered. He tried dragging himself away, slow and agonized against the floor.

“No! Don’t, oh my god, don’t move.” Özdal quickly knelt down before him, blocking his path with a massive hand that just barely missed touching him.

“Sorry!” Cotton cried, squeezing his eyes shut.

Özdal seemed to realize they were scaring him, and the hand was gone when Cotton dared to open his eyes. “I’m the one who’s sorry! Your legs! What happened? What are you? What were you doing here? Are you o–I mean, obviously you’re not okay.” The human had tears in their eyes.

“I was climbing, please don’t hurt me, I’m sorry.” Cotton kept his voice quiet, hoping maybe Özdal wouldn’t hear.

“I won’t hurt you!” Özdal’s hands went up again. Cotton would have flinched if he could really move at all. “You need… a doctor. Like an emergency room. I’m not, uh, I can’t help with this.”

No no no no no. This was all going so wrong. More humans, more eyes on him. He was going to be the one to expose borrowers, an entire existence of safe secrecy down the drain. Who knew how many lives would be uprooted, captured, ended, all because of him?

“No! It’s fine! I’ve been injured before, I can handle it, don’t take me to anyone!” Cotton insisted.

Özdal said nothing for a moment. They pulled a ‘phone’, a device a little taller than him out of their pocket, pointed it at him, then turned it around.

Cotton was there on the screen, like a mirror stalled in time. His top half was mostly normal, if not for some bruising, but everything after that was… wrong. His legs were hardly recognizable, smears of blood and bone that he could hardly believe were attached to him.

“I gotta take you to a doctor,” Özdal said softly.

“No, no, it’s fine, I’ll… handle it somehow.” Even if he died, he couldn’t go. It would mean the end of life as they know it for every borrower. “Remove that image. Please.”

“Okay.” They still used that gentle, soft voice, like they were talking to some kind of scared, infant animal. Cotton didn’t like it. Özdal showed him as they tapped a little icon shaped like a trash bin, and the image disappeared. “But I still have to take you to the doctor.”

“No. You don’t understand,” Cotton pleaded.

Özdal looked down at him in all-too-obvious pity, then left the room. Cotton tried to drag himself, but he could barely make it a couple inches before Özdal returned. They carried a rubber spatula in one hand, and a woven basket emblazoned with HAPPY EASTER! and lined with a washcloth in the other.

“Listen. I dunno what you are or why you’re here, but I’m not gonna just sit here and watch you die because I was too lazy to clean my room, okay? I’m sorry. I, uh, really hope this doesn’t hurt.”

“No!” Cotton protested, but he could do nothing as Özdal carefully slid the spatula under him. He screamed as it jostled the only part of his legs he could feel, his upper thighs, eliciting a frantic sorry, sorry! from Özdal.

And then he was lifted.

Cotton clung to the spatula for dear life, gasping as the floor fell out from under him and he plunged up into the open air. Just as fast, he was deposited into the basket.

“Here.” Özdal reached in and folded the washcloth over him, enveloping him in softness. “Just try and, um, rest, okay? We’ll be there soon.”

“No,” Cotton repeated, but it was hollow. He knew it was hopeless at this point. Nothing he said made any difference, and there was nothing he could do to make the human just listen to him. Not without telling them about borrowers, about his family, and that would only put everyone else in even more danger.

Özdal carried him out to their car. Cotton had only seen them from a distance before, terrifying, monstrous things. He never thought he’d end up inside one. It stank of oil and shook like thunder, but Özdal wasn’t deterred.

When the shaking finally stopped, they picked up the basket again. Cotton pulled the washcloth over his head as soon as he saw: humans were everywhere. They would all see him.

He felt the basket being placed down on something.

“Hi, I’m here with an emergency!” Özdal shouted.

They lifted the folded portion of the washcloth.

Cotton stared up, wide-eyed, at the bright-white room. There were more humans than he’d ever seen, and before he could even try to hide, several were already staring right back.

A couple of them pointed their phones at him, just like Özdal had.

Dread solidified in his gut.

“Oh no,” he whispered, finally passing out.

oneshots taglist

@icyheart-and-friends

@kira-the-whump-enthusiast

@whuarri

@reborrowing

@paperprinxe

-

@what-if-i-just-did

everything taglist

@lilac-and-lemon-whumps​

@t0rture-me

@whump-for-all-and-all-for-whump

@sowhumpshaped

@pigeonwhumps

-

@the-scrapegoat

@whumpycries

@lonesome--hunter

@whumpy-wyrms

@alextries

-

@wolfeyedwitch

@starfields08000

g/t taglist

@whumpinthepot

@cupcakes-and-pain

@reborrowing

events

@whumpmasinjuly

@gianttol

@whumperless-whump-event

[circusinthewalls]

SFW Gaz Ramblings - 18+ MDNI, AGELESS BLOGS DNI

(CW: Therapy Dog Hybrid! Reader | ow ow ow my fuckin' arms 😭) [Masterlist]

You whine as Kyle strokes his thumb over the length of your forearm. The movement is a little too quick, just a fraction too abrasive for your newly sensitive flesh. That familiar searing pain thrums back to life in mere seconds. Heat radiates off you with every pulse of it.

He sighs, setting your arm back down gently in your lap to instead inspect the other.

"You didn't wear sunscreen?" he asks.

You want to lie because you know how utterly avoidable of a mistake this was, but it's not like the truth isn't written all over you. You'd only make a bigger fool out of yourself at this point.

"Didn't think we'd be outside that long," you murmur, avoiding his gaze as your ears pin back somewhat.

Opposed to the chastising tone you expect to receive, he only tuts.

"Gonna have to have a word with those recruits, huh, sweetheart?"

Disapproval laces the question, but much to your surprise, it isn't actually directed at you. This sparks a bit of inquisitiveness within you, those folded ears perking up again. You tilt your head at him, curious.

"What?"

He looks up to meet your gaze now and seems almost amused at your apparent befuddlement, the corners of his mouth tugging up into a cheeky smile.

"Well, they're the ones that took our therapy dog for too long of a walk, aren't they?" he says. "Bet they forgot to put any on themselves."

"But I wanted to go," you interject, leaning forward and nearly sliding off the counter he has you sat on when he steps away to get in the fridge.

You watch him rummage around in it, digging through until he emerges with what smells to you like aloe vera gel. He returns then, already unscrewing the cap on the way over.

"I know," he replies, "but they knew how long that walk was going to be. You didn't. They should've known better than to go without sunscreen on any of you."

Your brow knits as you consider his words, ears pinning back once more.

"Guess so."

Kyle hums, content with your supposed agreement.

"Let me see your arms, love."

You comply, raising both. Another hum sounds from him, this one praising.

"So good," he murmurs. "Just hold still while I apply this, yeah? You'll feel better in no time."

---------------------------------------------------

Little something I wrote back on the first of this month while I was dealing with the most egregious fuckin' sunburn on my arms.

Anyway, sorry for the lack of posts recently! Been busy with work and other life things. My drafts are full up of stuff I've been working on (three larger fics and a number of one-shots + requests), so I really wanted to get something out for y'all. I do have a decent bit of free time this week, and I'm hoping to get back into the swing of writing. There will be more of Therapy Dog Hybrid! Reader in the form of little one-shots over time, but other stuff I've been meaning to get posted will come first.

As always, thank you for your patience! Y'all are delightful. Means a lot to know you enjoy my work. <3

Writing not permitted for reposting, transcription, translation or to use with AI technologies.

[yuri-is-online]

Hi Yuri! I hope you are doing well<333 I really enjoy reading your writing and I am always more fond of reading the little octatrio fish gang! I dont really know how this usually works because I never send in any asks at all nor do I see your rules list or anything but if you dont mind I would like to make a request<3

A mc who finds an out of tune and old piano and fondly remembers that they used to play piano back in their world. And perhaps Azul hears in on this and despite the piano being old and out of tune, it is rather beautiful how you play it because of how imperfect the notes are being played out. (SORRY I WAS LISTENING TO FALLEN DOWN AND THE FEELINGS WERE JUST SURGING AND THE BRAINROT WAS TOO MUCH)

You dont have to force yourself or anything! Please take care and dont feel too pressured! <3

The Most Romantic of All Arts (Azul Ashengrotto x Yuu)

Hello dear friend and I am doing quite well thank you! I'm pleased you like my writing; the octotrio is what finally cracked my resolve to check out Twisted Wonderland and put FGO on the back burner so I suppose I shouldn't beat myself up too much for writing about them so much. I am sorry I caused you stress with my lack of rules, I don't usually send requests or asks myself, so I felt really bad to have frightened you. Not too sure if this will end up being what you had in mind, it got away from me a bit.

Also when you say Fallen Down, you do mean the Undertale soundtrack piece right? It's a soothing song I listened to it while I was plotting this to try and get into a similar headspace.

notes: they/them used for Yuu, header taken from the painting Spirit by George Roux (1885) which I found on this wordpres blog article I took the title from, it's a neat painting, Azul learning to find beauty and love in imperfections is important to me ok? Other works can be found on my masterlist here.

Sometimes you wonder if Ramshakle is sentient. The old building has more rooms than you know what to do with, and lovely as the ghosts are they don't fully remember what they were used for, if they remembered in the first place. But still there was something about those rooms that seemed to love you; he guest room almost built itself up around you, the kitchen had only needed some basic repairs before it was ready to help play host again, and no matter where a fire place was found it was always eager to burst to life and warm you and Grim.

It does not have the same love for Azul, he'd complained as much when you talked about just what it was he wanted with the building after the events of his overblot had cooled between you.

"It's got a graveyard in front of it, though?" That really had been the crux of your whole argument. It was hard to be annoyed with his laugh when it sounded so nice, the genuine amusement a refreshing difference to his previous performitive indifference.

"Yes," he muses, sipping at his real before he continues, "I'm not bothered by that much, ghosts and grave ships aren't uncommon sights under the sea, but I always forget how unusual humans think they are."

"There's a lot of superstitions about places where people are buried." You mean it as an explanation, but it brings an odd look to Azul's face, like there's an emotion bubbling beneath his surface he doesn't want to acknowledge but is too strong to suppress. It settles over you both, as you try to focus on drinking your tea while your host seems content to let his grow cold.

"Well, I suppose it's a good thing that ruin isn't really sentient." He sounds almost bitter, disappointed in how long he has let his drink cool you decide as he reaches for the pot and warms it with some fresh tea. "Otherwise, I'd accuse it of trying to keep you."

It's a silly thought, but the sight of this latest discovery really does have you wondering. You are supposed to be in that wonderfully accommodating kitchen making snacks for when Azul decides to "coincidentally drop by" later this evening to "go over the Lounge's expenses" in your guest room. On a Tuesday. When it was almost guaranteed business would be slow enough to keep anyone from wondering too hard about where he'd gone or the twins from being too upset about running things. But instead of "just wanting to try" a new recipe, you are here, tucked in a room just a bit further down the hall from the guest room watching Grim give his best impression of Ace after completing a magic trick. Because stars know he has never seen any other magicians.

"TA-DA!" He puts both of his paws out to really sell the piano at the window. "See, I told you I had a great surprise!"

"I'm sorry for not believing you." You say and try not to laugh with just how much more proud that seems to make him. "But where did you find this? Or how I guess, unless you moved it?"

"Nah." He shakes his head before remembering he's supposed to be the "great" Grim. "I mean I could have! But I'm just so cool I managed to find a piano here already, so all I had to do was clean it up instead! You're welcome henchuman." You scratch just behind his ears and politely ignore his purrs as you examine the piano and its bench. They're old, likely just as ancient as everything else in the dormitory and likely extremely, achingly out of tune. But the mere sight of it makes your fingers itch, and Grim barely has to whine "Well ain't you gonna play somethin'?" Before you're at the bench, experimentally pressing the keys to try and sound out something.

Twinkle twinkle little star, how I wonder what you are-

You hum it rather than sing, irrationally worried Grim will somehow figure out it's a lullaby and complain that you're babying him instead of cutely dancing along with the music like it's one of the cassettes Deuce let you borrow. He cheers for another, and you oblige, letting your muscle memory carry you as far as it can as you try searching your brain for just what it was you wanted most to hear from yourself after all this time being unable to play.

And missing the click of a heavy door down the hall in the effort.

Azul hears nothing at first, and though it does disappoint, it does not bother him. He's had a long day, one about to be made longer still by the grey zone already draping itself around his thoughts as he shrugs his blazer off to his shoulders while en route to the Ramshackle guest room. He pauses, for what he tells himself is only going to be second, at the kitchen door and is left unrewarded for his detour.

You aren't there: and that does bother him somewhat, even if it should not if his pretext is to be believed. These visits were too commonplace to be random, but maybe you'd made plans, deciding not to look past his excuses for the evening. Maybe you were asleep, tired of the day or just plain tired of him. But there is a kettle sat on it's base, mercifully not on just yet, but two mugs and the pour over cone set next to as if it was expecting company. The nerves remain knotted in his stomach, though the cause shifts towards something more welcome.

So you do have a mug purposefully set aside and designated just for him, and is that a little recpie card with notes on coffee taped to that tin? These things should worry him, the picture he snaps and immediately hides in a folder should be for a purpose. But it's separate from those ones, labeled something inane and barely full with how careful he is to have his longing remain unseen. He wonders, briefly if it would be an intrusion to make the drinks himself. If it would reveal to much to show outright he knows the way you take yours instead of just saying it in time with your order, but knows that would not be the exact issue here. He is a guest, and guests limit themselves to the halls and that room he forces himself, with haste that would be noticeable if you were there to see it, back down the hall and back towards the guest room. Azul has work to do, he can content himself with the warmth the mental image the cups on the counter produces until something forces him to pause at a door once more. The piano is old, droning out a tune that is unpolished and rusty from the player's lack of practice but filled with such a specific sort of joy it has him actually running towards it.

You sit at the bench, a serious look of determination on your face so unlike the usual Yuu it can't help but be cute. Grim sleeps contentedly on your lap as you continue searching for the threads of melody still trapped inside your head from years of only occasionally reluctant practice. It's an unfamiliar tune in composition, but not in feel. There's words to this song, maybe not in the form of lyrics, but there all the same for him to stumble even closer to as he comes to a halting stop just behind you and the music ends in a surprised crash as you whip your head around to see him.

"Azul!"

"Very sorry to interrupt." He holds up both hands in surrender, composure only just maintained as you check to see Grim still asleep and laugh nervously. "I didn't know you could play."

"Can't really." You say somewhat bitterly and more confidence comes to Azul as a slight plan froms in his mind. "I'm really out of practice ugh. I know it shouldn't annoy me! But with how everything's been since I showed up, it's just not been on my mi- Oh hello?"

Azul fully removes his jacket and sets it on a side table close to where he had been satanding, moving to sit on the bench next to you. He has enough mercy not to loosen his tie or do anything else scandalous, but the close examination he gives to the keys could have fooled you. "Pity it's so out of tune, this is a nice piano."

"I know right! I'm really happy Grim found it." You resist the urge to poke his cheeks some and Azul lightly, trying not to too openly relish in your surprise reaches one arm around your back to place his hands into a similar position as you had been earlier, tucking you close to his side.

"May I?" He's smug. Too smug it's robbing you of sanity.

"What's it going to cost?" You try too hard not to sound like you're flailing as you look to see your question hasn't even phased him at all.

"Oh normally I wouldn't dream of charging for a performance," he clearly lies "but it's been such a long day I wouldn't say no to a cup of coffee." And he's off, music only marred by the off key of the piano in a clearly purposeful display of talent meant to sear itself into your mind enough that you don't think about his request too long. You and he are from two different worlds, but he knows that music has a way of gapping that if the stories of the mermaid princess told him anything at all. So when he purposefully slows the song at its end, he knows you know, that tricky smile he swore once he'd always hate kicking his heartbeat up again as you lean fully against his shoulder.

"Beautiful." You say, not bothering to give the compliment direction as he can't help but agree. "We should play together next time."

"I-" You pick yourself up and what he wants to say slows when you pick up his jacket for him and hold out a hand. Later, he all to easily decides. Later, without Grim and with specific time set purposefully aside so you know just how much it matters. "I would like that. You'll have to show me the songs that you can remember from your world." And he takes your hand just to soothe some of the ache, trying and failing not to show just how happy he is when you keep it.

[sacrivn]

removing the “rosaline and abduction” portion of the project ; a developer’s announcement

hi y’all!! first off, i’d like to say i’m sorry for the lack of updates on this blog. juggling my new job and developing sacrilegious has been eating at my time.

but i’m coming on here real quick to say i’m removing the “abduction” aspect of sacrilegious.

sacrilegious has a lot of sensitive and violent topics, much of which i’m comfortable writing about and making game mechanics around. it’s based off the dark web and black markets so of course it’s going to have sensitive content. it’s supposed to be a dark art project that touches taboo subjects for disturbance purposes.

however, i’ve come to realize that making a chapter and a mini game mechanic about abducting vulnerable people on the streets to kill them off, hold them for ransom, or traffic them is insensitive. unlike the other topics in the game, there’s no way to approach this in an entertaining manner. there’s no way to make light of abduction. nobody is going to have fun w/ picking people off the street in a white van then selling them back to their families. i can’t make a story out of it while writing on the side of the perpetrator.

i deeply apologize for initially adding this portion to the project. rosaline will still be a character in sacrilegious and amatory sacrilege, but instead i will come up with a different career for her chapter.

thank you for reading my yapping :3

[satuguro]

*ೃ࿐ BLUE MONDAY

[ ACT III: KNOWING, WANTING ]

ethan landry x reader

#SYNOPSIS— you facetime someone first and you hate it, ethan can't tell when you're joking or serious, and you really hate richie's style.

#CONTAINS— murder!, gore!!!!, satire (!!), familial issues (implications of abuse), mentions of anxiety/ptsd, richie x reader (heavily one sided), stalker behavior!, fake dating, richie (yes, he needs his own warning), suggestive content

#AUTHORSNOTE— i'm so sorry for such a late update and the lack of activity on my blog, my mental health took such a plummet.

ACT I, ACT II, ACT III

the low hum of the computers in the radio studio and the soft sound of music paying through the control room speakers were the only sounds you heard as you spun around in your chair. a clean spotify playlist— something you weren't supposed to technically use for radio, but your station manager used it, so who cares? — played soft music on air as you waited patiently for your last song to end.

humming softly to yourself, you scrolled mindlessly through social media, taking in the last few days of relaxation you had until you finally began with you and ethan's little plan.

reluctantly date richie. gather information. get the fuck out and give it to the police.

and if all else fails? well, you'd kill him (something ethan was surprisingly not that disturbed with. talk about sibling rivalry.).

you hadn't spoken to either of them ever since sunday, when you and ethan formulated your little plan at an aesthetically pleasing botanical cafe.

the music came to a slow end, and you paused the playlist before turning on your mic. "that was my last song of the night. remember; variety hour with blackmore university radio's music manager— which is me, if you've been paying attention —is every thursday from 9 to 10. good night, new york." and with that, you returned the radio on auto play, allowing it to bleed into a few promos.

the radio and studio office was dark at this point, lacking any form of life other than you. with an entire radio station being led only by college students, it was common for everyone to be gone by the time 6 pm hit.

but you were a bit of a masochist. so here you were, doing your mandatory radio show in the ambiently lit studio and office of your station. it smelled of soft lavender from the plug-in wall scent one of your co-workers put up, and the only lights came from the lamps and soft yellow light that was put in to replace the fluorescent white that you swore made days go by longer.

your headphones were over your ears, one of them pushed back behind your ear to allow yourself to hear the outside world (you had to be cautious nowadays). pulling your tote bag over your shoulder, you locked the studio door behind you and closed up the station. and as you walked down the dimly lit stairs to the exit, you half listened to the echoing of your footsteps as you shut the door behind you.

fall was your favorite season. not just for the fact that the weather was a perfect mix of not too hot and not too cold, or that it was the last few months before you fell deep into procrastination due to the lack of sunshine, but it was because it was always so beautiful. red and browns, yellows and oranges, all painted on once-green leaves before they fell.

the crunching of the leaves below your feet as you began to walk back to your dorm was soothing behind the autumn playlist (which you had carefully curated, of course) you were listening to. and it would've gone on like that for the entire walk home. the same walk you did every thursday without fail, when barely anyone was out and about on campus and when it was only you and whatever weather there was that evening.

but you could feel someone watching you.

as though someone had poured water down your back, your skin prickled and the hair on your body stood up as your walking suddenly came to a stop. pushing your headphones down around your neck, you dared to look behind you.

nothing. nothing but the darkness of the rest of the campus, barely lit by the flickering street lamps. the light from the lamp you were standing next to bled into nothingness, revealing practically nothing to your eyes.

your hands dug into your pockets as you grabbed your phone, swallowing thickly as you dared to stare deeper into the night. deeper into the darkness you stared.

and then you dared to turn back ahead of you, walking with a stride quicker than how you usually walked. step by step, shoes crunching in the leaves as you briskly walked, keeping your chin up in faux confidence, as though you weren't hearing another pair of footsteps walking in the same exact pace you were.

and then you came to a sudden halt.

and you heard the extra footstep from someone that certainly wasn't you.

and you began to walk faster. step. step. step. feeling those heartless and emotionless eyes staring in to the back of your head much like you had stared at the back of your father's head. hungry. blood thirsty. desperate to feel the warm crimson on your skin.

you could hear them breathe. heavy and warm, excited and thrumming with adrenaline because it felt as though you were paying attention to them. you were finally reacting to them in the way they wanted you to; by running away in fear.

you pulled out your student id card, slamming it against the card reader before opening the door to your dorm building and shutting it behind you, chest heaving as you tried to compose yourself.

you went to the elevator, slamming on the button to get you up to your dorm room.

your feet walked briskly on the hallway as you made a beeline for your dorm room, hands trembling as you found yourself disassociating, barely showing any emotion at all if it weren't for your shaking hands. but as you were pulling out your key, you saw the flower on the ground.

lilies of the valley. your favorite.

looking up and down the hall, you grabbed it hastily and you unlocked the door, shutting it behind you and letting out a breath. staring down at the flowers, you pulled out a single note with a heart drawn on it in crimson red ink.

"fuck," you breathed, shaking your head as you walked into your room and locked it behind you, throwing the lilies into the trash as you swallowed thickly.

who else could have done this? who else in your life was most likely to follow you like a predator stalking its prey, waiting for the perfect moment to strike?

richie.

he was stalking you. richie was fucking stalking you.

you grabbed your phone, scrolling before you found a contact, clicking facetime on it and waiting patiently as you tried to clam the harsh beating of your chest. once, it rang. then twice. then three times, and you almost reached over to hang up, if it weren't for the face that the little sound came out of your phone speaker, signaling that he actually picked up.

"hello?" ethan said, his face squished by his pillow as he peered into the phone screen. "you actually called me. i never took you for a facetime person, but uh—"

"is richie there?" you hissed, almost scared to raise your voice as you paced your room frantically. your hands moved on their own as you took your ring off of your finger and began to run it over your knuckles.

back and forth. back and forth.

"no, i don't think so— what's going on?" ethan sat up in his bed, voice hushed low as he looked down at you. you were moving— he could see it —and he looked haphazard as he stared at you through the phone. protectiveness striked at his chest again as ethan gripped his phone tighter. "y/n, what's going on?"

"ethan, he's stalking me," you hissed, panic evident in your tone as you tried to compose yourself.

back and forth. back and forth.

"i— i was walking home from work and i swear to god, e, it was him. and he probably left these fucking flowers at my door too." you flipped the phone camera to show ethan the trashed flowers. "i'm not having second thoughts or anything, but if i have to deal with his stalking it's honestly just gonna be a pain in my ass—"

"you're not having second thoughts?" ethan ran a stressed hand through his hair, breathing out a heavy exhale. "jesus, y/n, if i were you i wouldn't even pull through with this shit."

"good thing you're not me then, huh?" you swallowed thickly, walking to your bed and throwing yourself onto it, letting your back hit your mattress. raising your phone so that ethan could see your face clearly.

you hated facetiming people.

"okay, that's all," you stated, as though letting him know that his brother was a stalker was just the most casual thing in the world. "i'm hanging up now."

"w—wait!" ethan said hurriedly right before your finger pressed the bright red button. face dusted light pink, ethan looked over your (once again) unreadable face. "can we.. stay on call?"

"no." you blinked. "why would we?"

"because i'm basically sleeping in an apartment with a stalker-murderer!" ethan hissed, voice coming down to a harsh whisper as the sound of the apartment door opening and closing rang in his ears. "i don't want to be, like, attacked in my sleep or something."

"he's not gonna attack you when quinn is there," you stated bluntly, finger still hovering over the big red button. "even if he does suspect something. you'll be fine." and you almost pressed the red button again. almost.

"y/n," ethan groaned, letting his free hand cover his face. you were so stubborn, so brutally honest, and yet ethan found himself not even minding it as he practically pleaded for you to just stay on call with him. "just.. just stay with me for a bit, okay? promise you can hang up once i fall asleep."

you narrowed your eyes at him. "do i look like a guard dog to you?"

"you basically act like one."

you stared at ethan, practically challenging him silently as he stared right back at you with those warm hazel eyes. "please?" he added, making you suck in a breath as you huffed.

"..fine."

an appreciateive smile spread on the boy's face as you set your phone down, murmuring a half hearted, "i'll be back," as you went to do your skincare routine and get ready for bed. "don't die," you added before you shut your room door behind you.

bad joke.

you washed your face, letting your hands move slowly down your face as you let out a long sigh, feeling your continuously tense shoulders relax. staring at yourself in the mirror, you found your face blurring into the background, melting into your bathroom walls, features seeping into the tile, melting into the grout.

you stared at yourself in the reflective one way mirror, face blank, pupils constricted as your reflection stared back at you. it felt like you were floating far above your head, unable to anchor yourself in the present.

the voice of the detective felt like someone was speaking to you from underwater. his voice was so garbled, so muffled, you could barely comprehend it. “y/n. you have to at least say something.”

but what was there to say? that you mashed up your father’s brain and liked it? that was a bit straightforward. and only a little bit too guilty.

what were you doing? you were putting yourself into the same position you were in those few years ago; a position of danger, playing a victim just to feel the satisfaction of watching someone’s life melt from their face. and that satisfaction didn’t come with any kind of remorse, because it took a special kind of person to make you want to see their brains on the outside rather than the inside.

you were regressing. maybe you really weren’t over what had happened to you. maybe you never would be, and you felt tour skin prickle at the thought, your hands gripping the sides of your sink as you stared at your mirror.

“your mother says you were protecting her.” the detective leaned in, putting his arms on the table in front of you both. his gaze weighed heavy on you, and you could feel him scan you like a file; taking in how expressionless you were, how even after everything that had happened, you didn’t shed a single tear. “was your father abusive, y/n?”

and that made your eyes snap towards his, cold and cunning, staring at him, unblinking. but if you peers too closely, focused too much on the emotion behind your eyes, the exhaustion of living, you could see that you had every reason to feel nothing for what you had done. you had every fucking reason to smash your father’s head in.

the door to your bedroom shut behind you as you walked back into your room, throwing your shirt over your head and grabbing one to sleep in. "hello?" ethan's voice came through your phone, your breath hitching when you realized he waited on call the entire time while you disassociated in the bathroom. just another day.

"hey." you made yourself comfortable in your bed, hands coming together under your head as you laid it down on your pillow, staring at your phone right next to your bed. an awkward silence followed for nearly five minutes, the only sounds coming from your breathing and ethan's mild shuffling. your eyes had fallen shut as you listened to ethan's breathing through the speaker.

"are you scared, y/n?"

the question, the sudden break of silence didn't make you move. you only kept your eyes shut, silently manifesting for the sweet arms of sleep to clamp around you. you hummed in response, pretending to think, but you knew how you felt. how this exact situation made you feel like you were 16 again, killing your own flesh and blood for just an ounce of freedom.

you hadn't broken at the seams yet. you were still here, breathing, eyes shut, on a phone with some boy you had taught how to smoke only a few days ago.

that's what mattered.

"are you?" you asked, dodging the question easily.

".. yeah." ethan sighed, the sound loud through your phone (he needed to move away from the phone just a bit, but you didn't feel like telling him that yet). from his side, he laid on his back on his bed, eyes set on the white ceiling above him as he spoke to you, someone emotionally stunted (he would never say that out loud, a it would be hypocritical of him to do so), about how he was feeling. "i think i've always been scared. of richie, i mean."

you stayed silent, your eyes slowly opening as you looked at your phone. the waver in ethan's voice, the way he almost felt ashamed to tell you how he felt.. he was being genuine. "what has richie done to you? to make you scared of him, i mean."

ethan's jaw clenched, eyes unblinking towards his ceiling. staring. gathering memories he had tried so desperately to forget, but every time he saw richie's face, he could only remember them. "he was always the more popular one. him and quinn— i was like.."

"a nerd."

"rude, but true." ethan sighed slowly. "one time, during middle school, i snitched to my dad that richie had brought a girl into our house —he was in high school, mind you —and i couldn't sleep because they had been fucking in his room. and that lack of sleep made me late. my dad doesn't like it when we're late." he breathed in shakily. "a few days later, after my robotics club, i was walking home and a bunch of high school kids drove up next to me and, uh..."

your brows furrowed. ".. beat you up?"

"yup." ethan popped the 'p', breathing in deeply before exhaling again. "and i saw him. richie. sitting in the back seat of the car just watching as these teenagers more than half my size beat me up to a pulp. and he smiled at me. as though i deserved to have my torso bruised and my face slammed on the concrete in the 7th grade." ethan chuckled humorlessly, his laughter quickly fading. "point is.. he always gets what he wants."

he sounded so.. defeated. years and years of being tormented by your own blood made him so afraid to speak up; to the point where he didn't even feel like doing so anymore.

you didn't know how to respond.

".. you're still up for killing him?" you asked, voice slightly unsure due to the fact that ethan had just casually spilled some of his trauma over the phone to you, who was half asleep and barely coherent at this point.

"i wish it didn't have to be this way—"

"no you don't."

"what?" ethan blinked, brows knotting together in confusion as he looked at his phone in disbelief over your words.

"you don't mind that it went this way. because you hate him." you sounded so factual. so casual, as though the entire situation was a case you could easily dissect and observe from a far. "and he's done a lot of shit to you and others. the people he's killed. the people he's manipulated. people like richie don't deserve anything." your words became sour, laced with the poison from the past.

"how do you do that?" ethan asked you.

"do what?"

"be so calm in this situation. this is dangerous shit— y/n, you're willingly putting yourself in danger."

you swallowed hard, weighing your words in your head. "it's because i don't want anyone else to die like his victims did. and i," you blinked, "i want to get them their revenge."

"by killing him?"

"if i have to." a beat. "are you still okay with that?"

was he okay with that?

ethan didn't know. he had been walking through the entire week as though he was nothing more than a ghost— eating and drinking to survive, speaking only when spoken to, living his days out of fear because if his brother had been killing people, when would he turn on his siblings? when would richie kill quinn, or chad, or mindy, or tara, or sam, or him?

he didn't want to tell the police and had his brother escape from their confines the next day.

ethan sighed. "if i'm helping you, then yes. i am." a beat of silence, as though his thoughts were overcoming him, as though he was weighing his options in his head. he knew you were perfectly content with the silence over the phone (as you probably didn't want to be on the phone with him for so long in the first place), but ethan wasn't like that. he wanted to talk, but about what?

he wanted to talk to you.

he wanted to know you.

"if we're going to be working together, don't you think we should know each other more?" and his question came out as such a pure example of simple curiosity, simple human want to know of someone simply for the sake of knowing someone. to walk past one's walls and know the little facts about them.

you were not one to let people do that. you were not one to let someone simply know you, because your mind didn't work that way. it felt off, it felt odd— the idea that ethan wanted to know you before the shitshow began.

"you don't have to get to know me."

"i want to know you." ethan's breath hitched. "nothing like.. personal, or anything. just like.. what's your favorite season?"

"well, that's really pushing it." you heard his small chuckle on the other end, your eyebrows softening ever so slightly at the sound. "it's autumn. and yours?"

"spring." ethan blinked up at his ceiling. "i like the rain. the smell of petrichor— a lot of people hate it but i just.. don't."

you hummed in acknowledgement, turning your head towards your phone. "favorite color?"

"forest green. and yours?"

"greyish blue. like the kind that appears at dusk when there's fog over the ground." you felt your body relax a bit; the questions were fortunately far more shallow than you thought they would be. ".. are we gonna do this until you fall asleep?"

"if you don't mind," ethan murmured softly, shifting gently in his bed.

"what if i do mind? i do have shit to do tomorrow, you know," you muttered under your breath.

and ethan would've felt pretty bad by your words. you were always so brutally honest yet so horribly awkward (it was painful to watch at times, he had to admit), but there was one particular question weighing on his mind ever since he picked up your call. one that you had easily deflected moments before. "y/n, you didn't answer my question."

your brows furrowed. "what question?"

"aren't you scared?" ethan swallowed thickly, eyes spacing out as he stared at his ceiling, at the darkened abyss of his room. "for your life, for your friends, for anything?"

were you?

you didn't want to be honest with him. you didn't want to tell him that in all honesty, you were terrified. terrified of losing the friends (that was a strong word for it) you barely had, of losing the small bit of family that was still speaking to you with faux smiles and condolences even though they were under the impression that you were an unpredictable woman.

and unpredictable women terrified them.

but your emotions were always increasing tenfold with every passing hour, the thoughts being so jumbled up and so strong that you had simply learned to drown them out. to continue on with your life with your tornado of thoughts and no one to speak to and no one to look for because you were used to doing this all on your own.

you had dealt with it on your own before. you could deal with it again.

but rather than lie to ethan's face, you found yourself confessing much like a sinner to an angel. "i am. i'm terrified, ethan." and that was all.

your fingers flew over your keyboard, the past year of having to write essay after essay finally paying off as you typed furiously into your laptop.

evelyn campo murder 2020

evelyn campo murder cambria california

evelyn campo case

you had only found a few articles on her murder, most of them not even mentioning the girl's name, much less many details about her case (unless you counted grim retellings of the crime scene). there was only a brief mention of a possible suspect (the man you had a date with in literally a day), but other than that, nothing. the police had no leads.

"why isn't there much on her murder?" you asked, scrolling down an article with a frown on your face.

ethan sat next to you on your bed, peering over your shoulder as your eyes scanned your screen. jesus, you read fast. "quinn told me that her parents wanted to keep it under wraps," he murmured, only catching glimpses of the article's words. "but i heard they got some private detectives on the case, too."

"sounds like small town gossip."

"oh, that's cause it was." ethan's eyes landed on one quote from the article as your scrolling finally came to a stop. adam's apple bobbing at the sight of it, he read, '.. found stabbed an approximate 78 times ..' the sheer strength and passion, the excitement richie must've had when he killed evelyn made his stomach sick. and ethan would've easily puked over the side of your bed if you didn't speak to him, breaking him from his stupor.

"hey, stay with me."

and just like that, ethan did. his mind was brought back to the present.

"right. sorry." you oculd feel his breath fan gently over your neck as he continued to look over your shoulder. "if we find the fingertips of his current victims, we can connect him to her— evelyn's —murder."

"maybe he kept them." you looked at ethan, confusion written over his face at your words. "it's just a guess, i dunno. but if evelyn was richie's first victim, then he might have kept parts of her. like a—"

"trophy. oh, this is so fucked," ethan muttered under his breath, moving to lay horizontally on your bed, the situation at hand easily driving him to exhaustion as he stared at your ceiling.

"we should first find out who his most current victims are, if possible. see if anyone our age has gone missing in our university or nearby universities." you looked down at ethan, whose face laid near where you sat. "if we can't, then we need to find those fingertips."

"right."

a beat.

"richie's working, yeah?" you asked ethan, who nodded as his doe eyes turned to you.

"yeah. he can't really be anywhere but work right now.” a hint of a smile graced his features. “i stole a look at his scheduling. he’s probably knee deep in papers right now.” he saw your eyes flash over in worry, the glint disappearing just as quickly as it arrived, and ethan knew. he simply knew that ever since richie gave into his impulses and followed you home, you were on edge.

you were just good at hiding it. good thing ethan was a little bit too observant when he wanted to.

"y/n, he's working." silently reassuring, ethan gazed at you, reading your indifferent face, searching for any more sign of fear or worry, but it was gone. you had gotten rid of everything before it could show even more.

"right." you looked away from ethan, feeling his stupidly innocent gaze still lingering on your as you looked back at your laptop. if you were to meet with ethan anywhere else but your dorm, richie surely would've gone out of his way to see. at least in the safety of your dorm room, you could shut the blinds and lock the door and be sure of your safety.

"what're your guys' plans tomorrow?" ethan asked you, finally allowing your to move on from the indirect topic of your emotions.

you shrugged. "no idea. i never texted him first— that's embarrassing."

"you seemed fine with calling me first last night."

"i never said that wasn't embarrassing." you rolled your eyes, almost hearing the stupid small smile that graced ethan's face at your words.

a minute passed in silence, the only sounds being your typing as you tried to build your list of articles on evelyn's murder. you had a grand total of 5 articles; better than you thought, but not as much as you would've liked.

he shifted umcomfortably in his seat, the dead silence only a bit too awkward for him. "shouldn't you know your plans, though? just in case he, uh," ethan clears his throat, raising his brows knowingly. he didn't want to say the word; but you already knew what he was implying.

"kills me?"

"well, yeah."

"he's not going to kill me," you shifted uncomfortably in your seat. "not yet, anyway. i'm too close to mindy; if i suddenly go missing after a date with him, mindy will find out for sure."

ethan's lips twitched into a small frown, hazel eyes darking with turmoil as he listened to you. "evelyn was my neighbor, y/n. she literally lived down the street from me; he's unpredictable—"

you almost winced at that word.

you could feel them all staring at you. whispering harshly, practically pointing at you as you stood at the doorway of your aunt's house, hands clasped together in front of you. your mother believed that having you locked up in the room of your new shared apartment in new york was unhealthy; and maybe she was right. for once, she had your best interests at heart, only you knew the outcome of her plan to assimilate you back into society under your shiny new last name.

"she's unpredictable," your aunt hissed as she talked to your mother, shamelessly looking you up and down as though you were some freak of nature, ignoring the clouded look over your eyes because you were barely keeping it together as it was. "you saw what she did, didn't you?"

luckily, you barely reacted.

"i know that, e."

"you know," he sat up in his seat, moving to sit next to you, facing the opposite way with his long legs splayed out on your bed, "after he was questioned by the police, he'd come home as though he had just come home from work or something. and he'd," he let out a sigh, "talk about it. like it was something so fucking casual."

"around you?" your eyebrows raised at that.

"no, never around me. but he would around my dad." contempt laced ethan's tone as he continued. it was hatred, but there was something underneath it that was something akin to jealousy, you realized. ''he'd tell him everything. what they asked that day. the leads he thinks they have— and he almost sounded proud that he was their only suspect."

"can i ask something?" you shifted to face your body towards his, your legs lightly touching his side. "if you were so sure that richie was the killer, why didn't you say anything?"

"because my dad worked for the department. so richie had an in." there it was again, you noticed; that familiar contempt. "and even though wayne bailey wasn't a part of the case, he upheld richie's innocence."

you blinked. "your family is fucked."'

"oh, i know."

"do you think you're the same way?"

ethan's eyebrows raised at your blunt question. he would've laughed in your face at your honesty if it weren't for the fact that you were dead serious. you stared at ethan, almost unblinking, expecting an equally honest answer back. "oh, you actually want to know?"

"yes?" you frowned a bit, tilting your head to the side a little. "did you think i was joking?"

"maybe?"

your brows knotted together. "i'm not joking, though."

"well, i know that now," ethan groaned, cheeks dusting pink out of slight embarrassment. "i haven't been diagnosed with anything other than like.. seasonal allergies and peanuts. maybe my moral code is a little messed up because i told you last night that i'm willing to help you kill my brother if i need to," his hands moved as he fell deeper and deeper into his ramble, "so maybe? the answer is maybe."

you listened to ethan ramble intently, watching his hands move as he spoke, as he ranted his jumbled thoughts in his mind to you. and in any other circumstance, you would've found ethan bailey annoying. he talked too much, couldn't handle silence, and had a way of going back and forth on things.

but you didn't mind ethan. he was tolerable.

you liked tolerable.

"or maybe the answer isn't maybe and i need to see a therapist. because i don't particularly feel bad for trying to put my murderous sociopathic brother in jail — not as much as i probably should, by the way — so the answer might be a yes, but for the sake of my sanity the answer is still.." ethan's string of words died in his throat when he realized he had been rambling for a good minute now.

you seemed like the type to interrupt someone who was speaking far too much and far too fast in a short period of time, but you hadn't said a word.

you were listening to him. staring (albeit a little creepily; had you blinked yet?) and observing ethan as he spoke too much about an uncomfortable topic to try and get rid of the unsettling feeling in his chest.

ethan cleared his suddenly dry throat as he stared into your eyes (for someone who hated to socialize, you held eye contact a little bit too much sometimes). "the answer is still a maybe," he managed, officially finishing his ramble. offering you a tight lipped smile, he added, "i rambled."

"you did." you replied.

"i'm sorry i did."

"nothing to be sorry about. i don't mind it." you stared at him for a little longer, blinking before turning back to your laptop, failing to notice the way ethan's face turned a prettier shade of red at your nonchalance. "when richie and i are out on our date, you should look for any ids or items he may have kept from his victims."

"right." ethan focused his attention to the task at hand, ignoring the way your prior words seemed to echo in his mind. how could he be thinking so deeply about such a thing when you were acting as if it was nothing? you were just a nice person; there wasn't more behind your words. "you should try and be out with him for a good few hours just to give me time."

"a few hours with richie. sounds great." you clenched your jaw, your fingers stopping on your keyboard. but they were still thrumming on your thumb, each finger tapping your fingertip in an undisclosed rhythm. "any pointers? like anything he may like in a person that'll make him," your nose wrinkled at your words, "not want to go home?"

"he likes you as you are already." ethan paused, biting his bottom lip gently as he reevaluated his words. "actually— he likes girls who he can't really have. like sam?" he rolled his eyes as he remembered their hellshow of a relationship. "he pined after sam for like a year just because she was dating someone before they got together."

ethan avoided your gaze as he looked at your laptop screen. "you know when he listened while we pretended to have sex? how he waited," from his peripherals, he could see your expression sour with anger at his words, "until you 'orgasmed'," ethan made faux quotations with his fingers, "before he left?"

"yeah." the memory of richie's shadow under ethan's door made a sick feeling broil in your stomach. and that feeling only grew when your mind came to a horrible assumption. "you don't think richie's interest in me grew after that night.. do you?"

ethan finally looked at you, his jaw clenched in anger and protectiveness as he nodded once. and that alone made your face fall in horror.

richie partly wanted you because it meant he deemed you 'forbidden' territory. because he believed ethan was interested in you first.

you groaned, letting your upper body fall back on your bed. "your brother's disgusting," you stated, staring at your ceiling.

next to you, ethan sighed. "i know."

you stood stiffly as you stared at the black dress you wore. in any other circumstance, you would've been comfortable with how you looked. you had styled your hair and this was one of your many black dresses that fit your features well, and to top it off, you wore a heart locket necklace and had your bag over your shoulder.

but knowing what you were getting into, it was hard to stay completely confident. you had basically shoved more of your strongest emotions into the deep dark hole in your mind just to keep yourself sane, but you couldn't even deny the sickening feeling in your chest that seemed to grow with every passing minute.

you still had no idea what richie's plans were. maybe it was something boring, like a movie then dinner. or maybe a walk in the park that would eventually lead to your death.

all you knew was that he would pick you up at 7 pm. that was all richie texted you, and now it was 6:45.

15 minutes.

"hello?" ethan's voice on your phone made you snap out of your thoughts, jaw clenching as you looked at yourself one last time, making sure not a hair was out of place just to keep up the facade.

you had called him again. at this point, you were wondering if you were lacking self respect for yourself, choosing to continuously call ethan during times of high stress in your shared situation.

you really needed to stop calling first. it was getting embarrassing.

"hello." you looked at your phone, watching as ethan tried (and failed) to set up his phone on his bedside table. you had been in a call for 30 minutes now, and while most of the conversation was honestly just ethan talking and you replying with short comments, you didn't mind it too much.

"are you, uh," ethan swallowed hard, "ready? hasn't been back since work so i'm guessing he's on his way to you now."

"i'm ready to get this over with, if that's what you mean." you set your phone up on your table, thankful that anika and mindy were out on another one of their movie dates (mindy was a little too excited to watch evil dead rise), so you could speak without interruptions. you sat on your desk chair, showing the upper half of your body to ethan, who was sitting on his bed, his back laid back on his head board.

but when he saw you, dressed up and looking a little bit too nice for his shitty brother, ethan sat up. throat running dry like it always seemed to and cheeks heating up, he managed an almost shy smile as he looked at you. "you look.. nice."

"thanks." a pause. "do i not usually look nice?"

ethan's eyes widened in shock (and slight fear). "i didn't say that! i just haven't known you for that long and i've only seen you like a handful of times but i swear you always look nice! you just look especially nice tonight. for richie." his nose crinkled in disgust at the thought.

you were all dressed up for his brother. and while the entire situation had made ethan throw up almost daily and feel far too many negative emotions that he didn't know how he felt anymore, he knew one thing as he looked at you, sitting so casually as though you weren't stopping ethan's train of thought.

he was jealous. and worried. and feeling far too protective over you, someone who could definitely handle everything on your own.

you tilted your head a little as ethan ended his short ramble. "ethan, i was joking."

"oh." ethan nodded, clicking his tongue as he tried to play it cool. "right."

lightly glossed lips curled up slightly, revealing a small smile. "thank you." your hands pulled your ring off of your finger. you let it run over your knuckles; back and forth. back and forth. the heated metal (you hands were and it was only a little disgusting) moved easily over your skin as you tried to calm yourself.

9 more minutes.

"y/n," ethan said, making your eyes focus again. "be careful, okay?"

your mouth opened to protest, but ethan continued on.

"and i know you said you could handle it," he said pointedly, making you shut your mouth, "but i want you to be careful."

three loud knocks at your dorm door made you jump, hand closing over your ring and curling into a fist as your steady heart began to pound loudly in your ears.

he was here.

"i have to go." you grabbed your phone, voice lowered down as you looked at ethan one last time. and for a brief moment, he saw just how worried you were. "you know the plan. be careful." and with that, you hung up.

the door to you and mindy's shared dorm felt far away as you walked out of your bedroom, shoving your phone into your purse before opening your dorm door. richie stood outside with a single orchid in his hand, its petals pristine and white as he held it. sleazy eyes traveled down your body, as though he was silently taking in your every curve, every exposed area of skin. and not even caring to seem the least bit subtle, richie took his time traveling back up to your face, his cold eyes watching you with interest.

as though you were some unpredictable toy for him.

"you look beautiful," richie murmured, making you force a smile as you tilted your head to the side a bit. shutting the door behind you, you looked him up and down; an open button up black shirt with a white shirt inside and some black jeans. the lack of effort in his style was infuriating— why did you have to dress up but he showed up as though he robbed old navy?

"you look.. good," you managed, unable to keep your honesty at bay as you managed a tight lipped smile. your lackluster response made you want to walk back into your dorm and lock it, but richie only chuckled at your response.

"nothing else?" he asked, handing the orchid to you. "i got you another flower."

another flower. you tried to hide your disgust at the confirmation that richie really was your stalker, instead taking the orchid with a tense hand. as you took it, richie began to walk down the hall of your dorm building, ready to lead you out.

"thanks," you stated, walking next to him and reluctantly allowing him to take the lead. wary eyes watched him, taking in the way he seemed to have perfect posture, how pleased he seemed in himself, as though his mere presence was a blessing to you, and the way he was staring right back at you.

observing. watching, pupils almost dilating as he took in how perfect you looked under the fluorescent light of the hallway. richie could feel his heart pounding, adams apple bobbing as he took a moment — just a moment — to admire his date. his date. the phrase rolled off of his tongue quite nicely.

you immediately averted your eyes back to the hallway in front of you. "so," you began, ignoring the way his eyes felt on your skin, "you were pretty enigmatic about this whole date. i almost thought you'd kill me or something." the dry humored joke fell from your lips before you could stop it, and yet you kept your eyes focused on the hallway in front of you, barely a reaction on your face as blood rushed through your ears. as you both began to take the elevator downstairs, you heard richie laugh.

even his laugh sounded ingenuine.

he stood next to you, arm pressed against yours, a little too close for comfort in the empty elevator. "just wanted to keep it a surprise, that's all." richie's eyes traveled to your hand, watching as you rubbed your ring subconsciously, a lopsided smirk appearing on his face. "are you nervous for our date?" he asked.

eyes blinking, you looked up at him confusedly. "no," you said with a tilt of your head, "why do you say that?"

"because," richie said, looking down at you with a mischievous smile, as though he was always one step ahead of you. "you've been rubbing that ring of yours ever since i arrived. i'd call it a," he thought for a moment before clicking his tongue, "nervous tick." a knowing glint appeared in his eyes, and suddenly you felt a wave of sick paranoia wash over you.

you immediately stopped rubbing your ring, your head turning back to the closed elevator doors in front of you both. your distorted reflection stared back at you from the steel of the elevator doors, and it was as though you realized just how trapped you were. there was no going back from this plan.

again, you began to subconsciously rub your ring. and richie continued to watch.

#AUTHORSNOTE— i'm actually soso sorry for the long update & the cliffhanger, but thank you for reading!

#TAGLIST— @cham9ions , @netey6m , @mskitkatbubbles , @onlyangel-444 , @cyueksims , @tisthedamnseason69 , @helpimgoinginsanehaha , @anthemabby , @clemenscove , @vanillawhale , @lanascinnamongirll , @rhaenyra4ever , @shebreathedherlast , @datingspiderman , @marurubahbah , @taetae123094 , @kn1n3 , @nox222 , @ch9mpi0n , @ooyuhgetitig4

[zbeez-outlet]

This is my (unasked for) review and critique of Netflix’s live-action adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender. I’m not expecting much of a response, I just have so much to say and no one to talk about it with. I’m putting it here so it doesn’t fester in my brain and it’s my blog, I can talk about whatever I want.

I am going to divide it into two major sections, the first being a review of the show as a stand alone, the second being a comparison to the source material. Each section will have smaller headers so I can stay on topic and organized, I’m going to try really hard not to obnoxiously rant or flood my review with unsupported opinions. I have a lot to say, but I want to make sure I articulate myself well and don’t fall into venting without reason. If you see me doing that, please let me know.

I want it to be made clear now that these are my thoughts on the show, I’m not forcing anyone to think the same as I do or insulting anyone for having different views than me. I also want people to know that this is an extensive detailed review, I’m going to be covering a lot of very broad and very narrow topics. I’m not trying to nitpick inconsequential details, this review is supposed to focus on important and fundemental aspects of the show. I will be harsh, but I’m going to try not to be unreasonable.

This is going to be extremely long. If you’re not interested in reading it all, I completely understand and I’m going to include my initial rating and a summary of why I gave it that rating here.

My overall rating of the show: 4/10

Review Summary: While the visual effects and environments were for the most part really great, the quality of writing fell behind drastically in comparison. There were major issues with characterization, consistency, and plot development that will pose a challenge in future seasons. The dialogue was often dry and overly expository, it allowed no room for nuance, subtlety, or complexity because they’re constantly telling us what everyone is doing, thinking, and feeling. The acting was mostly subpar, but I think that was because the writing suffered so greatly rather than through major lack of talent or skill from the actors. The pacing was abysmal, 8 episodes was never going to be enough time to tell this story. For me, it has a very surface level amount of entertainment but as soon as you try to look a little closer, try to answer questions or search for any depth, the quality drops entirely.

Extensive in depth review below. Because I’m not watching the show as I’m writing this, please let me know if I’m misremembering any major details so that I can correct myself if/when needed.

Sorry in advance for how obnoxiously long this is, I tried to give clear headers so you can bounce around any specific topics that interest you.

NETFLIX ATLA as a Stand Alone Show

In this section, I will not be making any comparisons or references to previous Avatar content. I will do my best to strictly speak on what Netflix gave us and its quality in different categories.

Costumes/Makeup

Overall, I thought the design of the costumes and styling was really solid. They felt really unique and representative of the different cultures, which is always appreciated. There was an issue for me though that took me out of the show sometimes. Nothing looked lived in. There was no dirt, stains, wrinkles, or wear and tear of any kind and the colors were so bright. The actors sometimes looked like they were doing a theater play or dressing up for Halloween, not living in a struggling world at war. Overall, costuming and makeup was really good, just throw some dirt on there!

Yue’s wig was terrible, I think we can all agree.

I do have a gripe with Zuko’s design though. His scar looks like a bruise or an eye infection, not a gruesome burn scar. I know I’m not the first person to say this, and I’ll keep saying it until they listen. It needs texture, it needs to be larger, and for the love of god shave his eyebrow.

Environments and Locations

I thought the locations looked great, especially the artful cgi on the wide shots of places like the Southern Air Temple, the Fire Nation and their ships, and Omashu. Good cinematography and just really well done work as a whole. There’s a few times when the backgrounds during scenes looked more like stage sets than lived in cities or villages, but it was rarely anything so drastic it harmed the show for me. I really liked the amount of background clutter and knickknacks that helped with realism and there was always a lot of people that helped these places feel populated. Zuko’s room on his ship especially was so cool, it told so much of his story without ever needing explanation. Having a collection of avatar artifacts and plastering his walls with drawings, research, theories, maps, and plans was genius. I loved that they included animals, once again it helps with immersion and realism, and it would be really easy to just not include them for simplicity sake. Especially the funky animal hybrids, I hope to see more going forward! The use of ice, wood, furs, and bone for the Southern Water Tribe was so good. The massive rib cage for the community hut in the tribe was fantastic. I could go on for a long time. For me, the settings were probably the best part of the season.

Bending Graphics

The strongest elements of bending visually were air and fire. They really captured the movements of each, the fluidity and speed of air bending, and the aggression and passion of fire bending. Earth bending looked okay, the actors did a pretty good job of making it look heavy, but overall it felt like it was moving too slowly to me. I think the scene at the beginning of the first episode was the best example of earth bending. The fight with Bumi was very underwhelming for me.

Water bending looked terrible almost the whole time. The way the water physically looked was pretty good, but there was absolutely no weight behind it. Every time Katara hit someone with water, it splashed with the force of a Nerf water gun. The movements were slow, clunky, and so nonthreatening I probably wouldn’t have tried to dodge a single one of her attacks. Her battle with Pakku was one of the most boring battles I’ve ever seen. There was no haste or desperation in either participant. I’m hoping they’ll figure out how to do this better in the future. The ice was decent though.

As a whole, the fight choreography looked pretty good. Certainly moves I could never do. There were times when characters were completely cgi to account for difficult or impossible moves and it was really obvious. Aang in particular looked very wonky when he was fully cgi during his Avatar State moments or when he was flying around like his introduction scene. So passable but definitely room for improvement, I think the artists who work on these aspects of shows and films are very impressive.

Dialogue

The dialogue is 80% exposition, 19% repetitive conversations about responsibility and duty, and 1% misplaced poorly written humor. It’s unnatural, it’s dry, it doesn’t allow for any nuance, and there’s no room for character growth or connection when they have to waste all their words on making sure the plot is on track.

When the introduction of your main character is him looking directly into the camera and telling us the kind of person he is, there’s a dialogue problem. When so much happens off screen that you have to have characters talk to fill in plot holes because there’s just not enough time to tell the story, there’s a dialogue problem. When you put intentional pauses around bad jokes for people to laugh, there’s a dialogue problem. When characters have to say over and over that they’re family but they don’t feel like family in the slightest, there’s a dialogue and characterization problem. I’m not going to script the bad examples, I don’t have the time or patience for that, but I was very unimpressed. It felt like the first draft of a script to me.

And I dare anyone, of legal drinking age of course, to take a shot every time a character says the words responsibility or duty. I swear the floor and ceiling will switch before you reach episode 3. If characters have to keep shoving their responsibilities down our throats without actually doing anything to solve them, there’s a dialogue, characterization, and plot problem.

Also one of my biggest pet peeves with a series is when the first episode or movie ends with a line like “It’s only the beginning” and then plays crazily dramatic music. But that’s a personal preference, not an actual issue.

Acting

First and foremost, I have nothing against any of these actors. I’m sure they’re perfectly wonderful people and they deserve opportunities to prove themselves. My goal here is not to shame or insult or belittle any actor on this show. That being said, none of their performances were perfect and I do have critiques. This is not meant to be a personal attack on any of them or on anyone who enjoyed their performances.

I think the dialogue and overall writing really worked against the potential these actors had. I don’t know how involved the director was in the filming process or helping them with their performances, but there were definitely some failures here.

The strongest performances to me were Sokka, Iroh, Lieutenant Jee, and the Earth bender that threatened Iroh when he was captured (I couldn’t find his name, but he had an unprecedentedly good performance). By far the best was Jee, I felt his emotion more than any other character on the show and would love to see a lot more of him. Sokka balanced well enough with what he was given, but he also had the most character opportunity (which I’ll get into in the next section). Iroh I think filled the mentor roll pretty well, the writing for him leaned a little to close to fortune cookie, but he did feel wise and powerful when he needed to be, mostly. For a comedian though, his humor fell really flat to me, I wish they had given Paul Sun-Hyung Lee some freedom to improv, I think he would’ve done a good job if he could play with the character.

Katara and Azula were awful (so was Mai, but she didn’t get a lot of screen time so I’m not going to focus on her). Katara was so dull and emotionless for the majority of her role, her delivery felt so unnatural. Again, I think the writing was an obstacle, but I felt no connection from Katara at all. And certainly not between her and any of the other characters, which is a major problem for one of the main cast. Her and Sokka felt like strangers half the time, like they were getting to know each other as much as we were getting to know them. I swear Azula’s actress was reading off a teleprompter the entire time, she was somehow robotic and overacted at the same time (I’m sorry, I know that’s harsh, but she just isn’t a good actress, at least not in this).

Zuko had some really solid moments, his scenes with Iroh in particular were great, but overall I didn’t love him. A lot of people seem to be upset at his “tantrums” but honestly I think they fit the character well, though there was one or two too many. He’s an extremely troubled teenager estranged from his family and home, tantrums make sense. Again, I think the dialogue really got in the way of his potential and I don’t think he pushed his acting range enough. Almost every actor needed to show more emotion in one way or another.

Aang has some of the best moments and some of the worst. I have a lot of respect for young child actors, especially ones taking on the challenge of such a massive beloved character or franchise. It’s a lot of pressure for someone still growing up and learning how to be his own person. He handled the few childlike moments Aang was given so so well, he has the brightest little smile and playful attitude. The disconnect came with his more serious moments, he’d get these long monologues and, like Azula, sometimes seemed like he was reading off a teleprompter. I do think it’s a character he’ll grow into really nicely though as long as the writing lends itself to that.

It’s very important to remember that the director signs off on everything. Every performance, every scene, every script (that is also signed off by the lead writer). If something is off, it is not strictly the actors’ faults and should never be treated as such. Do the actors need more experience? Sure, but they more importantly need better direction, scripts, and support from the crew than what they’ve gotten. I’ve seen interviews with the main cast and they all seem wonderful with a lot of potential, particularly the actor for Aang, so clearly the director and lead writer are the ones that are slacking.

Characterization (of the main cast)

Aang

He goes through no change or character development from the beginning to the end of this season.

His water bending training hasn’t even started and he has no further control of the avatar state, so power wise he’s remained completely stagnant.

He constantly says how important Sokka and Katara are, because they’re his “friends”, but there’s been no bonding or development of their relationships. If they didn’t tell us so often, I wouldn’t even think they knew each other beyond first day of school ice breakers.

His most profound moment was his conversation with Gyatso in the spirit world, which I actually really liked. I think he really needed support from someone who knew him before. The home being deserted when Aang goes back to see him definitely hurt.

It feels like this show really really wants us to hate this 12 year old boy. Every adult or authority figure is constantly yelling or berating Aang for something he didn’t even do, it was an accident he didn’t come home and got frozen in ice. Especially from the avatar spirits who should know for a fact he didn’t purposefully run from his responsibilities. The tone is all off and I’m not sure the writers understand what they wrote.

Aang’s biggest mental hurdle will continue to be his guilt for disappearing, which he didn’t even do on purpose so the guilt is unjustified, at least the amount others are thrusting on him.

He looks confident at the end of the season, but I don’t buy it because he hasn’t earned it, there was nothing that he did or said that showed why he would feel so confident when he hasn’t learned anything and he hasn’t proven himself capable beyond getting possessed by the right spirits.

His reaction and aftermath to the death of his entire culture was very underwhelming. His grief sent him into the Avatar state and then he mutters a bland apology and the others are mad at him for falling apart when he’s literally lost everything and everyone he’s ever known. It’s something that needs to be handled far more delicately and it’s not.

As the titular character, it kinda sucks how sidelined his character development has been.

Sokka

If I had no knowledge of this series going into it, I might assume Sokka is the main character because he has the most developmental moments in the season and is easily the most well written character.

Physically handing over the protection of his tribe, while small, was a profound moment for him because he was not only going against his father’s orders, it was the first step to realizing he could be something more than a fishing boy from the south. Which is pretty much his whole emotional arc.

With Suki, he was able to prove himself as someone willing to learn and better himself as a warrior. He learned too fast considering it felt like they were only there for a day maybe, but they were on a time crunch with pacing.

In Omashu, Sokka found that his hobby for invention shows he has a talent for engineering and being a tactician. These are pretty important traits that make him a well rounded character.

By the end of the season, he’s gone through pretty profound loss and change to become the beginnings of a leader.

He was kind of supposed to be comic relief as well, but honestly to me it was done as a sloppy afterthought and almost none of the humor landed. Not just with him, but with most comedic moments.

Katara

I’m sorry, I’m about to rip this poor girl to shreds, the writing for her was awful.

She has absolutely no personality beyond the thousand yard stare she gets every time her mom comes up. Every emotion she has is weak and downplayed by exposition, she’s mostly passive and has almost no effect on the characters around her (besides Jet sort of? And I guess Pokku during the most boring fight of the show).

She adds almost nothing to the team besides being a water bender. It’s literally her only characteristic beyond dead mother.

Speaking of water bending, she did absolutely nothing to earn the title of master and no one can convince me otherwise.

She learned six moves from a scroll, trained off screen so we have to take her word for it, made one move that she copied from another bender, and never once had a single second of instruction from an actual master. Getting that title when she’s done nothing to earn it is crazy.

Teaching herself with no support or guidance is not empowering like the writers seem to think it is. It’s just lazy and so unrealistic it’s laughable. She doesn’t have any of the training necessary to be considered a master.

Also I just really dislike how every obstacle for her to be a better water bender is a mental one, first with Aang and then with Jet. Like yes, clearly emotional state matters, but it’s still a physical discipline that requires technique and training of which she’s had none of besides pictures in the scroll.

The fact she was so dismissive and disrespectful of healing bothers me too when it’s a very valuable practice. She didn’t stay for that training either, so how is she going to use the oasis water in the future? Oh wait, Katara’s “a natural” which is just so infuriating because she’s barely struggled to learn a thing the whole season. As soon as she’s in a good mood, her bending works just fine. That’s not how learning or mastering a discipline should work.

Sorry, I know I’m getting into ranting, I’m backing off. It’s just such poor character work for someone so important to the story.

Zuko

Episode 6, “Masks”, was by far the best episode and largely because of Zuko’s character work. Outside of that episode, he’s pretty consistently narrow minded and angry which doesn’t offer him a lot of depth. But it’s all packed into “Masks”.

I loved that the 41st division was his crew as it was physical proof of his sacrifice and compassion for life. Obviously his scar is also proof, but seeing the people he saved alive hits different. And the fact that he didn’t try to take any credit is very modest and honorable for him.

However, I wish he had chosen to make the 41st his crew rather than it being forced on him as an additional punishment to his banishment. I think if he had made that choice, it would have showed even stronger resolve.

His moment with Aang in the shed after rescuing him as the Blue Spirit was very well done and showed how hard it’s going to be for him to overcome his father’s influence.

Lu Ten’s funeral was a wonderful moment meant to build on Zuko’s relationship with Uncle Iroh, it was quite beautiful.

Unfortunately, outside of the moments I mentioned, there wasn’t much other opportunity for character growth because it had to be so exposition heavy.

Although he did choose to go after his Uncle instead of the Avatar in Omashu and that’s an important value in family that Zuko has.

I do appreciate that they cemented his ideals around honest and honorable glory, but it did get a little preachy and repetitive.

I think overall he has a lot of potential for growth in future seasons.

Pacing

Whoever thought 8 episodes was enough to tell this story is extremely delusional. Having more minutes does not equal having more time, 8 episodes offers no wiggle room for such an expansive story no matter how long they are. I’m so sick of production companies thinking it’s okay to so heavily compress storytelling, let your characters breathe and give them some time to develop. It’s one thing when it’s something like Queen’s Gambit (which is fantastic, if you haven’t watched it you should!) that only focuses on one person vs Avatar which is balancing four or five main characters, extensive world building, and complicated plots. It’s something that needs time, but is instead rushed so drastically there’s barely any time to comprehend one conflict or character before another one is expositing in your face. Netflix is one of the biggest offenders of this, but HBO does the same. The Last of Us could have used an extra episode or two for Joel and Ellie’s relationship to solidify more (I’m not going to get into TLOU though, so please don’t come for me for this opinion, it’s not the focus and if you want a more extensive review of that, let me know). It feels like writers think characterization and development just happens and they don’t have to take the time to actually write it in.

With 2-4 more episodes, they could have had the time to really explore the things they needed to without overloading on exposition. Ask yourself how much time did you feel like passed between episode one and eight? Did it feel like the few months it was supposed to be? To me it felt like maybe two-three weeks, and that’s not the fault of watching it so quickly. There’s never any indication of how much time passes, which is its own issue, but also ultimately confuses audiences if they have to guess.

Every interaction and conflict is rushed, why are these writers so scared to take their time? If Netflix isn’t offering more episodes, then you need to adjust your writing to compensate, not condense everything like a sardine can and then act surprised when it’s a structural problem. It’s a fundamental issue that affected the entire potential of the show.

Plot

Aang should have, at the very least, started mastering water bending. It’s stated several times in the season that he needs to in order to fully become the avatar and be powerful enough to end the war. That is the overarching plot that is integral to the story. And yet he doesn’t bend a single drop of water the entire show until he’s forced to after being possessed by the vengeful ocean spirit (and when Kyoshi also possesses him, but again that wasn’t him, that was the avatar state). Because of the time skips that’ll have to happen between seasons, he’ll probably do most, if not all, of his water bending training off screen. Which is, say it with me, bad writing!

They kept hinting at the comet but never outright said what it would do or when it would arrive. Not giving any kind of timeline for the biggest conflict of the show is really worrisome for their future plans. I understand they have to allow a certain amount of time flexibility to account for the younger actors aging, especially Aang, which I completely understand and respect. That’s why time skips will happen. But to not give any kind of timeline shows really poor planning.

Also, please tell me if I’m misremembering or if I somehow missed it during my watch through, but I’m pretty sure Team Avatar still doesn’t even know about the comet, what it means, or when it’s coming. That’s a pretty big thing to overlook when it’s the catalyst for the Fire Nation’s power.

The fact that the show kicked off with the genocide of the Airbenders, who are all conveniently in the same spot, and Aang just happened to escape it because he essentially went for a walk to clear his head and got caught in a storm that came out of no where is way too coincidental for believable circumstances. It’s, louder for those in the back, bad writing!

They had four years to plan this all out, I don’t understand why it all seems so unfinished and thrown together with pieces from different jigsaw puzzles!

Comparisons to Source Material

In this section, I will be comparing the Netflix adaptation of ATLA to the original animated series. This will be about things that stuck out most to me as consistencies, changes, and valuable moments in each rendition of the story.

Consistencies

Writing-wise, obviously they got a lot of the big plot points down, and I’m not going to list them all. If you’ve watched both, you know what they are. Pretty much the essentials…sort of. The great divide even got a shoutout which I thought was funny.

I mentioned above how “Masks” was by far the best episode of the Netflix season, well it’s not a coincidence that it also has the most parallels and consistencies with the episodes it was based on (“Storm” and “Blue Spirit” which are also arguably the best episodes of Book One). I was going to be so mad if they took away the Blue Spirit part of Zuko’s character, but clearly it’s a fan favorite and for the most part I think they did it justice.

I loved that they kept in a lot of the hybrid animals, at least in dialogue if we didn’t actually get to see them. It would have been a really easy thing to just get rid of for simplicity sake. I hope we get to see some more CGI versions of these animals because the ostrich horse looked really good. Momo and Appa for the most part looked good, sometimes a little wonky but nothing crazy, I just wish they had more screen time. They don’t feel like characters yet, just a pet and a vehicle (essentially).

I was really pleasantly surprised to see Hei Bai, I was honestly expecting them to scrap him. He looked really cool too. I do wish we could have seen him turn back into a panda when Aang helped him, but overall I’m just glad we got him at all.

I didn’t love what they used him for, but Kho was visually amazing and everything I hoped for. Absolutely terrifying, will haunt my nightmares again.

June was also a pleasant surprise, I hadn’t looked too deep into the cast list and wasn’t sure if she’d be included. I did think it was a little weird she was flirting with Iroh vs the other way around (like what was the point of that? just take out the flirting entirely if you’re going to be weird about it) but overall she’s pretty much one to one the same and I still liked her a lot. Nala should have been a little more anteater/mole-like instead of wolfish but overall not bad at all.

We got the Cabbage Man. They teased him a little a first, but we got him.

My Favorite Moments from the Netflix Version that Change or Expand on the Original

I sang its praises above, but again Lu Ten’s funeral scene was just so beautiful and really built on Iroh’s fatherly affection for Zuko. I know it’s mostly a replacement for the leaves from the vine scene in “Tales of Ba Sing Se” because they’re never going to be able to fit in that episode. So it’s nice that they deemed it a moment worth capturing in a different way.

I’m not going to reiterate exactly what I said above so go see Zuko’s characterization again if you need to, but making the 41st division his crew members was a constructive choice that I liked a lot.

I don’t know why but just the idea of Gyatso sticking around in the spirit world to be able to speak to Aang one last time hit me so hard. I absolutely loved it as an addition to building their relationship. Aang always deserved a goodbye, and even though this wasn’t exactly that, it was what Aang needed to cope with his immense loss and the pressure he was under.

When Iroh was arrested by the guards of Omashu and being taken to the pit, he had a really intense but moving interaction with one of the earth bending soldiers. I think it was such a good way to portray war and perspectives from both sides. The soldier rightfully and angrily blamed Iroh for his brother who died at the siege of Ba Sing Se, which Iroh was responsible for. He accused Iroh of being evil, of having never gone through loss, which we as viewers know isn’t true, but he doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t defend himself. Doesn’t reveal his own loss to get even. He takes the abuse and the blame and just utters that enough people have been hurt. Great performances all around, really solid writing. I wish more of the show had followed this example.

That lady hitting Zuko with a brush to stop him from attacking Aang, a child, in Omashu’s marketplace. That was one of the funniest scenes in the whole show. Bring her back!

“Everything I need is on this boat.” - ‘nuff said.

Major Character Differences (I’ll try to keep this concise)

Aang

He lost the majority of his lightheartedness which made him so lovable in the first place. He does a lot of monologues and speeches to intense music now. He’s still 12 guys, let him swim with giant elephant koi and dress up as Pippinpaddleopsicopolis the Third to get into Omashu!

I really don’t like that they changed him actively running from his title and responsibilities to just going for a jaunt with Appa to clear his head. That removes so much depth, guilt, and fear that he should have. In the original, it was his choice to run away with the intention of hiding and never coming back, in the Netflix version, it was an accident he never came home. That’s a massive character change.

People called him a coward, but he literally isn’t when it was a very coincidental accident that forced him into the ice in the first place rather than his choice to actively run from his destiny. He’s yelled at and screamed at and insulted constantly, even by people who are meant to help him, when he didn’t even do what they’re accusing him of. He didn’t deliberately run away, he accidentally got caught in a storm. And he just takes all of that guilt and blame and anger from everyone when he genuinely did nothing wrong.

Getting rid of his crush on Katara is a problem, but I’ll get into that more later.

I don’t care why they think they did it, but making Aang agree with Pakku in any respect about not letting Katara train or fight was so extremely disrespectful to both characters.

His reaction to losing his people was way underdeveloped, they gave him no time to grieve. And the fact that Katara doesn’t help him out of his initial Avatar State spiral is so damaging to the friendship they’re supposed to have. Their friendship always came first, let them interact and build that relationship!

Sokka

His small sexism arc that everyone is up in arms about. Do I think it should have been included? Yes. Is it the end all be all of his character? No, like I mentioned above, he got the most character moments in the show. But it was really important in its own way. I saw someone say, “Sokka may not be misogynistic, but Netflix’s ATLA adaptation certainly is.” And they’re right.

What I really didn’t like was what they did with his relationship with his father and ice dodging. Sokka had a great relationship with Hakoda built on trust, mutual admiration, similar tactical mindsets, and strength of character. He passed his ice dodging test with Bato with flying colors. There’s no reason to completely flip those dynamics, there’s already enough other conflicts to explore without giving Sokka daddy issues he didn’t have in the first place. Whoever made that choice was projecting hard.

Hakoda eventually trusts Sokka to lead the invasion in Book 3, but none of that exists here and it doesn’t feel like there’s a path yet to lead to that. (I have a lot to say about the invasion later)

They have Sokka take over a very paternal role with Katara instead of her being maternal, and he is constantly very overbearing, patronizing, and talking down to her as if she has no (or does not deserve a) mind or agency of her own. They (as in the writers) are acting like the age difference between them is 10 years instead of 1-2 years.

Also taking out the very important moment when Sokka was the one who saved an entire Fire Nation village from Jet was just wrong. Not only was it an important stepping stone towards leadership and diplomacy for Sokka, but it also showed that even on the “bad side” of the war, there are innocent people who deserve protecting.

Sokka wasn’t nearly as funny as he should have been.

Katara

Everything about her was wrong, scrap it and try again.

She had none of the passion she should have had. Katara gets mad, she yells and insults and waves her arms around to make her point. She gets jealous and petty. But she’s also so unbelievably kind and caring, she’s the only reason any of them take proper care of themselves. She’s lighthearted and fun when she can be, she plays and laughs and cares so incredibly deeply.

Katara inspires people in a way none of the other characters can, although Aang does learn a lot from her in that regard. She’s incredibly hardworking, loyal, and dedicated to those she loves. And yes, she feels immense pain and sadness for her mother, but that’s not all she is.

LA Katara felt like a hollow shell 90% of the time used for exposition, 5% mom trauma, and 5% sort of emotional. The writing just didn’t lend itself to complexity, flaws, or character depth.

She’s one of the first well written and well rounded female characters a lot of us encountered as kids and they stripped her of everything that made her who she is. Someone for young girls to look up to. It’s shameful.

For some reason they made her explicitly and directly responsible for her mother’s death, which is a very strange and damaging change to make that I don’t think they totally understand the difference of from the original.

They took away all of her maternal behavior, which just tells us what they think of maternal behavior, that it’s a weak trait for a leading character and not worth exploring in a person that had to take that role in her family and village as a whole at such a young age. It’s like the writers thought that Katara being motherly was problematic and sexist, which is a mindset that is itself problematic and sexist.

They’ve essentially turned bending into a magic that relies solely on emotional and mental stability instead of a martial arts form requiring discipline and training. I don’t even think the writers realize they’ve done this, which in and of itself is a massive issue.

Although I will say the water whip on the flaming arrow was a good use of water bending, it just didn’t feel earned to me.

For as much as they focused on her mom, they never once brought up Katara’s necklace?? They took out Pokku’s connection to Gran Gran and never mentioned anything about betrothal necklaces. There’s just so many changes they made, large and small, that feel pointless or contradictory to the source material for no reason.

Zuko

Frankly, so early into Zuko’s character arc, there isn’t a lot of difference here. Most of his development starts in Book 2. I do like the animated version a lot better, though. I am biased, but I also think that even though they hit on almost all the same points, the original just handled it with far more nuance, care, and time. With the Netflix version being so rushed, any payoffs we had just didn’t feel totally earned.

I do think it was a big shame that they had Iroh kill Zhao instead of allowing Zuko’s attempt to save him from the ocean spirit. It’s a pretty important character moment that shows how Zuko wants to help people, save people, if he can regardless of how they’ve treated him. They can make this point again if they do “Zuko Alone”, but I’m honestly really scared they’ll cut it.

Having Zuko fight back during the Agni Kai against his father in the flash back was way out of character and takes away from the severity of the punishment and the trauma of the abuse. He was a 13 year old child terrified of not just disappointing his father, but of suffering harm from the one person he should trust most. And Ozai convinces him he deserves it, so there’s no world where he would have fought back in that scene. And it changes the meaning from a father violently burning a child that has surrendered and begs for forgiveness to a soldier winning a one-on-one battle against another soldier and branding his victory, no matter how dishonorable it is.

Also, at this point, Zuko is an amateur fire bender with barely any experience or progress in his training. Him getting the high ground over Ozai for even a second is ridiculous and diminishes Ozai’s skill level. It could be argued Ozai did it on purpose to give Zuko an opportunity to prove himself as ruthless as Ozai wants him to be, but that completely goes against the precedent set by Ozai that he hates being questioned or otherwise made to look weak in front of anyone. I think I understand what they were going for, but honestly it came off as an opportunity to show off the actor’s fighting skills rather than holding the weight it should for the story.

I DO like that Zuko has a war journal (*diary*) about the avatar, history, and essentially a map of his journey. I DON’T like that Team Avatar uses it as an expository tool and excuse to not properly explore the world and learn things for themselves or through other people.

I don’t think Zuko said the word “honor” once, but please correct me if I’m wrong.

Iroh

Similar to Zuko, they hit a lot of the same surface level points with a few misses here and there.

They didn’t show us Iroh’s connection to the spirit world, they just told us right before the battle at the North Pole and we’re supposed to believe it, which we do because we’ve seen the original, but that was kind of lame. (Not including Roku’s dragon was also lame, but I digress).

They expanded on his past in a few different ways which I did like a lot and mentioned above.

The Netflix version comes off more preachy and gimmicky to me than wise, which is disappointing. I think the actor could have done amazingly with the right script.

They didn’t show him redirecting lightning, which is arguably one of the most valuable skills in the entire show and extremely important for the finale for both Aang and Zuko.

And just like Sokka, he was not nearly funny enough.

Bumi

His characterization was all backwards and wrong and I hated it.

Visually, his makeup and design was pretty good, but that’s the extent of any positives with the Netflix version.

Bumi would absolutely never ever ever have made a joke about the genocide that took Aang’s entire people. That was disgusting and disrespectful to Bumi and Aang.

He was never mad at Aang for disappearing, he was actually extremely understanding and only hoping to teach Aang further about his duties as the avatar. He quite literally welcomed him back with open arms.

The way he treated others, especially his servants, was appalling and borderline cruel.

He never stepped down from protecting his people or became complacent in a way that put them in danger, Omashu was thriving beautifully under his care. When he surrendered to the Fire Nation in Book 2, it was the best way to protect his people without bloodshed and he knew he’d eventually get their home back. He was literally waiting for the Solar Eclipse to do it (which I’ll touch more on later).

This also means that by having Bumi actively fight and lose, instead of surrendering with neutral jing, he won’t be able to realistically give Aang the advice that is supposed to lead him to Toph. Wait and Listen.

I did appreciate the lesson he was trying to convey to Aang about the difficult choices that wartime forces on us, especially leadership (like who gets what food or medicine), but they did it all wrong.

Shame on the writers for what they did to Bumi’s character, I could write an entire essay on everything they screwed up just with Bumi.

Suki

They made her into a lovesick day dreamer instead of the strong warrior and leader she was meant to be. She’s going to go off to war, don’t diminish her strength. Her being a fighter should be the forefront of her character, not a lonely girl pining for a boy and dreaming about the big world.

Her and Sokka’s relationship should have been built up over time, their kiss was so misplaced. When not much time passes before Sokka falls for Yue, it makes him seem like a player.

And that moment Suki’s staring at him shirtless is cringy and yucky, they’re teenagers. Don’t do that.

We’ll see how she is when she shows up again…I actually liked the actress quite a bit, but her writing wasn’t good. That seems to be a theme here though.

I do wish her hair was still auburn instead of black, that’s personal preference though.

Gyatso

They did him so dirty with his death, it was anticlimactic with none of the power or savagery that was implied in the original. His skeleton was literally surrounded by dead Fire Nation soldiers, I wanted to see that dangerous potential on screen and am very disappointed not to get it given how explicitly they wanted to show the genocide of the airbenders.

Jet

Jet’s vendetta is specifically against the Fire Nation. On some level I do believe he would resort to violence against a traitor giving the Fire Nation information, but I don’t think he ever would have put Tao or other innocent (non-Fire Nation) bystanders at such great risk. Maybe that’s splitting hairs though since in the original he was prepared to drown an entire village, of Fire Nation people specifically, as a whole he felt pretty consistent.

I just don’t like Netflix smashing so many plots and characters together, they deserve room to breathe in their own stories.

I hate that he was the catalyst for Katara’s bending training though, instead of her own hard work and practice or training with actual masters. Jet knows nothing about bending or how it works. It’s another instance of stripping Katara of her skill and work ethic.

Yue

As a personal preference, I hate that they made Yue a water bender. She has part of the spirit of the moon in her, so logically I understand where they’re coming from giving her those abilities. But she’s not a water bender! The spirit was working to keep her alive, not to give her powers she shouldn’t have had in the first place.

She’s a princess dedicated to her people and wanting to learn how to lead but also buckling under the pressure of expectations, particularly around her arranged marriage. I saw none of that in the Netflix adaptation, except that she likes to make desserts when she’s stressed, so there’s that I guess. It’s just still missing the depth, but again they don’t have time to really explore these topics.

They make a point with Pokku about the role of women in the Northern Water Tribe and yet somehow Yue is allowed to just call off her arranged marriage. That’s a pretty distinct cultural contradiction. It just shows me the writers don’t know how to portray misogyny as a narrative tool or how to do consistent world building.

Her wig looked awful.

They should have used what happened to Momo (which ouch, that wasn’t necessary) as an opportunity for Katara to prove that she knows how to heal, because she hasn’t done it yet and she’s supposed to bring Aang back from the dead in Book 2.

Azula

I appreciated her introduction scene where she exposes a coup against her father while undercover. It was a little cheesy with her reveal, but it does establish her character decently well early on. And the cover she chose, dead brother and mother, is really interesting narratively.

The writers for Netflix went off about how they didn’t want to portray sexism, through Sokka specifically, but then they stripped the main female leads of most of their agency (Katara, Suki, and Azula all fit this category, I’m worried what they’ll do to Toph).

Azula has almost none of the arrogance that she should have, certainly none of the calm calculated intensity that made her so fearsome and intimidating. Azula should be scary, and she’s definitely not here. She just came off as such a brat with a twitchy face and prone to tantrums.

Her fire isn’t blue, that bothers me a lot. Blue fire is hotter than red fire, it’s supposed to be an indication of not only her fire bending strength but also her temperament. Plus it’s supposed to help us differentiate between their powers when she’s fighting Zuko.

Lightning bending requires so much skill, precision, power, and focus. I don’t believe for a second Netflix’s Azula should actually be able to do it. She was only able to do it because she was mad, and that’s not how it’s supposed to work.

She definitely didn’t earn being able to overpower Bumi and takeover Omashu. Although granted it feels like they nerfed a lot of Bumi’s power, he certainly doesn’t feel like one of the most powerful earth benders in the world.

Ozai had originally sent her out to collect Zuko and Iroh, not to lead an army in a battle against one of the greatest (or what should be one of the greatest) strongholds in the Earth Kingdom. It’s unrealistic and silly. And it’s not like Bumi gave up like he did in the original, he literally said “We’ll be ready to fight” when he revealed that the Fire Nation was headed their way.

Ozai treating her like a nuisance is also way out of character. He’s supposed to feed into her ego and inflating all of her more dangerous traits because he sees them as powerful and necessary for the future leader he expects Azula to be. Zuko should be the disappointing son with no faith or support from Ozai, and Azula the gifted prodigy given every opportunity and surpassing Zuko in Ozai’s eyes. As Zuko said, “He used to say Azula was born lucky, I was lucky to be born.” Somehow that dynamic has almost completely switched and Azula suffered the most from it.

She’s very miscast, the actress was awful. I’m sorry, but not sorry enough not to say it.

Ozai

Ozai should despise Zuko, he’s far more terrifying that way. It’s way more compelling watching a son that’s been so manipulated by his traumas try to win the affections of his father that don’t even exist than the same daddy issues we see in almost every movie or show where the son is trying to live up to his father’s expectations unhappily. Ozai should have no expectations for Zuko, that’s the difference. He sent Zuko on a mission he wouldn’t come back from on purpose, to get rid of him.

That’s terrifying, how disconnected he can be from his son. Trying to make Ozai more human or sympathetic by making him care for Zuko takes away from the monster he’s supposed to be as a villain. They’re not making him more complex, they’re making him more generic.

I just kind of generally don’t like that they’ve revealed so much about him and Azula in Book 1 because part of the well written structure of avatar is that the “villains” escalate from season to season, going from Zuko to Azula to Ozai as the main antagonists. I’d rather they had kept that structure and given more time to better plot and character development.

Plus revealing him so early took away a lot of his intimidation factor for me. Mystery and intrigue is good you guys! You don’t always have to lay all your cards on the table right away.

And at the end when Ozai more or less says that the attack on the Northern Water Tribe was a distraction to take Omashu makes zero sense to me. Not only is it an arbitrary copy of what Sozin said in the beginning about attacking the Earth Kingdom as a distraction for killing all of the air benders (which is also stupid), but thematically and structurally it doesn’t make any sense. The timeline doesn’t add up at all, not that they gave us any indications of timeline. And at this point in the war, the different nations, tribes, and kingdoms are so segregated that the Water Tribe probably wouldn’t have gone to help Omashu in the first place, certainly not in time.

Also I refuse to ignore the blatant contradiction they put in Zuko’s scar story. Zuko is punished extremely severely for INDIRECTLY insulting Ozai, when he’d literally been asked what he thought of the war plans, but when Iroh DIRECTLY questioned Ozai in front of the entire court and spectators (interrupting the Agni Kai, a sacred type of battle in the Fire Nation), there’s no punishment at all. I really don’t understand what the writers are doing with the amount of contradictions.

Roku

Botched, I hated what they did to Roku.

Trying to make him funny? That, right away, ruined his character entirely. I won’t ever be able to take him seriously. He would never make jokes when Aang is desperately looking for guidance and understanding. He’s not a funny silly character, it’s like the writers forgot to add in some levity and chose literally the worst character to force humor onto.

Roku is one of the coolest and wisest characters in the series with some of the most badass scenes and they took away all of them. The future of his portrayal does not look bright.

Kyoshi

Now, I love Kyoshi as much as the next person, but she got way too much screen time.

Not only did they give Roku’s badass possession moment in the Fire Nation Temple to her for absolutely no reason on Kyoshi Island, but they made her the leading influence of Aang’s spiritual journey (he’s constantly trying to reconcile with the advice she gave him) which makes zero sense.

The hundred year war is the consequence of Roku’s legacy and mistakes, it has literally nothing to do with Kyoshi. Roku should be the one mentoring Aang spiritually and guiding him through the remnants of his choices as the Avatar.

Giving her weird future vision for the attack on the North Pole was really weird and made no sense to me, and completely shifted Aang’s motivations from learning water bending (which he never does even once) to warning the Northern Water Tribe, which they end up not even needing him to do because they’re already prepared to fight. Just a convoluted mess narratively.

She isn’t supposed to be that agro of a character, she’s pragmatic and diplomatic. They based her off the memes far more than her source material and it shows.

Making Kyoshi so much more prominent feels like such an insincere thing to do for the sake of “girl boss strong female characters hoorah” that ultimately hurts the writing.

Kuruk

I don’t really know why they decided to give Kuruk so much screen time when it should have been given to Roku or any other character for some development, but I would say it was a decent portrayal. Just an unnecessary one.

They actually used book material for him, which is surprising given the changes they made, but it was specifically for the “spirit killing knife” which was stupid and no one can convince me otherwise.

Having spiritual conversations with so many of the past Avatar’s this early on feels like they’re going to be removing, or at least drastically changing, the Lion Turtle scene in the finale which has me very concerned.

Egregious and Potentially Detrimental Changes from the Original

Removing Jeong Jeong and Aang’s First Experience with Fire Bending

Aang’s terror of fire after hurting Katara when he got too confident is vital for his development. It’s the main reason he eventually accepts Zuko as his fire bending teacher because they both struggle with having hurt people and wanting to fix their mistakes.

This was also supposed to be Katara’s first use of healing, which again I think is something really important for us to actually see she can do. Because all they’ve said is she’s “a natural” just like everything else and that’s such bad storytelling.

Jeong Jeong is a member of the White Lotus and a really important factor in Iroh’s endeavor to take back Ba Sing Se in the finale. Could they do it without him? I guess, but it’s really disrespectful to me to just not include him.

Taking him out will affect plots all the way in season 3.

Not only that, but Jeong Jeong is a valuable example of someone born on the wrong side of the war wanting to make a difference and change his ways. It’s realistic nuance for war!

What Seeing Wan Shi Tong in the Spirit World Means to Me, the Implications for the Library, and Consequences

Wan Shi Tong, similar to Tui and La (the moon and ocean spirits), came to the physical world with the express purpose of bettering humanity. He made the personal sacrifice of staying away from the spirit world so that the human race would have access to his vast and wonderful knowledge. He couldn’t go back and forth between the physical world and the spirit world because he had to be there to keep the Library standing in the physical world in the first place, it can’t stay there without him. The fact that he’s in the spirit world, to me, means that the library may not be in the physical world at all.

Other indications that his library isn’t in the physical world are that Zhao didn’t get his knowledge of Tui and La from the library, he got it from ancient Fire Nation scrolls and records instead (which doesn’t make a lot of sense), and the sun dial that Sokka would have used to discover the solar eclipse and begin the plan for the invasion is now located in the Fire Nation instead. How is Sokka going to learn about the Day of Black Sun now for the invasion? (There’s a lot of setup for the invasion that they’ve screwed up and I’ll talk about it more in a couple other sections).

So assuming we’re no longer going to have the library, there’s a lot of follow-up implications and consequences. This means that we won’t have Appa’s kidnapping which causes a few problems.

One, Appa’s kidnapping directly leads to Jet’s death, the only major on screen death (or injury that leads to death) in the entire show. I guess you could also count Combustion Man, but Jet’s was infinitely more emotional and important to the story.

Two, Appa’s kidnapping and subsequent rescue is vital for proving to the Earth King that Long Feng is a traitor and the Dai Lee has been compromised. This leads to the Earth King trusting Team Avatar’s word implicitly about the Kyoshi Warriors which allows Azula to infiltrate, learn about the invasion plans, capture Katara, and ultimately “kill” Aang at the end of Book 2. Can the writers work around this? Probably. Do I trust them to? No.

Three, protecting Appa is how the Kyoshi Warriors get overpowered by Azula in the first place and Azula is able to infiltrate the Earth Kingdom in disguise. It’s how Suki is captured and ends up at The Boiling Rock prison.

Four, Zuko being the one to let Appa go is a massive character moment as he struggles to let go of the burdens that Ozai pushed onto him to capture the avatar at all cost to others and himself. It leads to his “metamorphosis” as Iroh calls it, leads to him giving up the Blue Spirit identity, and is what makes his later betrayal so painful. Plus, Appa likes him now which is a stepping stone later for Aang to trust him when Zuko wants to switch sides.

And five, Appa’s brief stop with the guru as he’s trying to get back to Aang leads to how Aang gets any instruction on controlling the avatar state. Which also leads to his “death” at the end of Book 2 when he tries to reopen his chakras like he was taught during the fight with Azula. Again, do I think there’s a workaround here? Yeah, but I don’t think they’ll do it well.

Where’s Haru and What it Means for the Future

Removing the “Imprisoned” storyline takes away Katara’s first and one of her most important moments of being an inspirational leader, learning how to speak up for others, and how to make connections with people outside her culture. But they’ve already stripped Katara of so much of her depth, I’m not surprised they took it out.

The more important issue is that Haru, his father, and their people (all Earth Benders) that she helped rescue were very prominent foot soldiers for the invasion in Book 3. Where are they going to get alliances to build an army against the Fire Nation now? My bet is either they won’t, which is concerning for many reasons, or it’ll happen between seasons off screen which is a massive writing problem! Vital events and plot points happening off screen shows extremely poor planning.

Indications of Removing the Swamp and More Poor Planning for the Invasion (are they cutting it out?)

I’ve pretty much convinced myself that the writers are cutting the invasion out of the plot. I’ve listed many reasons above why I think that’s the direction they’re going, but the last straw was when Sokka and Katara were in the spirit world.

I’m almost 100% sure they’re getting rid of “the Swamp”.

When Sokka and Katara are in the spirit world, they are confronted by their worst memories and most difficult emotional obstacles the same way they had been in the original when they were in the swamp. It wouldn’t make any sense to do that again, so they’re probably getting rid of the swamp entirely.

Which means Team Avatar will never encounter the Swamp Water Benders, which then means they lose even more foot soldiers and allies for the invasion. That’s two major allies that just won’t be involved. Between the potential changes to the Library, the lack of allies, and the fact that Hakoda has no trust in Sokka as a warrior, I don’t see how they’re going to realistically be able to do the invasion. If they do, I’ll be shocked and skeptical of how they manage it.

And as another personal pet peeve, taking out the swamp also removes another facet of water bending, being able to control plants by the water in them (which additionally leads into blood bending).

Other Changes That Really Bothered Me

Exposing the Genocide of Aang’s People and the Comet in Episode One

While I did appreciate (to a degree) getting to see the attack on the air benders and how the fall of the Air Nomads happened, I really don’t like that it’s the first thing we see. Like I mentioned earlier, it’s okay and often more beneficial not to reveal everything right away! I much preferred getting bits and pieces as we went along to put together the whole puzzle and have the time to process each new facet of the war. Giving it to us all at once and as the first thing we see takes away so much intricate story telling.

I really didn’t like that all of the air nomads were in the same place for the attack, that’s so unrealistic that they had to create an arbitrary festival to make it happen.

Originally, the Fire Nation attacks all four Air Temples with the power of the comet to back them up for the initial attack. It shouldn’t take one night where they’re all conveniently in the same place (except Aang) and kill them all, it should take one night to deal them such a severe blow that finishing them off over the next few years is easy. Because of course some would get away and were hunted down, that’s how war realistically works.

Removing Aang’s Crush on Katara and What it Means

Oooooh this bothers me for so many reasons, but I’ll try not to be too crazy about it.

I don’t know why they got rid of it completely, unless they’re just waiting until Aang and the actor are a little older for it to be more appropriate. But with what they did with the “Cave of Two Lovers”, I think they’re scrapping the love between Aang and Katara entirely.

Which they haven’t done anything to help them bond at all as friends in the first place except like two moments of bending instructions from Aang and a lot of dialogue about how they’re family. Aang and Sokka have had way more bonding moments together, I can believe they’re friends at least.

One of the biggest issues will be, if they somehow manage to trick Netflix into letting them adapt Korra as well, Aang and Katara’s kids and grandkids are fundamental to the plot there. But that’s getting way ahead of ourselves, let’s just focus on ATLA.

Aang’s feelings for Katara are very important, particularly for being the sole reason he stops trying to master the avatar state, only to attempt it again later to protect her, and then he ends up “dead” for it. He admits to loving her out right in those episodes.

The thing about Avatar is almost every detail is valuable in some way and dominos into a larger plot point. Their love for each other isn’t a major focal point of the show but it does matter, I just really hope they’re not planning on changing love interests.

Moving Anything from Other Seasons into Season One

I’m not going to spend a lot of time on this, but bringing anything from other seasons into season one when you already have such limited time is really irritating because that time would have been better spent on actual character development or including more vital points from season one.

Changing Lore

Aang accidentally bringing both Sokka and Katara into the spirit world with him just because they were in close proximity is ridiculous. He shouldn’t be able to do that. It makes much more sense that they’d be stolen by Hei Bai than piggybacking off Aang when neither of them are spiritually inclined.

Making Avatar shrines the only way for Aang to access his previous avatar is so limiting and irritating, he gets better at it as he becomes more spiritually connected to the avatar state (like in the ocean during the first episode of Book 3 when Aang contacts Roku, or on the Lion Turtle when Aang contacts four past Avatars). Also they completely contradict this rule letter in the season when Aang sees Avatar Kuruk for a few seconds just outside in the Northern Water Tribe. Like they specifically said it, and then completely contradicts themselves, that’s a pretty big consistency error when it’s a change they made.

They removed any significances of the solstices. Once again, giving us no timeline or indication of time passing in the world.

The reason Roku is able to control Aang’s body and powers as much as he can in the Fire Nation Temple is because of the winter solstice when the veil between spirit and physical world is thinnest. But now any Avatar can do it as long as Aang connects with them at their shrine. Kyoshi should not have been to do that to him and it replaced Roku’s very profound moment at the temple.

I don’t like that they said Tui and La are only in physical form one night a year (I think that’s what Zhao said, or something about an ice moon, whatever), and then that night just happened to be near. I can’t think of a single reason why they would make that change. There’s just too many convenient coincidences happening in this version of the story. Tui and La specifically gave up their spiritual forms for vulnerable physical forms for a reason, learn the lore!

The special spirit killing knife was stupid. I don’t know if it’s in the novels and I missed it or if the writers (more likely) came up with it, but it’s seems like really convenient and silly lore that actively contradicts a lot of what was originally set up about the spirits. And added a lot of unnecessary exposition that didn’t even tell us how Zhao got it.

In another similar vein, the MacGuffin of the statue of the many faces goddess spirit that Aang took from Roku’s artifacts to save Katara and Sokka from Kho was just so weird to me. He just eats people now? What happened to him stealing faces if you show an emotion? That was what made him so terrifying, and it was just another moment they stole from Aang and showcasing his potential. It wasn’t his negotiation skills or his self control that saved his friends, but a very convenient object just sitting on a shelf waiting for him.

None of their lore changes made sense or had a purpose to me other than to arbitrarily be different from the source material.

Mature ≠ Graphic

The writers said repeatedly in interviews and articles that they wanted this live action adaptation to essentially be a more mature version. They even likened their vision to be something similar enough to appeal to Game of Thrones fans, which to me was a massive red flag going into the show. Please, do not mix up maturity and graphic violence.

The only thing more “mature” about the live action is that we actually see people being burned alive and killed throughout the season. The original has far more mature writing because of how delicately and intricately it handles very serious concepts. The Netflix writers either do not trust audiences to pick up on subtle and complex ideas, do not trust the actors to portray subtle and complex ideas, or they do not know how to write subtle and complex ideas. Or some combination of the three. Everything is exposition, which I’ve said so many times before, but I will keep saying it until they learn not shove plot right in our faces with no nuance.

The writers simply think they’ve created something more mature because it’s sometimes violent and not a cartoon, which isn’t how that works.

It’s not mature, it’s graphic. Know the difference and you’ll be a better writer for it!

Humor

Yes the humor in the original leans a little more childish, but you don’t solve that by stripping the humor entirely in the adaptation! Almost any attempt at humor, to me, felt like an after thought and was mostly misplaced in a scene (like with Roku, I’ll never get over that). Just overall lost a lot of the whimsy. I understand that animation lends itself to way more expressive, cartoonish, and childish humor, but there’s plenty of funny live-action films and shows. Why did it have to take such a back seat? Again, that’s not a sign of maturity, it’s a sign of a very surface level understanding of how writing works and of what the original ATLA had to offer.

What Was The Point and What Could They Have Done Instead (imo)?

Being brutally honest here, I really don’t think there was any point to making this live action adaptation, especially with the limitations they put on themselves. I think it was, overall, a waste of money and resources. In theory, it was really exciting to have the opportunity to see the world come to life. And in a lot of ways I think they accomplished that between the location designs, costumes, respectful and accurate casting, and environments. I just think that was their main focus, making it look right, that the writing took an unfortunate back seat that made the whole show suffer.

There are two directions I think they could have taken instead.

One, I think they should have planned for six seasons. Every book of the original has a roughly mid season event that could act as really solid season finales. They would be able to stretch out the story and not compress or rush their writing so much. It would be structured more like this:

Season 1 Finale - The Winter Solstice and Discovery of Sozin’s Comet

Season 2 Finale - The Siege of the North

Season 3 Finale - Getting to Ba Sing Se and The Drill

Season 4 Finale - Aang’s “Death”

Season 5 Finale - The Day of Black Sun Invasion

Season 6 Finale - Sozin’s Comet and Confronting the Fire Lord

I understand that doing this doubles the length, and subsequently the cost of the show, which is a big ask. But I also think if they don’t have the resources to do it right in the first place, then they shouldn’t have done it at all. Is it better than the 2010 version we got from Shyamalan? Of course, but please allow yourself to have higher standards than literally scraping by the bottom of the barrel of quality.

I don’t expect anyone to have as in depth opinions or critiques as me, and I don’t begrudge anyone for enjoying the show or even liking some of the changes! But I will say that we all, no matter how critical a viewer you are, deserve better than mediocre quality.

The second direction I think they could have taken, and I really think they should have, is to write something completely original within the world setting of Avatar. There are quite literally dozens of avatars that existed before Aang that have no story yet! They had an opportunity to write some original that actually fits into the 8 episode limit they had while also further expanding on the history and world we all love so much.

I just think the audience, that mostly consists of fans of the original, would have been far more accepting and open to an original story rather than a middling attempt at retelling a story that’s already so beloved.

If you made it this far, I am extremely impressed and also worried for your health! This was mostly me needing to get all of these thoughts and critiques out of my head without ranting to friends and family that have no idea what I’m talking about and would get annoyed.

Anyway, that is my very extensive review that nobody asked for! If you need clarification or further analysis on anything I said, or if there’s something I missed that’s a critique for you on the live action, or if there’s anything you disagree with that I’ve said, please let me know in the comments below! But be nice, I will block anyone being mean about people opinions or thoughts. This is an open friendly space, I won’t tolerate bullying.

Thank you for probably far too much of your time!

[hxly-fxther]

OOC;

I think it’s about time I talked about my thoughts on the event.

I would like to say, first, I appreciate and respect everyone who has attended this event and even more to those who had stuck around this far and to those who have participated as an “Antagonistic force” of the story. I deeply appreciate all the work that everyone has put in, the effort, determination and interest. It’s very nice to see how much this has impacted everyone involved. I have seen everyone grow steadily with their muses and quality of writing. This verse has achieved what I have wanted from it which was two things-

1. Bring people together who otherwise would never had the chance to write with one another.

2. Push characters to their limits and beyond to see who they truly are or offer a different perspective on their characters that writers otherwise wouldn’t.

I would say overall, I am happy and proud of everyone and the verse itself. There’s been so many good moments that I will cherish for the rest of my life and I hope that is the same for others.

However.

This is my first and quite possibly only event I will ever create and possibly attend as this endeavor has taken so much out of me to put together. Playing this role means to keep up with everything and everyone and while I do have help, which I do appreciate, at the end of the day I am the one who drives where the story is headed. Having so many things happen at once and trying to come with sensible conclusions that make everyone involved happy or content with the decision is next to impossible and more so heavily stressful on my shoulders.

It has been difficult to come onto this blog and continue things and the longer I take the more lore, need to conclude things piles onto my shoulders. I see everyone else becoming restless and burnt out just as I am.

I want to deliver a good ending but I believe it wouldn’t matter what ending we get as long as it’s the “good” ending. It feels as though whatever is delivered will be met with a sigh of relief instead of a feeling of profound feeling of accomplishment and earning that victory.

To be a little blunt, it has been almost eight months since this began and even longer when the thought of all of this had even been considered. I never planned for this to go on so long and I’m just stuck. There’s a lot demanded of me and I cannot even enjoy my muse outside of the event because almost everything I say is taken as something that’s compared to the event which locks what I can and can’t do on here to a degree that’s put such a heavy roadblock on this character.

It has been a stressful last couple of weeks between muse drama, mun drama and trying to work everything cohesively together and I have finally hit the point where I can no longer juggle what I used to be able to. I know this may discourage others and I am sorry, I have done what I can and I very much do plan on finishing this story but I cannot promise a ending that wraps everything in a nice bow like I would have liked.

Admitting that makes me… Upset. Sad. Everything. I once had multiple panic attacks a week with how I was going to finish all of this up but now I’ve become so jaded much like all of you that I just simply want it to end however way possible. The writings on the wall and it is ever unfortunate that this all needed to be said because this is or perhaps was, my biggest accomplishment I have ever managed in any given RPC.

I will not point fingers nor will I allow anyone to point fingers, if anyone has failed it was me. Lack of writing, energy, and too much leniency on my end has caused a lot of this and where the load was supposed to become lighter got heavier and it’s become too much.

I am sorry. At the home stretch I’ve failed you all and there is no better way to put how disappointed I am of myself for letting things become so difficult.

Again. I want to make it clear, that I love this verse, there has been so many great things that has come from it and I do have plans for an ending soon and we can all finally rest and have those conclusions we have planned for.

Thank you for taking the time to read this, I know it is not the most encouraging read and rather unexpected. But I would like for everyone to take a minute and think about all the good that has come to you on your end of the verse and simply enjoy that for even a moment. If all of you can do that then the purpose of this “unification” ideology would have served its purpose to its fullest.

I will see you all soon.

-Shade❤️🎥

[random-introverted-blog]

I suppose you want to hear about...

Me! Hi!

So first things first, what is this blog? Despite this name, it's actually Not a Shadowheart exclusive BG3 blog. The name is just a play on a joke I made with some friends that there is a DEEP lack of Dark Justiciar Shadowheart and Dark/Jealous/Possessive content for her. While I, of course, get and love our precious, wholesome Selunite baby, there's a lot of untapped potential for her Sharran Side. There's already a whole post I made on why I think you can definitely pull off a Yandere/Obsessive Shadowheart if you're interested. Can find that post Here, if you're interested.

This blog will be

Astarion and Shadowheart focused. BG3 blog maybe a random aside thought?

Not everything will be Yandere/Dark

I would like to be heralded as a Meme Queen, thank you

YES, I write fanfiction too, there's no escaping us.

I have SO many prompts/ideas/drabbles to share with you guys too

Maybe an opinion or such, like the Yandere Shadowheart post

Requests? Don't trust myself to do them in a timely manner. Suggestions of things to write? All for those, hmu girlies

I write a longfic on AO3 called I Want To Live. You can find me... Here!

I also now write a story called His Star - His Queen and that can be found... Here! Or if you prefer to continue reading on Tumblr I have a master page I call the Chapter Index and the link can be found... Here!

My Tumblr name is different from my AO3. I have yet to transplant my drabbles to my AO3 but if you want to stalk and stare at the relative void of my page, you can find me Here! My name there is A Random Introvert.

My inbox is open in case you guys aren't aware. There's really no limit on what you could send in that I won't reply to.

My Masterlist can be found here!

If I'm perfectly honest?

I'm actually a Spawn!Astarion simp more

ALRIGHT PUT DOWN THE PITCHFORKS I'M JUST BEING TRANSPARENT HERE.

But I've always had a weakness for dark romance, yandere content, obsessive/possessive/jealous content, and Ascended!Astarion has that in SPADES. So does Sharran!Shadowheart and DarkJusticiar!Shadowheart just saying.

Hence why the profile picture and banner feature Astarion and Shadowheart. This blog is for both of them, as I simp both.

Now not to come across condescending or anything, I know most people are aware what a yandere is. But just in case there are some newbies/uninitiated in this sacred, unholy character trope. Never want people to feel awkward or unwelcome or even ashamed they don't know something.

There are many other tropes that tend to be interwoven into a yandere. It's hardly ever their only trait. You can learn the rest by reading that, and your own research.

Look, I may be a Spawn!Astarion simp but I'm very staunch in my belief.

This is above all a No Judgement - No Shame blog

We can all enjoy ascended Astarion or Obsessive Shadowheart or whoever else you want to make a dark character. We can, because we can all acknowledge that no one in a healthy frame of mind would actually want to be with a Yandere in real life. But here, in text and words, we can enjoy it for what it is. A fantasy. I have a partner (hi babe) who is the complete antithesis of a yandere. I am actively writing a double Yandere electric boogaloo fic on AO3. Which they actively read and I talk about often. Doesn't change that I want a healthy relationship. And if I ever got a hint that they were recreating the scenes I was writing, I would ***SPOILERS*** drop faster than Shadowheart's parents when she kills them that's dark and I'm not sorry nor feel bad for it ***END SPOILERS**

That said; I welcome you to this little blog of mine and wish to be welcomed to this fandom if you would let me.

I think we're going to have a lot of fun together

[1800duckhotline]

im new here and missed your bg3 phase entirely can i hear what makes the game so sucks for you (or ill go look in the tag! fine too). i love to hear people bitchin about games everybody else doesnt wanna criticize

omg hello... first of all welcome to my twisted mind etc. my blog is an array of a completely random agglomeration of interests so im sorry if i shift from posting from x to y at the speed of light LMFAO. my bg3 obsession phase was definitely a strange exception but i guess it is what it is

and def i can give u the sparknotes version of my criticisms for the game, which are both rational and not and you're free not to agree and so forth, i'm just one guy expressing an opinion which i think i'm entitled to since i've played this game for over 200 hours almost i am fairly sure. i was not okay.

obviously i'll be mentioning spoilers fyi. i got long here but i promise this is just the Resume of my actual opinions

i hate the fact everyone sounds british except minsc or jaheira. i just dont like it. like a few characters here and there its nothing that bothers me but i'm tired of british accents in fantasy media. it makes things more of a snoozefest

for a game that prides itself on characters being reactive and interactable (esp companions) more often than not the companions reactions have been disappointingly lackluster and straight up Sad because they're so Nothing. i.e. durge reveal

i think not having tav/durge voiced was stupid. my onion!

the game is not as revolutionary as people make it out to be when it comes to character design and good lord the character creator to me is offensive. the companions are all EXTREMELY SAFE when it comes to 'conventional beauty standards', and while i'm not surprised nor did i expect any less, the lack of body diversity to me is just so... boring. it's so nothingburger. like i love projecting hcs and shit but i wish i didn't have to do that

wyll having so little in terms of content and writing and reactions in the game compared to astarion (and let's also say shadowheart bc on a technical level she's the second favorite of larian) is genuinely the worst thing to me because his concept is charming and interesting and larian just decided to do nothing with him. players that are black and/or poc obviously have said this a trillion times, i'm just echoing the sentiment because i also hate how blatant it is, esp when i read up and watched how he used to be in EA. like not to say the writing there was stellar but he had dimension. larian just does not give a fuck abt him and it is irritating lmao, esp since astarion has tangentially 0 actual involvement with the game's main plot in his arc WHILE WYLL LITERALLY GETS HIS ARC SIDELINED BY THE EMPEROR I FUCKING HATE THAT STUPID TURN OF EVENTS SO MUCH

act 1 is probably the best optimized out of all the acts, with the optimization being probably up to midway of act 2. then it alllllll goes downhill. i said it so much but i never get tired of saying it: act 3 is so poorly organized, so many good ideas all smushed together in an indigestible slog of an act with too many quests flattened in one single serving making it so fucking hard to want to get it done. which is awful, because a lot of poignant plot events and fights happen in act 3. i'm still of the firm belief they should've made an act 4. considering this ties in with the aforementioned issue where wyll was supposed to get more content... and it got cut out 'for time'.

i fucking hate astarion fans. i trust like 2 people that do like him. i genuinely was so indifferent to him in the game. like he's fine as a character. i just dont like him much because of the fans. Again ties in with the wyll issues too because people love to pretend astarion would be in wyll's place in the dancing scene when astarion would call you slurs and kill you if he could

also like think what you will of minthara but i think it's criminal that she's a companion and alongside wyll is left to rot at the bottom of the game's code. it's definitely more egregious for wyll imo but like. idk i also am not a fan of this esp since i discovered halsin was added as a companion because THE FANS begged them to. seething

again, there's people more well equipped to discuss this and i did reblog and share posts abt this before on my main account but the embarrassing fantasy racism is there and it's an innate problem of dnd. i think it should be mentioned and kept in mind regardless if it's done well or not (which i don't think it was).

this is less abt the game itself and more abt the fandom but i genuinely cannot fucking stand people who are so aggressive at users who have sexuality headcanons for some of the characters of the game. i've seen people have SO much fucking vitriol towards lesbians having lesbian hcs, specifically, gee i wonder why. this hasn't happened to Me but i have witnessed it.

i think that's more or less the Issues i have with bg3. you're free to ask anything in specific but like... i dont hate the game. or i wouldnt have played it so much. but it should not have been GOTY to me. sorry. like there's so much i just think is wrong... but im just one guy.

i usually prefer completely different types and genres of games, so obviously i'll be more dissecting towards a game i tried out of curiosity and Liked, but with many grievances. the type of stuff i usually like is also far from perfect but i judge a lot of those things in bg3 because of how the game presents itself as in advertisement and social media posts, as well as just like, the steam page. i have plans in the future to try similar games to bg3 to see if it's a common problem within that genre or if it's the black sheep (for me) but for now it is how it is

anyways i did also like a lot of parts of the game, it's just, i can't really reccomend it without mentioning what i didn't like you know?

[jonathan-cranes-mistress-of-fear]

Hello, I hope this is okay for me to send. I'm one of the blogs you blocked. (First off, this is your good right, and I completely understand and I hope this isn't a breach or invasion of privacy to send this from a different blog)

I always made sure to only tag content of Nolanverse Crane when it's really him and not any other Cillian role because I understand the frustration. And like I said, I absolutely understand that he's not a proper Scarecrow in your eyes. But it kind of hurts to get lumped into a group where I don't feel like I belong (if that makes sense)

Scarecrow in general is my favorite character in any comic related media. Arkhamverse Crane and Audio Adventures are at the top for me, and I also have a deep love for Fear State and little fan interpretations where he's just a funky little freak. My blog is Nolanverse centric atm because I just haven't gotten around to writing fics for the others. (And I'm worried I won't write them well tbh)

But all of that aside, my reason for actually sending this was because I was genuinely missing your posts and opinions on my dash. I was honestly a little worried that I didn't see anything from you before I realized what happened.

This isn't me being angry or petty and please don't think I feel entitled to seeing your posts (I don't want to be THAT person)

I guess this is just me saying goodbye to a pillar of the Scarecrow fandom, and it makes me a little sad

From the bottom of my heart, I hope your mom's recovery goes well and you have a great rest of the day/week/month. And a happy early birthday, Moffy

(ALSO SORRY FOR THIS ESSAY OMG)

A couple of things </3

I THINK I knew who this is. I blocked one person after I made that post. Looking back, that was probably a stupid mistake. I'mma unblock to check when I post this, and you let me know? (I was thinking....oh god I'm gonna get hate from the fangirls and taht legit clouded my judgement. I still fear anon hate)

See, that post was mainly about people I blocked weeks/months ago. I often only block the fangirls, for lack of a better word. I actually made the Cillian post on a whim. I needed some content for the day. (you probably know I upload daily) And sometimes, a little anger is okay. it's a valid emotion. Again, the people I block are more fans of the actor than the character. My main complaint was seeing Cillian stuff, which was not from the movies, in the tag. It just sorta....clogs it up?

Anyway, I can clearly see you're not one of them. If some reason , within the next ten minutes, you're still blocked. Send me the url. I am human. I understand. Mistakes and stupid shit happens. (especially with all I am dealing with irl) (I've been so stressed I think it clouds my brain)

You clearly love the character behind the actor, and I respect that. I think you may have been following me, cus my count went down after I blocked ya. So yeah, I did think that was WEIRD.

I'm sorry if you felt lumped it, it was just an error on my part. I hope you can forgive that.

and ya know, just because I'm not a fan of nolancrane, doesn't mean it's bad. I should reiterate, it brought so many into the fandom. That's great! I still reblog fan content of him. I suppose, the truth of the matter is my autistic brain doesn't do "live action" -- I can't think of one human who could play Jonathan Crane to my expectations. Voice actors yes, Dino Andrade forever lmao

But I just...live of art/comic/animation/games

and anything else feels uncanny. Like now. I dont imagine Crane as a real person. I have no image inside my head unless it's a comic illustration or game render. I Hoooope that makes sense

[sizzlingpatrolfox]

looking back, my experience in this fandom was mostly based on shipping jikook, reading conspiracy theory blogs, and mostly watching their moments, all of that was first for me, and BTS as a whole was secondary. I could say that jikook always kept me in this fandom, and I was waiting for concerts or other content with their "moments". I think that bts' popularity is partly based on the shipping community, just the fact that I knew bts members from wattpad fanfics long long before I joined the fandom

Yeah, that's something that just happens in kpop. 70% of the kpop experience is the content that's not related to music. There are so many groups that would sell only a couple of thousands albums if they were as inactive as Jimin... but I wholeheartedly believe that they sell that much because of their "close relationship" to fans.

The more time passes, the more of these groups exist. I genuinely can't believe anyone listens to stray kidz or NCT and enjoys it😭 but that's another topic. I'm sorry if anyone reading is a fan, but I just can't. They don't really perform well on charts, but still loyal fans will buy millions of their albums just to "support" them, and collect pretty pictures. It's not really about the music, and almost everything is about the fans liking the idols as people or entertainers, more than musicians.

Part of BTS popularity is definitely thanks to ships, and to the "ot7" agenda. The same as it is for literally every other kpop group on earth. After BTS blew up after winning their first bbma social award, they doubled down on the "we're a family we're so close" stuff. I'm not saying it was fake, but it was also a tool. The way two famous people dating will mean pr moves for both of them in spite of how genuine their love might be, BTS started putting their relationship as a group on the forefront of what being BTS meant, and it was also a pr move.

Bighit made a survey for fans in late 2017.

It was a study market but most of the questions weren't about music. There were a couple that were something like "what do you like about BTS" and relationship between members was one of the options.

I don't know if you were around, but here's a link where you can see the questions, since I can't find screenshots of the survey itself.

A moment that stuck with me was in 2018 when news said that Jungkook had bought his own apartment. Before that, there had been news about Jin, Yoongi, Hoseok and Taehyung buying their own places. Silence from the company. But when JK bought trimage, bighit immediately issued an statement denying it. Even though Jungkook did have his own place there 😭 but him being the youngest was sort of the glue that was supposed to keep the family together. Half of BTS lore is how Jungkook was raised by all the other six members. He couldn't possibly be independent.

A lot of that obviously goes under the radar because BTS music is actually good, or at least they had some outstanding stuff.

The 2020 - 2022 period was particularly "worse" in that sense... All there was to be enjoy was ships, and the members interactions or their "relationship" with fans. The music was bad, no tour, no performances in general, and the behind the scenes content was lacking too. The whole "we didn't want to do solo songs we wanted to sing all together 🫶" they pulled for their last concerts.. it was all about the same narrative of "being together". The LA and Las Vegas concerts were a whole other level of fanservice.

[hootnhoney]

I’m on the patreon, but I most definitely don’t pay Thomas just for sanders sides. I like all of his content, which is why I pay him. And I think given the fact that the finale is supposed to be four parts, and they’ve been hit with struggles including a *hurricane* in the past year preventing them from working on it as much as they’d like, the amount of time is understandable? Yes, the wait is on the long side, but still understandable for me. And I don’t think pressuring Thomas is going to help matters? If it’s not okay to pressure people to finish fanfics, which we all agree on, why is it more okay to pressure Thomas to make content? And why would that be more helpful? Yes, people pay him, but again, not just for sanders sides. If you pay him just for sanders sides that’s your problem. And I have seen an increase in content, from things like Roleslaying, songs, and livestreams. I am absolutely getting what I pay for.

My main issue is his responses. Ppl r specifically asking about content A and he’s says “yes but I’m giving you content B and C so you shouldn’t say that cause it’s not nice”

I’m happy you’re able to enjoy his content and at least some people are happy with the situation. But the thing is he made his patreon for sanders sides. He’s making money off of people who are paying for sanders sides and not getting it.

This isn’t a fanfic. This is his job. He’s making money from it. He has a whole team to work with. Fanfic is freely given and the authors have no obligation. It’s not the same.

I have my own project (the wonderland blog) that I make no money from. And when I need a break from it or want to focus on something else, i let my followers know what going on. And give them an estimate for how long it will take. If im struggling to make long posts, I change the format to make posting easier and faster.

And people are allowed to complain. there’s nothing wrong with that. When Thomas sees people’s complaints I don’t really see anything constructive in response to that. Just “what you said is hurtful you should support me”

I would love to hear a “I’m sorry about the wait, it’s taking so long be cause of A B and C. It will probably take about this amount of time for the next video.”

The way I see it is Thomas is selling a product. The customer is complaining about the lack of product and the sellers response is “don’t say that it’s hurtful”

I think the best thing he could do in this situation is change the quality of the videos to how they were originally. The quality of the last videos were great. But if that’s preventing him from getting the videos out in the first place and people aren’t happy, don’t do it. I’d love to see him keep things simpler like they were before. That would make videos easier to make and I think take a lot of pressure off him.

And nothing against you anon. I am glad someone’s content with that Thomas is offering. But a lot of people aren’t happy and I think they’re totally valid for it.

[askmacan]

// Not AskMacan

Hey, thanks for all of the recent asks lately! It's very cool to see so many people interested in this silly format of interacting with the Housamo characters, and I very much enjoy playing the part of Macan and Nomad.

But lately I've been at a loss of what to say to so many asks. For many reasons, but the first being that many of them aren't relevant (which I will touch on in a second), or are a bit too inappropriate to respond to. Although I do have a content warning on this blog, it becomes hard to want to answer asks with that sort of content. And if thats the majority of the asks I'm receiving, it seems like a "give and no take" situation considering how little im putting out.

For those who don't know, I, the owner if this blog, am Grey Asexual, so I'm not particularly interested in the sexual aspect of Macan and Nomad. Yes, I do love the fact they are big titty kitties, but it's less about the gacha-ness and more about the characters' personalities and dynamic (for me at least). Macan is a crazy, loose cannon, and Nomad is a broke guy, and it's very fun. So that's mostly how I structure the jokes and replies. This is not to say I'm just completely uninterested in the dirty jokes, but "Macan and Nomad gay SEX" doesn't do it for me all the time.

The other thing I mentioned is the relevancy of the things being asked... Look I understand some people find reference humor... humorous, but I really do not. And frankly, it urks me, because if I do not understand the reference, I have nothing to say. If other people don't understand the reference, they gain nothing from the joke. And, even if I do understand the reference, I will still lack any kind of way to write a joke, or even an interesting observation. Reference humor is only enjoyable for people who both enjoy and know about the refence. Considering this fandom is small, there's not a lot of circling culture for the benefit of a well-written refence joke, other than that what Housamo provides. And Housamo in of itself is not a very quotable/easily quoted piece of storytelling 🫠

All of this is to say without questions that "strike the rock" so-to-speak, I don't have much to comment, and I'm sorry but lmao this isn't an easy thing to keep up 😅

No, it's no ones job to feed this blog content, and it is not your job to change the questions you want to ask. Just keep in mind without a relevant question pertaining to these characters in this world, there is not much interesting dialog that can come from it. Maybe you'd love to know about how Nomad feels about Black Ops, but like... I don't know anything about it and neither does he, so what am I supposed to write? (Non-specific example.)

[further-from-maths]

28th Feb 2024, 12:24

I'm back lol sorry for dropping off the face of this blog. that's what IB does to you I guess

Some very cool things have happened since I was last here in writing. I got all five offers back, and I've accepted a firm and insurance choice to two wonderful places!!! Their creative writing departments were wonderful, and the lecturers at my firm were genuinely inspiring to listen to. To get in, I need a 6 in English, and 36 points overall. I think I can do it. My current goals/predictions are:

HL English LangLit: 6 needed for uni, and I managed it in my one mock since switching up. If I get a 5 I can still get into my insurance just fine, but I REALLY want to get into my first choice if I can.

HL Psychology: 7 is the goal. I really want a 7, and there's no excuse barring a lack of revision to not get one. My psychology department is genuinely incredible, and I've done very well in all my mocks. I really want to make them proud so I'm hoping the essays they give us are kind.

HL Global Politics: 7 suggested by the mocks so far, but I'm not the most confident in my politics abilities. I do want a 7 in it if possible though because I really like my politics teacher and also want to make him proud lmao

SL CompSci: 7 almost certain considering my mock grades thus far. I'm not worried tbh.

SL Maths Analysis: 7 PLEASE Maths is so easy to revise and it's easy points!!

AB German: 6 is probably more realistic than a 7 because too many minor slip ups can sink the grade completely, but I really want a 7 too.

Core: 2 is what I'm expecting tbh. My EE and TOK were both fine but I don't think they were WOW yk. I'm expecting a B for my EE hopefully and a B for my TOK, but if I've made my corrections well then hugely maybe I can get an A, which would give 3 points????? That's assuming my EE is in fact B-worthy which I really have no clue about.

Obviously I want to get as high as I can, but if I get a minimum of a 6 in everything, that's still more than enough with Core. I know I'm extremely likely to get a 7 in at least CompSci, so at a minimum I'm thinking I'll get 39 unless core flops?? My goal is to get over 40 though:))))

I'm terrified of making some kind of mistake that gets me disqualified. I know that's irrational but the fear is still there. My English teacher kinda spooked me by saying someone once failed their diploma because they didn't put page numbers in their EE so uh.......................... woooooooo. I'malso terrified about AI writing affeciting me. I haven't touched AI for anything I've done for school ever, but I'm nervous that the AI checker will be bad:( And what if I haven't cited something correctly?????? aaaaaaaaaaaa:(((((((((( Also as a heads up, for this exact reason, I won't be liveblogging my exams lol. I don't want to risk saying anything I'm not supposed to regarding the exams, so I'll make notes and post about them after results day or so. If I post anything during exam season, it'll probably be good-luck posts and nothing more lmao.

We've finished content in pretty much every subject now, which is exciting!! IAs are nearly done -- just waiting for final confirmation that a handful of them are ready for submission, and I've got my computer science IA to finish correcting. The end is scarily close.

Feeling terrified, but as long as I keep my head down and work hard, it'll be alright. Less than 11 weeks left. Let’s do this.

75 days until.

[gregorygerwitz]

Ok, so I'm new to your blog! (Sorry abt that) but I'm super interested in the super soldier and pirate au's. I tried searching your blog for more info but as we know Tumblr search is terrible, can you point me to more posts on the topic or tell me some stuff about them?

I do have a specific question about the super soldier AU; what super abilities are we talking about aside from enhanced strength?

As for pirate Au (which I am just as excited for) is this based on any source material or is it entirely your worldbuilding? I'd love to know more!

Hi, nonny! Welcome to the chaos! I know I gained a lot of followers during the first run of the firefighter bracket, to welcome to all of you! And you definitely don't have to apologize for being new here, especially for One Chicago things - I'm still kinda new here.

I did give both Super Soldier AU and Pirate AU tags on this blog in an attempt to keep things organized, but you're absolutely right. Tumblr search is a whole mess sometimes. But! Pirate AUs have a masterpost here, with a link to the tag in it, and the Super Soldier AU posts can all be found in its tag here, though it has significantly less content to peruse for that one than Pirate AU (to be fair to me, I actually have plans to write Pirate AU this year, whereas Super Soldier AU is just something I think about from time to time with no solid plans to actually write it)

As for your specific questions...

Super Soldier AU

I was literally joking last night (and this morning) that the experiments kind of just... gave Mouse more autism? Yes, obviously, there's the cliché super strength, and heightened senses, but that makes his life so hard when he already got overstimulated and overwhelmed by too much noise or a stressful day to begin with.

They also kind of reverted his brain to a few base instincts? When he's living his every day life back in Chicago again, it doesn't show, but that's because everything is triggered by stress or certain situations. Mouse was, for lack of a better word, programmed to take out threats - usually, he's explicitly told what those threats are, for the missions he went on for the army, but without that guidance, and specifically without a proper handler, it becomes this vague order that he doesn't know how to handle and process all the time.

It's what led to him doing his single handed rescue of Jay in the situation outlined in the moodboard. He saw his friend in danger, perceived a threat, and took it out, like he was programmed to do. When he's not in a war zone, it just turns into protecting his friends instead of following orders.

Pirate AU

This AU happened because I saw a picture of Sam from a short film he did ~11 years ago, where he's holding a sword? I thought it was hot, so I built an AU around it. In my defense...

He should be allowed to hold a sword more often (yes, I watched the short film and made gifs they're very important to me they get me through rough weeks)

I kind of built the idea of Mouse as a pirate around that image, and then engagement-of-convenience Linstead happened off to the side of him, and the plot fell into place after that. And then I listened to a lot of The Amazing Devil and it's a whole world now. I don't think about Pirate AU enough considering I'm supposed to be writing it this year...

I know I haven't shared much about either of these AUs by way of like... the actually plot of Pirate AU, or any of my world building for Super Soldier Mouse, so if you have any more questions that I haven't answered yet, feel free to ask them! I love talking about these little universes! Thank you for giving me the opportunity today!