#I HAVE SO MANY IDEAS ITS NOT EVEN FUNNY IVE GOT A WHOLE TO DO LIST FOR STUFF IVE BEEN DAYDREAMING ABT DRAWING I JUST BARELY HAVE THE TIMEEE

[soobvape]

i need brownies so fucking bad rn

[eggo-tistical]

my bad for not posting much lately!! im not free for winter break yet and my days generally consist of fluctuating between "IT'S SOO OVER" and "WE'RE SO BAAACK" at incredibly rabid speeds,

[steelycunt]

i am quite curious on your opinion on how regulus black is characterized in fandom… completely understandable if you do not want to answer, but since i have my own opinions on the matter i was curious about yours! i love a steelycunt ramble

hi omg yeah! unfortunately for all of us i do have thoughts lol...i already know im about to ramble because ive been dying for an excuse to do this for ages so i think it would easiest to break them down into points but tl;dr or i suppose thesis statement i think the fandom characterisation of him is soooo awful lol. terrible 0/10. i do not even massively care about him as a character other than as background for his brother but since he is pretty unavoidable ive been driven to develop opinions.

he was a willing fascist stop pretending he wasnt its LAME

so many colourful ways people have conveniently sidestepped his fascism to uwufiy them, all of which i find extremely lame and pointless considering we know virtually nothing of the guy other than that he was a fascist and then had second thoughts. which actually could be really interesting if you just accepted that rather than bending over backwards to create these alternative (and so much more BORING) narratives where his being a DE isn't his fault or he was forced or whatever. we know that wasnt true he was a fascist because he chose to be a fascist and he held the views of a fascist. the moral purification and absolution of his character because people want to interact with him but are uncomfy about the fascism thing is so lameeee and stupid lol imagine being so uncomfortable with a character you claim to love that you have to get rid of everything we know about him and invent an entirely new personality for him. boooo. grow up. you can be interested in fictional characters who are bad. although it is funny how much easier people seem to be able to reconcile their fav being a fascist than like. being a cheater or something. which is a cardinal sin apparently.

2. the black cat goth sassy millennial characterisation.

theres this really common characterisation of him where hes like this sassy dangerous deadpan tiktok-esque spurter of witticisms which i just find so cringy and boring and inaccurate. the whole 'ooh he takes his coffee black he looks like a cinnamon roll but he could kill you!!!!' thing that makes me feel like ive been dragged back to tumblr 2015. he kind of sucked he was a conservative who did one good thing in his life and got killed in the process i dont know where people have got this badass thing from he just wasnt. also the idea that he was a goth girl because his name was black? we can try a little harder than that come on now. but yeah im not trying to imply theres some moral problem with characterising him this way i just find it cringy and inaccurate and i think there are much more interesting things you can do with him

3. abuse + relationship with his brother.

another thing i find really annoying is the assumption that he was treated by his parents the same way his brother was. big disclaimer because i can hear the complaints already yes i accept that being a child in a house where there is abuse in and of itself in traumatic and horrifying. but there is no canon reason to believe he was directly abused by his parents the way his parents were, especially considering his brother seemed to be punished for transgressions against his parents. regulus was the good boy he was the better son and he did as they asked. i think people have begun to just assume he was also abused the way his brother was in order to make him more sympathetic or excuse his behaviour (not how this works anyway) and again i find it very lame. the dynamics we actually get from canon are consistently infinitely more complex and interesting than what people then do with them. as for his relationship with his brother theres the whole idea of sirius 'leaving' him in the house which is ridiculous and almost too laughable to discuss but. the idea that regulus is the victim of his abused brother running away...girls get real. he was in his room getting radicalised i dont feel sorry for him. plus his whole relationship with his brother tends to irritate me anyway--i dont know if these people just dont have siblings, but the whole ultra close, sirius being incredibly protective, would die for each other, them against the world thing again seems to contrast everything we actually know about that relationship and also...not all siblings are that close? like theyre just not? idk again, personal taste but i find their super healthy close relationship very boring its kind of a dealbreaker for me!

4. he wasnt conventionally attractive and if you cant deal with ur fav being ugly he's not ur fav

needed a section all of its own because thats how bad it annoys me but the way people swear to hell and back that he was actually super handsome. or 'umm he wasnt handsome but he was PRETTY. umm ummm ummm'. booo throws tomatoes at you. we know from canon (again like. one of five things we know about him). that he was not considered handsome, like his brother was. i find it so incredibly pathetic the way people who claim to like him deny this like their life depends on it and try to argue that actually he was like omg conventional beauty is everythinggggg to you people isnt it. omg this fictional character who isnt real is nothingggg to you if hes not described as a model is he. you cant really like him that bad!!!! again what a fun thing to lean into that fandom instead has to revise. the guy was not hot why does it bother you that bad omg. if you cant accept that i immediately know all ur opinions suck sorry its the same as when people have to pretend remus was some sort of hunky alt casanova to like him at this point just write an oc pleaseeee because you dont seem to like anything about him thats actually established. anyway. tl;dr he wasnt handsome get over it my god

5. he would not be friends with remus u guys just think he would be because you borrowed remus' personality to give him one

another dealbreaker for me i cannot read something that implies remus and regulus would be friends. to get the obvious out of the way: regulus was a fascist and remus is part of a minority group he would want dead. but otherwise the idea that theyd be friends confirms to me that someone doesnt get either of them and the only reason i think this has gained traction is because regulus doesnt have a personality and in order to position him and james as r/s 2.0 where james stands in for sirius, people just superimposed remus' fanon personality (quiet, sarcastic, dry, bookish, exasperated) onto regulus. which is a characterisation i dont like anyway but then because youve turned them into the same person people then say theyd get on...i cannot think of two people would be gel worse. theyd have nothing in common. nothing to say. absolutely nothing. they would sit in awkward, unpleasant silence. literally no two characters less suited to each other i am begging you. also the substitution of peter for him as the fourth person in their group nowadays bffr...not only is peter far more interesting but also he would not get on with any of them his brother included. i hate when i am reading a fic and he turns up when hes not supposed to. put him back! he belongs ina victorian dollshouse!

6. things i like + how i picture him.

okay done a LOT of moaning. again i dont really care about him as a character im not interested in him apart from how he affects sirius' character and i dont like jegulus so i dont really read much where hes a central figure but i do think he COULD be very interesting if done right, and so things i do like: characterisations that lean into the fact that he was a willing fascist as a teen, willingly radicalised, nasty nasty politics. i like a regulus who is very uptight, who has a very strained relationship with his brother as the younger brother to someone he knows would always have made a better heir than him, was better at practically everything but just didnt want to do it. i think living in the shadow of that would make him crazy uptight and touchy lol. as for stuff which is less grounded in canon and more just how i imagine him: i think he was a nerd, i think he was a serious young boy with a huge sense of responsibility, and i can imagine him having some sort of niche hobby which is quite antisocial like stamp collecting or model railways or reading big dense history books about ww2 or the magical equivalent of one of those. i think he was a bit weird and quite weak and sensitive. his brother is a massive sore point for him. he was not cool or sassy or badass i think he probably wore matching pyjama sets to bed and carried around a handkerchief with his initials embroidered into the corner and clung to his family and his wealth and his ancestry as a marker of his superiority and good breeding for dear fucking life because he did not have much else going for him.

[kookidough]

random rant about tbp tiktok cause i’m actually Sick of it at this point💆‍♀️💆‍♀️ these issues probably exist Outside of tiktok as well but i only ever see them on there so thats the platform i’m gna talk about

before you read i just wanna say warning for mentions of sa!!!!!

first of all i dont want to jump straight into the serious shit so the unoriginality is actually INSANE like ive been seeing the same jokes since 2022, can we Please get something funnier than “griffin does gymnastics / is a ceiling fan” 😭 the amount of times recently i’ll see a tbp tiktok and then get someone copying the idea and making the Same exact post like 3 scrolls later is insane like Pls can we be original Pls this movie is so sad i need something to laugh at

outside of being totally unoriginal some of the jokes tend to be Really Fucking Disgusting like straight up joking about assault, i shouldn’t even have to explain that thats not funny in the slightest?? this one person made a bunch of really gross ones and kept blocking people who called them out in the comment section, my friend had to dm them Several times and all they did was take down one post, the rest are still up with a ton of views :/ i know its like shock humour or dark humour or whatever but i dont see the ‘funny’ side of a grown man forcing himself onto a child and i think if youre laughing at that you should sit down and ask yourself why you think thats so funny.. people in the comments are always like “i shouldn’t laugh” so they Know its wrong as well which just ugh the whole thing just really gets on my nerves

another thing that gets on my nerves is the lack of media literacy and straight up spreading misinformation, maybe on the media literacy part i’m just a hater but i see so many questions being asked or theories being posed when all of the things mentioned were… literally answered in the movie?? “whats up with finney and gwen’s mother” it’s literally said in the movie that she has the same ability as gwen and she killed herself bc of it, next question, “why was max so interested in finding the missing boys” maybe because he was a coked up conspiracy theorist who saw a serious crime happening in his brother’s area so he decided to be a genuine concerned citizen who wanted these boys to be found💀 “why did the grabber kill max” because he had evidence of the highly awful crimes he’d been committing and was about to let his latest victim free?? the list goes on and on but those r the main ones i see all the time

as for the misinformation. Ough. it annoys me So much this is a hill i will die on😭 i dont know if its people’s half-baked theories or personal headcanons that just got way out of hand but i see so much stuff being spread that just Isnt true, it gets spread so far that when you google these things it appears as true when its not which is annoying !!! i actually was gonna make an entire rant about one theory in particular that pisses me off so bad but i can fit it in here alongside my list of “other theories presented as facts that i Absolutely Despise”

first theory, the one i was gonna make an entire post over, is the theory that vance is the grabber’s son. if i see one more tiktok of those two with that marina and the diamonds song im going to fucking lose it😭 i have no idea where people got this from but its so fucking popular that it comes up on google and i Hate it, i think it comes from the fact that in gwen’s dream sequence, which, might i add, WAS A DREAM, it looks like the police drop vance off outside the grabber’s house and he goes inside there, which… apparently automatically makes them related…?? it takes like one ounce of media literacy to realise that Obviously he’d be getting dropped off at his own house in real life, but as a ghost he’s centred on the place he died and is showing that house to gwen in her dreams, like how every other ghost shows that house to her. awful theory awful take i hate it, if its ur personal headcanon sorry but i do Not fw that

the other theories i have like. not much to say about other than the fact that they’re Not true, i see a lot of stuff about griffin for some reason? the number tends to change but a lot of ppl say “he was kept in the basement for 4 years” like . Huh. where is your proof???? i know the missing posters are insanely unreliable but if you literally read them griffin went missing on april 2nd and billy went missing on may 4th so highly likely griffin was only in the basement for like. a month at most, no idea where ppl are pulling 4 years out of💀 i also see people say griffin has broken legs or a broken back Just because of the first scene where we see him doing a backbend but . if that was the case then he wouldnt be able to stand with the other ghosts when they show gwen the house, i think the backbend was just the position he died in and thats why he first appeared that way to finney but Hey thats just my opinion! last two i have like no rants over but just. firstly people saying robin never made it to the basement for some reason but clearly he did otherwise his ghost would not be down there with the rest of them😭 secondly the theory that vance was kept there the longest “because he’s the most feminine” which. just makes absolutely zero sense to me whatsoever idk whos random headcanon got popularised but i dont like it

okay getting serious again, while this one does not make me angry its like. just really weird to me? i think its common knowledge at this point that both the book and the movie are inspired heavily by the john wayne gacy case, with the grabber literally being inspired by john wayne gacy himself (you Cannot argue with me on this one its literally confirmed and theres a boatload of evidence supporting it). i guess its natural to see people making comparisons between the movie and the case because of the inspiration but i’ve seen Several videos recently of people taking photos of jwg victims and putting them next to tbp characters and saying thats who theyre inspired by and i think thats . Really coming across as insensitive i cant lie😭 we know the grabber was inspired by jwg and its heavily thought that billy was inspired by johnny gosch but theres not much about the others and i think its just really distasteful to compare real life murder victims to fictional horror characters just to get views/likes on tiktok, it comes across as insanely disrespectful to me but idk i havent seen anyone else talking about it so i might just be being sensitive

last thing that really really bothers me is grabber simps. while i do see it on tiktok i see it on here, tumblr, most often and its… so odd to me…. like why are you thirsting over the paedophilic serial killer… so so strange to me… i want to see art and character analysis and silly little posts about all the characters but every time i open the tbp tag i’m jumpscared by someones weird ass grabber x reader oneshot and its SO GROSS get that shit away from me😭😭😭😭 also saw this one girl on tiktok one time whos literal entire account was dedicated to the grabber and she defended this by saying the sa in the movie was “just a theory” which is so victim blamey girl i do not trust you there is so much evidence for it in the movie, again w the media literacy point, just because something isnt directly shown to you doesnt mean it isnt shown in other subtler ways… anyway i get if people like the grabber as a villain but actually like. loving him and thirsting over him is weird as fuck to me

so um ya the fandom is a trainwreck can we go back to there being like 3 of us please and thank u. if you actually read all this then Wow thank you its literally just me being chronically online and ranting about stuff that doesn’t matter in the real world at all

[thatdeadaquarius]

I have so many ideas but none of them can be put into words, all I can do is just wheeze as they come along🤣

Also remember how wordy and flowery Teyvat speech/dialogue is? ADD THAT TO THE FACT THAT TEYVAT HAS ITS OWN LANGUAGE---

Reader can understand the basic speech which is why they are so blunt (I love this idea so much 🤣) and can piece together an idea what the person is talking about.

*insert random person talking about a commission with a long ass backstory*

Traveller & Co.: *understands completely and making plans to retrieve said commission*

C!Reader: (They said they had a cart.... a bunch of hilichurls appeared... dancing?.... they want us to dance fight the hilichurls???? Dance off???)

Actual story->The person's cart got ambushed by a group of hilichurls and taunted them by dancing around it.

....... it doesnt always translate well

Also imagine Reader heaeing random names and overthinks it as a word instead of a name.

Example: Pantalone means pants in Philippine English (sorry not sorry Pantalone)

Tsaritsa??? Oh do they speak russian there??? - reader

Capitano -> captain in some countries

(I once mistake Sandrone as Sandalone and I just went "... ehh??? Standalone? Sandalone as in Sand Alone???? Sandal (Flip flops)????

Oh wait its Sandrone" ".... as in Sand and Drone??--)

-Vine Boom

VINE BOOM ANON MY BELOVED 💖❤🧡💛💚💙💜✨️✨️

Gif is me writing u anything ever:

AHFLALA FERRRALLL I STG I ALSO THOUGHT ABT THIS!! WHY U COULD ALSO BE BLUNT BC U ONLY GOT THE BASICS 💀 RIP

Man theyre written language looks so scary to learn, kinda like when I looked into trying to learn Mandarin/Japanese (and even Korean), the letters r just inherently so different i was so intimidated

And u dont even read it like left -> right like English

Omg i tried to reply to a arabic comment on my art post once, and i felt so acommplished when i finally was able to type "اشكرك (thanks)" but like, i had to put it on the OTHER SIDE OF THE TEXT BOX, LIKE ALIGN IT TO THE RIGHT INSTEAD OF HOW U KNOW ENGLISH IS INHERENTLY ALIGNED LEFT, IT WAS SO TRIPPY-

Going thru genshin life only understanding minimal words of anything anyone says is honestly how i feel like ive been playing Genshin LMAO

Those analysis videos/lore are saving a bitch's life out here

PANTALONE IS ALSO RLLY CLOSE TO SPANISH FOR PANTS I KNOW WHAT U MEANNN LOL

UR ENDLESS CONFUSION FOR SANDRONE PLEASE ANON U DIDNT EVEN GET IT RIGHT THE FIRST CORRECTION IT JUST KEPT GETTING WORSEEE 😂😭 SAME THO

That would literally be you in genshin tho, like i could easily see it being like, back to back misunderstandings 😭😭

Like u think u got it right (Oh so his name is Rex Lapis, wait what? Morax? Ok his name is Morax...?? What??? Zhongli??? WHO IS THIS MAN-)

.

JFC first they gotta have a whole different language (like u saw in game)

And ON TOP OF THAT THEY CAN TALK FOR 10 MIN STRAIGHT ABT THE WEATHER OR SOME SHIT??

No... just, no.

U quickly decide u like what little bits of language u could pick up so far, which just results in,

U guessed it, simple speech and short fragmented sentences (or broken Teyvatian)

U cant even bring urself to care when u give half the characters a heart attack and send the rest into laughing fits

No fucks given, they wanna make this extra hard on u by being wordy on top of a new language,

Yeah u dont care what comes out of ur mouth anymore

Also, since everybody is raised in Teyvat very few ppl dont know the language, which once again brings us back to ancient/older deities/creatures who have a more simplistic version/outdated version of modern language

.

Omg getting stuff mistranslated bc u cant understand it all/only keywords sounds like hell but also rlly funny

Traveler/Paimon: "Alright, yes, all is well. We will accept this comission, and depart soon."

You: "...they want us to?? Dance fight?? Hilichurls...???"

Traveler just stares at u half in pity, half trying to hide their amused smile, Paimon is giggling

The commissioner is shook bc a supposed ancient creature?? Just accepted?? Their simple commission?? And u think they want u to dance battle???

.

PLEASE U MISTRANSLATE THE HARBINGERS NAMES RIGHT TO THEIR FACES

Signora: "You shall rue the day you crossed the Fatui mortals!"

You: "Lady we don't care, just fight us."

(Signora just means 'Lady')

Signora: *offended gasp*

Traveler/Paimon trying to stifle laughter

Raiden Shogun jaw dropped a little

.

Pantalone: "What a pleasure to finally meet you traveler, and thine wonderful companions!" *little bastard smile*

You: "And it was awful to meet you, Pants."

Pantalone: 😶😧😡 "Pants?! HOW DARE YOU NOT EVEN GIVE ME THE MOST BASE RESPECT, AFTER I GREETED THEE SO KINDLY-"

.

Oh its so funny, everytime you talk about Childe you always phrase it like he's an actual child bc u thought everyone was just calling him a little kid for some reason (u dont know how Teyvat ages work, he could be for all you know!)

Not very long, but Vine Boom anon your brain >>>>

Ur ideas r so on point, i love them sm

That makes perfect sense why u could be talking blunt too, like an in world explanation really

For you, all the desserts🥰 🤲🍪🍨🍰🍮🧋🍦🍡

Cheers,

🌒🌊🌧Aquarius♒️🌌🌘

[suffarustuffaru]

i need to share my very horrible idea to combine the reinhard/julius/otto/subaru boy drama into one julius-centric fic

ok so a little while ago ive made all kinds of ottojuli and reinjuli posts and while i havent finished all my major julisuba posts Yet i am quite fond of julisuba also and i think itd be incredibly funny if you just dumped all of these ships into one story. just go ALL IN on that boy drama!!!! go big or go home amirite!!!! the worlds WORST love trapezoid youve ever seen!!!!

this post is just me rambling fic ideas bc i sadly dont have time for Every Fic Idea and also i just. i just think itd be funny putting multiple ships with the same person in them into one fic. on a serious level its like mimicking real life relationships where sometimes people come and go and you have different dynamics with each person!! on another level i just think this is also very funny so!! here we go. under the cut:

anyway so my idea for this is that you know, julius of course meets reinhard when hes ten and reinhard is eight and then it alters julius's brain chemistry. at first he's in complete awe of reinhard. and then over time the shame starts setting in. that julius isnt as strong as reinhard. and the jealousy sets in a bit too, so julius's got this chip in his shoulder trying to carry his family's legacy and trying to carry the weight of knighthood to be as perfect as possible. to be as close to reinhard as he can. they meet again in their teens and julius shows reinhard the ropes of like basic knight stuff bc reinhard just joined the knights. and of course reinjuli become friends but julius has spent his whole life quietly watching reinhard from afar and now julius still has that distance with reinhard even as theyre supposedly friends now. reinhard is a God, you know? his powers and his leash from the kingdom and his family keep him distant and the two of them are ignoring that. classic homoerotic "do i want him or want to be him" friendship where both of you are too scared to get any closer for various reasons with a Twist (reinhard's very real monster complex that keeps getting validated bc Everyone Around Him thinks hes a monster).

anyway but then julius remembers that you know, shit between reinhard and him wont work out for many reasons, like reinhards family deciding to torment julius at various points in his life (heinkel, whos julius's boss, and reid, who went from julius's childhood idol to. you know.), and also reinhard needs to have kids because hes the sword saint, and also homophobia exists in rezero. and also even if those werent all obstacles julius still has his Complexes connected to reinhard and they got that distance between them so. no go. (repression gets in the way of relationships :((( )

also quick side note is that ex 4 happens and julius reinhard ferris go to vollachia and julius interrupts a meeting with vincent vollachia himself to go "I UNDERSTOOD THAT LITERARY REFERENCE YOU JUST MADE. THATS A REALLY GOOD REFERENCE I LIKED IT A LOT" bc hes a massive nerd and ig this is slightly-more-of-a-disaster-gay julius au so julius is like ............................. vincent was kinda cool for that.

AND THEN SUBARU CRASHES INTO JULIUS'S LIFE and julius is like seeing this guy who's also got a chip in his shoulder and then he insults the knights and says the knights are all depending on their dads (nepotism) and julius is like .......the chip in my shoulder was bad enough and also youre kinda like me fr. and you are clearly a fucking misguided kid so now i have to save your ass. i cant NOT save your ass. and reinhards like "julius and subaru nooo you dont have to do this :((((" and julius cant admit atm that hes also doing this to save subarus life so julius is just like "he disrespected the knights >:(((("

but yes we all know what happened there. julius saves subarus life. julius has to slice subarus throat in that one failed loop. they become friends across several timelines. they also homoerotically share souls, you know, typical bromance things, rivals to lovers except subarus the one going YOURE MY RIVAL and julius is like he is SUCH an upstart. hes really grown on me like a fungus but thats the appeal. and julius i think sees subaru as like a kindred spirit (or at least thats how i interpret julisuba) except subaru is like way more freer than julius is. same desire to prove yourself but subarus not restraining himself constantly like julius. its sometimes to the point of recklessness and general stupidity and what have you, but his boldness and bravery and determination and heart really is admirable.........................

yeah so anyway julius falls for ANOTHER guy again, you know how it is sometimes. the heart wants what it wants and julius is cursed to always have the worst meetings with his closest friends. and of course julius gets heartbroken bc wtf i have to kill my new friend :((( noo!!!! but in the finished loop its like. oh subaru...... hes really improved himself. hes grown so much already. hes kind of. inspirational really. idk how he does it. except subarus you know got that Mystery to him the same way reinhard does (theyre traumatized and Cant Take About It Normally so they just randomly lore drop what they can) and also subarus SUPER into emilia. and julius is like .................... well. subarus taken. haha. and reinhards. taken. fuck me. fuck. and like somethings going on with subaru and rem and emilia right. fuck. and subarus got his whole toxic masculinity / gender crisis..... and he doesnt know hes Bisexual yet...... man. what a loss for julius amirite haha.

and also subarus busy after arc 3........... and julius has no idea whats happening there but that seems Real serious :(( and julius's got other things to attend to so he hopes subaru reaches out to him eventually..... or that they cross paths again since subarus in the emilia camp and julius is in ana camp (and of course reinhard is in felt camp and like that was a whole debacle bc wtf. reinhard, u do know thatd be a big deal to our mutual friend felix?). so. julius pines from afar ONCE AGAIN HAHA.

(also of course subarus still attracted to reinhard here. its um. well julisuba can bond now over pining over reinhard but thats for later also!!)

anyway of course during arc 3 julius briefly runs into some gray haired merchant twink thats being dragged around by subaru bc ana camp rescued this guy from a cave somewhere??? and this new guy and subaru made a deal or whatever so he was just helping out in the background of the fight against sloth??

and whaddya know................ julius goes to drink at a bar bc you know he probably tastes wine for fun in his free time (hes definitely Fond of wine anyway iirc) and now hes Sad over the Ones That Got Away so. bar it is. and gray haired merchant twink is there!! no way. they start talking a bit casually while drinking you know and julius's taste is Unfortunately either the graceful ones (anastasia, because julius has great taste in women) or the cringe fail ones (all the twinks - except for felix - that julius keeps having the wildest first meetings with, because julius has slightly shit taste in men) so julius is like huh this otto guys kinda funny lol. endearing in a weird way!! and -

oops they both end up being a little. they make a little bit of a move on each other. bc they were drinking and got a Bit tipsy. ottos Also not over the one that got away (subaru) (again) and hey. the finest knight truly is. Fine. objectively fine. totally. so you know. things get a little out of hand, maybe they do a bit of cringe fail flirting hidden underneath five million layers of repression and the Horrors of Being Known but ultimately they both embarrass themselves somehow (read: how far they went with each other while under the influence is up to you) and agree to Never Speak of This Again bc oopsies they were both technically each other's first time being Straightforwardly Not Straight with another man. oops. anyway julius has to go back to his camp and otto fucking bolts but he bolts right into subaru and gets his ass dragged into sanctuary drama.

julius is totally not a little bit envious about that.................... about otto getting to accompany subaru to sanctuary... but dont worry julius!! youll get to make up for it later!! bc eventually arc 5 stuff happens. and julius is Glad to see reinhard and subaru again. even with all the Baggage. and subaru is of course Weird about julius but eventually subaru reassures julius after they both confide in each other about the astrea drama (theyre honorary astreas via being dragged into the astrea family mess). and subarus reassuring to julius in a whole new way okay. subaru, whos unrestrained and incapable of being on the down low about anything, and julius, whos always holding himself back with a gazillion layers of repression, starts learning to let go a bit...

but also juliotto meet again. its terribly awkward and they both agreed to never speak of their awkward encounters again. subaru is going ??? and reinhard is clueless. otto then also goes to save reinhard and felt from heinkel trying to take felt hostage, which was also terribly awkward but reinhard and felt are grateful about it (but lbr if reinhard and otto knew each other deeper reinhard would maybe be a little. Apprehensive. around otto while otto would be sympathetic with reinhard bc hes like male emilia). but then while otto manages not to get erased by gluttony....... julius gets erased. of course. which you know results in being forgotten by reinhard in julius's THIRD first meeting ever with reinhard. and subarus the only one who remembers him of course.

then arc 6 happens :,))))) and julius of course has to confront his ideas of knighthood, his identity, his self esteem, and who he is outside of His Name. and also julius gets his ass beat by reid. his childhood idol. who reinhard KNEW was a shitty person but never ever told julius (whether this is because reinhard wanted to spare julius's hero worship or because reinhard never got the chance to tell julius is hard to say lajdsf). but julius does get to triumphantly win in the end!! grow as a person!!! learn to undo a bit of that repression and not hold himself to impossible standards all the time!! hes growing still!!! hes finally solidified his friendships with people like subaru and emilia!! hes remaking his relationship with anastasia!! hes asserted himself, hes planning on going to meet reinhard again one day and duel him!! things are looking up even if its still bittersweet that he doesnt have his name back yet!! does this mean?? perhaps?? a HAPPY ENDING?? julius can have the two men (reinhard and subaru) he admires the most in his life?????? as friends???? or as boyfriends?????? slowburn mutual pining????????????????????????????????????????

and then comes. arc 8 otto. that piece of shit.

julius is very much someone who has to grapple with the weight of the expectations that people throw at him. and also reinhard is someone who May envy julius a bit, but there's also you know, joshua and subaru with the Explicit Envy and (past) resentment because theyre placing heavy expectations on julius!! theyre pointing blame at julius!! julius is trying to find himself outside of stuff like that, especially after arc 6, but he's still got stuff to work on you know? he still has duties to fulfill!! loyalty that he has to act on bc hes gotta help subaru and co in arc 8!! and then in comes otto.

otto is also someone with expectation placed on him, but its Different. ottos mostly a nobody and when hes Not a nobody, his reputation tends to be Derogatory. hes a menace. hes a bad luck charm. hes grappling with the fact that he has to keep being left behind - post-arc 5 bc he was injured, but also repeatedly during arcs 7 and 8 because hes too physically weak to be on the same playing field as emilia or garfiel or subaru on the battlefield. he feels Useless after placing his identity on the expectation that hes Dependable and Useful.

julius is a bit more on even ground with otto now that julius is. also mostly a nobody bc his name is still gone. and also julius had to deal with having that part of his identity crushed. julius tried to be useful over and over in arc 6 only to get his ass repeatedly curb stomped by reid in the beginning. he was a nobody. he wasnt dependable anymore. and also otto is that one guy he had a Passing Fling with over having The Ones Who Got Away and julius was still vaguely hopeful about maybe being pals at least but ottos brushed him off a bit since arc 5. theyre like each others secrets you know? and now otto doesnt know that shit - julius is the only one who Knows - and otto also hates julius's fucking guts now. over SUBARU. and julius has been through this whole rodeo clown circus with arc 3 subaru so this is an absolutely terrible ride through memory lane.

and this is julius's THIRD twink that hates him for terribly unfair reasons. julius is very tired and a bit heartbroken in this au trying to pretend it doesnt bother him. on one level it doesnt. bc ottos pathetic and clearly Overcompensating for Something. on another level it kinda does bc julius had a Thing going with otto. and otto is the complete opposite of julius. like hes different from the other guys julius has liked.

julisuba is about complimentary opposites - they appear Extremely Different at first glance but theyre very similar. theyre people who try to look and act bigger than they are, people who keep reaching to be The Best, to be Perfect, because theyre overcompensating. theyre worried their entire identity is only built off of trying to be bigger than the shadow that other people in their lives (like their families) cast. but they cant reach perfection. and julius is like subaru but if subaru tried to really make himself "refined" - if he tried to stop putting his heart on his sleeve all the time. reinsuba are very similar too. theyre very refined knights who try to keep themselves in check at all times while the weight of the world is on their shoulders. they cant have a hair out of place. except julius is like the "smaller" version of reinhard. julius is less powerful. its like comparing a human and a "god" - reinhard, whos untouchable. but its a double edged sword, because julius gets to be a normal person, because half the expectation placed on him is also purely from himself, while reinhard isnt. reinhard isnt Free. hes on a leash by the kingdom and his family. julius even gets his kind of "celebrity" status stolen from him via the loss of his name. hes truly kind of Normal now - julius is like if reinhard didnt have his crazy abilities and had a little more of a chance to be free.

otto? yeah otto is. very very far from all of that. hes so obviously imperfect that most of his reputation, when its brought up, is just him being known as a mess who's caused various forms of chaos everywhere he goes. either that or hes just. There. Invisible. very very average. and otto is someone who wants a nice comfortable life, someone who wants to fit in - julius and subaru arent Exactly like that, and while reinhard also wants to be normal, ottos the one who has more of an opportunity. but he doesnt. because otto Dooms Himself by being recklessly cutthroat. otto is like if subaru was just. More of an asshole, so ottojuli would just be a rather Extreme Challenge for julius to have to deal with HAH. and normally otto is someone who repays how people treat him - a very "you treat me like this, i'll treat you the same way in turn" kind of deal, except ottos developed a vendetta against julius and its basically like if subaru never let go of his arc 3 julius vendetta.

yes so anyway. etc etc stuff probably happens but i ran out of ideas lajdlfjasdf i just think combining ALL the boy drama and recontextualizing + adding to canon would be. batshit crazy. and terribly entertaining. im so sorry julius but i want to see you crack a bit under the pressure. reinjuli as a ship is like tragic gay yearning that never goes anywhere past being friends with quiet homoerotic tension, then julisuba is. you know. extreme rivals to lovers, starts out Rough but then ends up being super super sweet and theyre Trying their best underneath the self esteem issues. and then ottojuli is. toxic yaoi at its finest (pun intended). you get Every flavor of mlm possible!!

ok so you may be asking "ok what would you even name this fic then" and to that i say that this would be called To All the Boys I've Loved Before.

anyway i really wanna write this idea someday ill inform you guys (if youre reading this and are Interested) if it ever happens :< so. in conclusion this is just julius the entire time throughout all of these events:

[the-s1lly-corner]

Ookay this one is really really tooth rotting fluff level

Tadc x reader who just realized christmas is coming, and is freaking out with absolute glee and childlike wonder

TADC cast x reader who loves christmas!

AAAAAA im so so sorry i could have sworn i answered this but i guess i didnt??? i promise i didnt mean to leave this in the inbox this long on purpose i think i must have lost track of stuff </3 regardless, i hope you enjoy! admin must admit, asides from presents and the christmas tree, he doesnt do many holiday activities so... admin is underqualified for this but hes still gonna try! a lot of the character segments intertwine in this btw! like not in a "similar idea" thing but in a "they are actually overlapping and interacting with one another" way so !! side note unrelated to the post eheheheh the second batch of macarons have been piped! theyre now on the counter set out to dry, and ive got my ganaches out to get to room temperature so i can whip em up into a frosting :3

CAINE:

oh i just know that caine would lean hard into holiday stuff, plus i think he has the best sense of time in the digital world out of everyone.. plus he just seems like the kind of guy to celebrate all sorts of holidays, not just christmas! year round stuff, you know? not just winter... so you guys would likely team up and totally deck out the grounds to match the holiday spirit! sure caine on his own already puts in way too much effort decorating everything, he even makes it snow! but with you around he cranks it up to 11! lets just hope there arent any scrooges around, though.... also prepare yourself because he would definitely find a way to have christmas music play on loop in the background... somewhere... ambient music but its festive songs... i think caine is also the one responsible for most of the presents, since he can basically get most things with just a flick of his wrist! ooooo perhaps a date (platonic or romantic! up to you!) where you guys wrap the gifts together!

POMNI:

funny enough, while i usually think pomni would SUCK at cooking, i think she can make a mean hot coco. granted, hot coco and/or hot chocolate arent the hardest things to make, but... i dont know, its just different when she makes it... (recommendation from the admin, add a bit of cinnamon or nutmeg to your hot coco its a game changer frfr, this goes for a lot of chocolate stuff, actually. its like the chocolate-coffee effect but like. makes a different flavor profile. add a bit of nutmeg to your chocolate chip goodies. rn.)

anyways! pomni always keeps you supplied with hot coco, and honestly it benefits you both! keeps you nice and warm, plus its delicious; and it gives pomni something to do... i mean, its christmas... surely she can take it easy from trying to find the exit... just for the season... helps with her anxiety about the whole situation, you know? making digital food sure is weird, though...

RAGATHA:

as mentioned in gangles part, she joins you and gangle in helping making a skirt for the tree! keeping up with the idea of sewing things, i think she would also make stockings for everyone; leaving most of them blank so everyone can customize them however they like... but you and her get together to decorate your own together and just !! i just think thats sweet! depending on how soon caine starts putting the christmas stuff around, you and her might be able to make some ugly sweaters for yourselves! thats a christmas thing, right? oooo and they match.... OOOO YOU GUYS MAKE AN EXTRA LONG SCARF FOR YOU GUYS TO SHARE!!!! rolls around... she makes you mittens so you can go mess around in the snow caine put all over the grounds

JAX:

snowball fight. and i mean really intense once. in fact it wouldnt be too much of a stress to call it a snowball WAR! honestly jax might just be the type to put rocks in his snowballs.... but because this is meant to be nice and sweet, he wont... just this once, and because he feels TOO mean crushing your holiday spirit (even if your digital body would quickly recover from the possible injury...)

you guys make forts and go absolutely ham. the stuff ragatha had made for the two of you! i mean sure you guys cant succumb to hypothermia, buuuuuuuuuut being really painfully cold still sucks... but the sweaters help you guys stay out for longer to play! and you can perhaps ask pomni to make some hot coco

oh yes its all coming together

ooo perhaps you convince jax to make snow angels and snowmen with you... though, i think jax would make the snowmen purposefully unappealing... but maybe you think hes actually trying his best... oh you jolly little thing..

KINGER:

okay so i admit this one might be a stretch and its mostly because his robe already has the fur and he gives off grandpa energy (even though hes only 48 but hey some grandpas become grandpas young) but imagine somehow someway he dresses up as santa (and i say that loosely, his robe turns red and the fur turns a plain white), bonus if he wears a hat to tie in the entire look. while caine is the one getting the gifts and wrapping them, i like to think kinger would ask to be the one to put them under the tree at an ungodly hour. sweet man. chews

as for an interaction with the reader... hmm.. hes the last character im writing, everyone else already has their parts done... the one christmas activity i can think of that hasnt been taken yet is baking! honestly i can see him being a decent chef! maybe its the dad/granddad energy speaking to me again... perhaps its the admin projecting... buuuut imagine you two make shaped cookies togehter; stars, candy canes, trees, bells, ect... and you ice them together! sure they may not be the prettiest or look the most professional; but does that really matter when youre having fun? they still taste delicious!

ZOOBLE:

ok i get it, i tend to lean hard into the zooble being negative and/or unimpressed with things a liiiiiiiiittle too often, but again zooble doesnt strike me as the type to enjoy most holidays. they seem more of a halloween person to me, you know? though, i think that they would switch out their antennae for ones that resemble antlers more... or if they dont have those, they string lights up on them! all for you, just because they know how excited the holiday makes you. they dont care about many things, but they care about you... and if it means doing (harmless) things they normally wouldnt do, then so be it! dont expect them to get in on many holiday activities, though...

GANGLE:

you and her make decorations for the grounds and the giant digital tree caine put in the main common area! handmade ornaments, paper stars and snowflakes, things like that! you and gangle stay up take cutting each thing, applying the colors and the glitter and any small details.... dozens of times.... because caine chose a tree that was way too big than it needed to be.... oh you might have to have gangle on your shoulders so she can reach the higher points of the tree! sits and thinks.... ooouuuuuuuuugh you guys make a skirt for the tree together with the help of ragatha... little group activity... sobs...

[ana-nya-cat]

marowak, day 17 of drawing every mon in GSC OU

i love marowak in gcs OU, its so graciously ungracious, it kinda is a choice band pokemon in gen 2, kinda

happy with thiss drawing, tho i feel like i made the outlines a bit too think, eh

the pose was a doozy to settle on, i wanted to make a pose with more movement, but i just wasnt being able to do one which was good, because i have never made more active poses like that, and marowak is a bit too awkward too be the first, awkward design wise i mean, also i just wanted to mention how fucking funny it is that the hgss is probably the best sprite but it was redone for bw, a shame

i have got on the new tcg pokemon gacha game and im hoping i get a marowak ex. i have no idea if the mon actually is good i just want to have my marowak

next one will be the last pokemon alone, snorlax (im pretty sure)

once again i will say im not drawing jynx and i propose a jynx mega ban on all competitive formats cuz she sucks

i had a marowak in frlg with a bone club, it took hours to get it, i think i deleted the save file, which is a shame, but if i ever replay i will reuse marowak, along other mons ive found greater appreciation along the years

i do like the lore catastrophe that is cubone and marowak, like as far as i know every fucking cubone mom dies, so it makes the whole team rocket thing a bit less tragic, but also its like even if everyone is gonna die doesnt mean murder is right

i love team rocket, theyre simple but that makes them special honestly, they may not make many things, but they make fucking money

[nanistar]

do you have any tips on story writing / comic making? ive got something all plotted out but i just dont know where to start with executing it

hmmm this one is tough because i have a long history of starting and giving up on comics, even if i have a full script written out. i'm personally really bad at the whole planning-stuff-out thing. i tend to work in short bursts and write stuff maybe two or three scenes in advance.

i think my best advice would be: if you have something planned out, and you're excited to start working on it, just start working on it.

don't wait to find the perfect beginning, because in my experience, you'll eventually lose confidence or motivation if you wait too long. the worst thing that will happen is you might come up with a cooler idea later, but the good thing about webcomics is you can always start over, especially if it's early on. my "main" comic- something ive been working on since 2014- i have started and stopped about 6 times, and i have changed the plot/settings completely about as many times. i even wrote it out as a 100+ page novel for a creative writing class in high school. i actually started SBC with the intention of doing a short 1-2 year comic to kinda "warm up"

share some of your process online and with friends for feedback as you go with pre-planning. when i was building up the mojave clan concept, briskwater was intended to be the main character, with vulturepaw, a sunclan cat, having an unrelated but major side story but when i shared my first character sketches with my friend server, they all went bonkers over Saltburn so i changed my plan to focus on her. you don't have to share everything, but just having people initially interested in your story is a HUUUGE motivation boost. if you're having troubles scripting a start, don't script. think about openings to shows/series that you like and just start sketching stuff. i really like the foreboding prose-like openings of Fellowship of the ring and Avatar the last airbender, that tells you everything you need to know about the world itself, and mayhaps foreshadows a bit, but is still opened-ended enough that it can go anywhere. you can also start in media res; AKA start where the action all ready happened/is happening, and do a "teaser" of sorts, and then go back, sometimes called a Cold Open (tho that one is used mainly in TV, and some argue it's different but they're both functionally the same thing). think about how procedural investigation shows will often show you an obscured view of how the episode's victim gets murdered/kidnapped/whatever, and then it launches into the shows opening credits.

also finally, and i mean this so, so genuinely, it does not have to be perfect, and it wont be. you are going to be drawing SO many characters so many times, so many BGs ect, things are going to slip through the cracks that that's OK. you can take shortcuts, you can be lazy, you can have continuity errors. also give characters in the BG funny stupid faces instead of worrying about details because its fun to do

sooo yah. that's all i got TLDR: look at intros to media you like, and steal their style. don't worry about getting it perfect. if you have even a slim idea of what you want, just go for it and it will come to you. if you don't know what you want.... also just go for it.

also. my style of writing/comics works for me, but it might not work for you so take any advice i give with a grain of salt. ask other comic folk, like @razmerry and uh. ive been sitting here for 15 minutes but i literally forgot every other comic person ever. so sorry. but anyone who knows things feel free to add on.

[trashworldblog]

i think the "nice doing business with you" line from the s5 finale is definitely going to have significance to season 6. there are too many examples of innocuous lines that end up being foreshadowing to overlook it. it's also a general rule of genies that they can't bring things back from the dead, so i think that's going to end up playing into whatever the "deal" with ryan was. the genie could've said it was against the rules to bring prof back, so ryan made another deal to get him back (1/2)

[i think there's also going to be a conflict with time travel in season 6. it's such an integral part of the show, and ryan definitely screwed the timeline by bringing prof and his family back. if we hadn't seen the article with the photo of the prof and his parents' fossils, then i would be a little less convinced of this, but because its explicitly shown onscreen, its very likely that something will go wrong with the timeline (2/2)

oh i also think that the substitute survived defenestration, but i think he's going to be a minor antagonist next season. just a nuisance, if you will. like yeah he's still a problem, but there are much bigger fish to fry than a 1'2" puppet hologram with an obsession with murder (3/3)]

...

sorry for taking so long!! this has been sitting in my drafts and ive been slowly pulling my thoughts together on this so its taken me some time!! (plus ive been chillin with the holidays and such) i appreciate this ask so much!

!disclaimer! i may accidentally pull from shane's commentary on the season finale on pateron. im doing my best not to because i know some people dont have access to patreon content. (plus its fun to make it more challenging) all puppet history lore is like marbles in my brain and its hard to separate what ideas came from where. im doin my best tho!

ok lets jump into it!

i am So. Curious. on how ryan and the genies whole deal is gonna shake out. was that it? will there be consequences? i have a feeling we'll be seeing some kind of fallout from this wish. it feels like they cut their conversation very short for a very specific reason. theres gotta be something going on there.

I think that ryan didnt *technically* wish the professor back to life, he just wished the professor back to the present. i also like the idea used in @ask-the-substitute that ryan used his 3 wishes to bring the professor back and thats how the profs mom and dad got to the present. its so perfect, i love it. just the idea of ryan thinking the first wish didnt work so then he tried again, and again. incredible.

i am curious if there is gonna be any time travel conflict! im not sure what that would look like (my brain kinda melts when it comes to timey wimey bullshit). honestly this is the part im the most unsure of. like theyre probably is consequences, but i dont even know where to start for what that would look like. i still like to think that the article showing the professor's family's bones just faded away like how people in photos did in back to the future.

the substitute ABSOLUTELY survived the defenestration!! watcher hq is one story and im slightly convinced the substitute cant die (unless we go by hot daga hologram logic, in that case you would need a witch and a volcano to kill most holograms [and i dont have a volcano handy])

i hope the substitute turns into either

1) a minor villan thats more annoying/funny then anything.

2) character redemption arc. we really like this funky guy and it would be cool to see him chill out with the stabby stabby. (just a little, he can stabby stabby as a treat)

now it would be REALLY FUNNY if the substitute did ad reads for future seasons Especially for nord vpn and other online security stuff.

i think the bigger fish to fry is gonna be those puppets trapped in the wonderium arena!! we gotta get them outta there and back into their earthly bodies!! how is that gonna happen??? god is asleep, the devil isnt gonna help, and neither is the genie. how the hell do you even get to a purgatory like that? dorthy ruth has moved on even though her husband isnt really dead!!!

what im really curious about for next season is

1) who is gonna be the musical guest. if the professor cant time travel, where is he gonna get his musical talents? will he reuse the substitutes tech to make guests?

2) any new stuff to go with our new professor??

3) are dino mom and dad gonna be involved? casually mentioned? i really hope a guest asks if the professor has a family just so that he can excitedly say "yes!! i do :D"

those are most of my thoughts going into s6! pretty excited to see what next season is going to look like! not sure if its gonna be lore heavy. ill be keeping an eye peeled for any hints 👀 either way, im excited to learn :)

[schwarzeneggr]

Ive been making friends... so i got : a few old friends. one friend from an old psych clinic. and a whole group of funny people from current clinic im living my best life with them but also... ive never had so many people in my life 🧍 like how am i supposed to manage everyone... How do I keep up im fr i went from friendless to suddenly like 7 friends i genuinely like im overwhelmed... also i really like being alone and listening to music and drawing 15 hours a day and i gotta catch up on the office to talk abt yaoi with my other friend and its like impossible here ? is this normal peoples daily life im fr learning this at 26 is making me dizzy. i have no idea how to manage all of this. On top of uhm. y'kno. being in a psych clinic for a reason.. and I really want to work on my charity zine so bad. Genuinely wtfff do I do i used to fill my time with activities so suddenly realizing i am. included ? in friendships with people i like genuinely so I have to maintain the friendship and not go full ignore mode for weeks.. which i cant do anyway since me and my psych clinic friends see each other lunch and dinner. Its been 2 weeks of friendshipping and i genuinely want to take an entire week of absence to recover.. I used to need a full 3 days to recover from one small social gathering. This is insane. fuck i didnt even include my dnd groupe i feel like i need to start writing a list. How does a person whose the type of people to have like 3 to 4 friends they really like sitcom style manage more friendships than they can handle.. this is hurting my head

[timothylawrence]

What was racist and sexist in borderlands 3? I played it once so long ago and never finished so I can barely recall what happened in that game. I have no plans to go back to it either but I really would like a refresher on this :) the only thing I can remember is the bs they pulled with Aurelia

ive answered this a couple of times before and ill link my answers below but the whole Katagawa jr/Promethea arc is rooted in racist stereotypes, Aurelia being completely re-written into a villain for no reason (yes even the writers have stated they have no idea why shes evil now lmao), and then the clusterfuck of a mess that was guns love and tentacles all just makes the game uncomfortable.

Also, many people forget Balex's entire character which is...?? i hate my ex girlfriend??? like i genuinely do not see why he hates her so much lmfao other than for breaking up with him. he's a type-a incel character that is supposed to be 'funny' to the audience and others and its just violently uncomfortable. Aurelia again comes up here where she suddenly calls the players 'whores' for no reason?? like she has a point in tps where she refuses to curse at the robot but for some reason every other word that leaves her mouth is 'whore' ?? That isn't even getting into the fact vaughn has a girlfriend he got from rigging a game show -> said woman also has no speaking lines and only ever screams gibberish lmao

here's an ask i got about promethea's arc specifically that goes more in depth

again like. to some it might not be that bad but as a woc its just. horrid. i cant remember half the game because i was just entirely tuned out lol

[millermenapologist]

https://www.tumblr.com/millermenapologist/753018718824660992/ive-read-right-now-your-list-of-topics-you-would?source=share

Actually, that was a smart fucking response!! I doubt I would answer in this level, I mean, you made me realize I talk like a teenager compared to you (that's a compliment btw💖)

And I as someone who haven't read the book, You managed to clarify some things I had no idea about, and the whole concept of 90s is actually true and a point that never came to my mind when thinking about lolita: this was an era in Hollywood with this concept of "oh naughty teenager falls in love with older man or a male with some kind of power (like a teacher)" - I mean, The Crush starring Alicia Silverstone is an example. Those really had a part of internalize to people the belief that teen girls have a dubious innocence.

And what you said by the end just confirmed that this movie is truly what I was thinking: a coquette horror story🫠

I feel bad for her. I mean, she had a hard ass fucking life even after him, and then died so early giving birth. When I remember about the girl reading in her backyard or loving a normal life with her mom, it's hard to imagine that this person is the same one that had that life and ending. Does the movie says something about her baby and husband, or not?

Anon you're too kind (๑•з•)))⋆♡⋆ฺ=͟͟͞͞=͟͟͞͞

Also, I 100% talk like a teenager too. I'm one of those annoying ass people who repeats "like" every other word, the magic of having learned English by watching YouTube videos from 2016. My writing just happens to be a lot more curated in style because my college internship was at a place that required a lot of writing and not only I was the only woman, but I was also the only ESL, so... it was the trenches. The trenches, I tell you!

Oh, and on this topic! In his entire career of (bestselling) writer, Nabokov rarely did impromptu interviews: if someone wanted to interview him, he'd ask for them to send him a letter containing all the questions they wanted to ask him, would type down the answers, and then read them out loud during the interview. He claimed that his reason to do so was because English wasn't his native language, but it was very much another way for him to fuck with people.

Rest of the "professional" answer below the cut, and beware that, because of the very last question, I'm gonna mention stillbirth.

We are still getting this kind of movies, tbh. Miller's Girl is from this year, and it comes with a very similar premise too: young girl (albeit this time we managed to get her to turn 18! Let the kingdom rejoice!) goes out of her way to seduce a much older man because the idea of it tickles her fancy, and, as a consequence, his life is ruined from top to bottom despite him being the actual victim of the story.

We did get a lot better, as a society, at treating kids like kids (just look at the stark difference between Katherine Hardwicke's Thirteen and Bo Burnham's Eighth Grade), but as soon as we're talking about (especially) girls in their late teens, then it's still treated like open season.

Anyways, yeah, the movie is a coquette horror story, and I can't but find funny the fact that so many people on TikTok got up in arms when others started referring to Lolita as "coquette." It is. We can acknowledge it's a story about a child being abused while also recognizing its soft atmosphere and pastel tones.

I do wish that the coquette people would also find a way to include the horror too, tho...

[...] to buying beautiful things for Lo. Goodness, what crazy purchases were prompted by the poignant predilection Humbert had in those days for check waves, bright cottons, frills, puffed-out short sleeves, soft pleats, snug-fitting bodices and generously full skirts! [...] Did I have something special in mind? coaxing voices asked me. Swimming suits? We have them in all shades. Dream pink, frosted aqua, glans mauve, tulip red, oolala black. Part 1, Chapter 25, p. 107

You picked them? They're just there for a second, a small detail that your brain barely notices, but Humbert did, indeed, refer to the shade of pink he wanted to buy for Dolores' swimsuit as "glans mauve," and the black swimsuit is not simple black, it's "oolala black," which hints towards it being a lacy undergarment designed to look sexy.

The whole book is littered with descriptions of what Dolores wears, and although the coquette style definitely does fit those descriptions, what it constantly misses is that sense of uneasiness that comes from them, the little details that make you furrow your eyebrows, re-read, and go "Oh."

Also, I definitely forgot to mention this in the other response, but I think that the movies (both) aged Dolores up, brought her to a very vague age that was around ~16ish, but in the book Nabokov was very clear: Humbert is only attracted to children aged from 9 to 14 at most (he has a whole monologue about it that wasn't brought up in neither of the adaptations), and Dolores was 12 when they first meet. The bulk of the novel takes place between the summers of 1947 and 1949, and Dolores was born on January 1st 1935. At her oldest, when she was with Humbert, she was 14.

Sooooo... to your actual question (the yapping I do, my god...).

Charlotte wasn't exactly a good mother to Dolores, and the movie sweetened her a lot, and not just because he brought Humbert into their home (it's a common trait of predators, to target single mothers to have easier access to children).

In the book, Dolores used to have a younger brother, a child who had died at 2 in a very tragic accident (he's never brought up again afterwards, but it does reinforce one of the main themes of the novel: childhood lost, in the most literal of senses), and Charlotte is hinted as having greatly preferred him to her daughter.

The reason why Humbert escalates to plotting her murder isn't because Charlotte sent Dolores to summer camp (although he complains and complains about it, defining it as him losing two months of her beauty), but because she wants to send her away forever.

"Ah," said Mrs. Humbert, dreaming, smiling, drawing out the "Ah" simultaneously with the raise of one eyebrow and a soft exhalation of breath. "Little Lo, I'm afraid, does not enter the picture at all, at all. Little Lo goes straight from camp to a good boarding school with strict discipline and some sound religious training. And then - Beardsley College. I have it all mapped out, you need not worry." Part 1, Chapter 20, p. 82-83

We have no reason to doubt the truthfulness of this conversation because it works in Humbert's favor: of course he planned to murder his wife! He wanted to take away from him the love of his life, whatever else was he supposed to do? Wouldn't the kind gentlemen of the jury understand his actions, had they been in his place?

So... Dolores would've probably ran away from her mother too, if she had had the possibility. Or from boarding school.

As for her husband and baby, the movie greatly diminished their role in the themes of the plot.

For starters, when she writes him the letter asking for help, she does so by opening with "Dear Dad," and then continues to do so for the entirety of it, referring to herself as "Dolly" in the bottom signature. She desperately wants to believe that that's what he'll now be for her: a father, nothing else. Just... she was terribly scared, and this is a sentiment that's completely overshadowed by Humbert's feelings. She's pregnant and penniless, and so terrified for her future that she went out of her way to contact the man who abused her for years (and that she suspects killed her mother) in the hope that he wouldn't act like a monster and lend her just enough money to get to Alaska, where her husband wants to go because he heard that there are a lot of jobs there.

And you know what his response to the letter is? He becomes angry, violent, and plans to murder her and her husband both. He goes to her house with the intention of doing so, and the only thing that stops him is that he suddenly finds himself recognizing his Lolita in Dolly.

Her husband, Dick (and yes, the name is not a random choice), is a hard-of-hearing man who is completely oblivious to what happened to her. Dolores, a girl who spent her entire life being unheard, ultimately married a man who cannot hear her either. She has to yell at him to be heard, has to scream or force herself into his field of vision to make sure he's paying attention. No matter how much the people say they feel for her, she's still isolated, she's still alone, she's still unheard. Dick is as deaf to her needs and voice and personhood as Humbert was.

As for the baby, we gotta do some plot "rearrangement". The movie opens with Humbert reminiscing his early adolescence spent on the French Riviera with Annabel (again, I still don't understand why in the adaptation they have sex, but whatever), and only at the end (and in text) we're told that Humbert died in prison, Dolores died in labor, and that her baby was a stillborn.

In the book, we get this information as a first thing, in a Foreword written by John Ray Jr, PhD, who informs the readers that:

[...] their author, had died in legal captivity of coronary thrombosis, on November 16, 1952, a few days before his trial was scheduled to start. [...] Mrs. "Richard F. Schiller" died in childbirth giving birth to a stillborn girl, on Christmas Day 1952, in Gray Star, a settlement in the remotest Northwest. Foreword, p. 3-4

Nabokov makes you read the entire plot already telling you how it ends: Humbert gets arrested and these are his confessions, a woman married to a certain Richard Schiller dies in childbirth. You already know, and yet, plot-wise, it makes perfect sense that he'd spoil it within its very first few pages.

The following decision I make with all the legal impact and support of a signed testament: I wish this memoir to be published only when Lolita is no longer alive. Part 2, Chapter 36, p. 308-309

Again, Nabokov is fucking with us. The sole act of getting the book published means that Dolores is dead, and therefore it should be of absolutely no surprise, when the reader realizes that "Mrs. Richard Schiller" is no other than the titular Lolita and that she died in childbirth (and generally, though, the very last paragraph of the novel contains so much information and deserves so much analysis that it'd require a post of its own lol.)

So, now for the baby.

One of the main themes of the story is that of the double (Dolores is the double of Annabel; Humbert is the double of Quimby; Charlotte is a double of Humbert's mother; Humbert's name itself is a double; in the scene in which they walk in their room at the hotel where Humbert assaults Dolores for the first time, he describes it by saying that each object has itself and then its twin reflection in the mirror), and Dolores' baby has a double too.

Some motels had instructions pasted above the toilet (on whose tank the towels were unhygienically heaped) asking guests not to throw into its bowl garbage, beer cans, cartons, stillborn babies. Part 2, Chapter 1, p. 146

It's the slightest of mentions, just as with many other things, but it's there, aids the theme and serves as foreshadowing for what's to come. And, again, Nabokov just genuinely liked fucking with his readers.

Uhm... I think this response is finished here? Lemme know if you (or anyone else) wants more of this, because I could seriously go on all day ʚ♡⃛ɞ(ू•ᴗ•ू❁)

[that-one-raccoon]

THOGUTS ON THE NEW COIL CHAPTWR???? IF U HAVNT POSTED ABT IT ALREADY

AALJSJNJSNSJDGSJNSDGJN

SORRY THIS HAS BEEN SITTING IN MY INBOX FOR DAYS

(seriously how did this take almost a week to get to omfg im so sorry)

okok

i have.... so many thoughts about this new chapter

FIRST OFF

the gang ♥️ ♥️ ♥️

i love them. i also love how begrudgingly pansy got accepted, i love her character and i need dazai and pansy to be best frenemies

Second off, oooasodjjf GEORGE

THAT"S MY BOY!!!!

no seriously he's one of my favorite characters ever and i dont even know why

Percy!! Get 'em!!!

also,,,, them talking about Dazai possibly getting sent to azkaban is so interesting to me because there's no way dazai's innocence getting proven and the whole sensitivity to magic is getting wrapped up in three chapters and *checks notes* the next book is the prisoner of azkaban so.... 👀 👀

and considering how we have the whole DOE situation i think that, if we do get another installment, Kouyou might play a larger role which i'm really excited about (i love her)

(i really hope we get a third installment but seeing how shitty some people have been to allegory there is very much a possibility that it isn't going to happen. its a shame, but also very fair considering the type of shit people have been commenting)

the whole chamber scene was really funny to me jsut the loyalty club (back together again♥️♥️♥️) bickering the whole way was just hilarious.

Dazai and Pansy being reluctant frenemies, and a shit ton of Blazai contenttttt yesssssss

THE. FIGHT. SCENE.

AAJASIJDOIFSSGI

was so good???!!! also i love the trend of dazai passing out after the final boss of the story it's hilarious

oh i cant wait until snape gets the potions in order bc i need a poppy interaction

(if the idea of her adopting dazai is still on the table, then his possible arrest would make a fantastic conflict ohhhhh i can smell the angst potential)

OH I ALMOST FORGOT

if you couldn't tell ive been thinking about the azkaban theory way too much and i was wondering...

what if the dementors arent magic?

HEAR ME OUT

obviously they're magic, in a sense. but because abilities and magic are practically the same thing in different fonts in this universe, i wonder if the dementors are similar in nature to lovecraft's "ability"

meaning, dazai wouldn't be able to nullify their effects.

that would be so interesting to explore

but anyway yeah all in all, amazing chapter, i cannot wait to see what's in store for next chapter (tomorrow, wow this is so late im so sorry)

[h0n3yk1tt3n]

4 17 22

4. How many fic ideas are you nurturing right now? Care to share one of them?

I think for simplicity's sake I'm gonna say.. three. Tales From The Lagniappe, Pink Foam on Play Night, and the newly renamed freshman fic My Kingdom For a Whole Lotta Bullshit. TFTL is still pretty loose, MKFAWLB is still mostly comprised of old ass crumbs from 2018-2020, so here's a snippet for PFOPN

A simulated hand gave him a pat on the shoulder. “That’s your cue, slugger,” the SQUIP almost sang. Jeremy swallowed thickly, voice wavering. “She’ll do whatever I want.” “That’s what I promised.” It sounded so innocently proud of such a horrific feat, like a cat that'd brought a dying bird to the doorstep, the poor creature’s blood staining the concrete as it struggled to cling onto each weak breath it took. But the cat didn't know that its act of affection wouldn't translate the way it thought it would. Or it didn't care; you could never really tell what was going on in the cat's head. 

17. Do you write your story from start to finish, or do you write the scenes out of order?

Oh out of order as fuuuck. The Swamp Fever campaign (ch 14-17) of L2C was closer to being finished than Dead Center (ch 2-5) for a looong time before I finally focused more on finishing the chapters chronologically so they'd be done in time for posting.

22. Choose a passage from one of your earlier fics and edit it into your current writing style. (Person sending the ask is free to make suggestions).

Um. Funny story, that's like. Exactly what I'm doing with PFOPN and MKFAWLB lol. Pink Foam is a spiritual rewrite of The Play-centric chapters of my first fic and My Kingdom is going to completely overhaul what I was planning to do for this. (I was debating on whether to add onto this fic like it hasnt been 6yrs since ive touched or to just start over and rewrite the first couple of chapters. For archival purposes, im leaning toward the latter) So. Uh. Lemme see what I've got!

The SQUIP didn’t even need to actively fight Michael to make it difficult to give Jeremy the Red Dew, as his pained writhing was more than enough to make the task near impossible. It might’ve been easier to wrap him in a blanket burrito just to keep his limbs from flailing around, like he were a skittish cat that needed to be held still for a vet. But Michael didn’t have a blanket or some readily available equivalent, and straddling Jeremy wasn’t getting him very far, so the best he could do was try and restrain him from behind. This was more effective at keeping Jeremy still when it was a full body effort, but it didn’t give Michael the freedom to actually get the bottle open, so the victory was hollow.

A recently familiar clickity clack caught Jeremy’s ear, and thankfully Michael’s too, as he was waving a hand trying to flag down a certain popular kid on crutches. The context of Jeremy being locked between Michael’s legs on the ground was clearly lost on Jake, but they couldn’t really complain when he hobbled over to see what all the commotion was about.

“Jake! This is gonna sound weird, but if I hold down Jeremy, can you make him drink this Mountain Dew Red?” Michael tossed the bottle up to Jake, watching him catch it out of the air.

Jake looked between the bottle and the two of them for a moment, then flashed an annoyingly charming smile that anyone attracted to guys would swoon at. “Actually? That doesn’t sound weird at all.”

Thank fuck for chaotic theatre nonsense expanding Jake’s horizons on what constituted ‘weird.’

“Up, up, down, down, left, right, A.”

Jake hissed and winced at some internal pain - one that Jeremy immediately knew the cause of when he felt it too - bringing one hand up to his forehead. He grinned unnaturally wide and unscrewed the bottle's cap with just his thumb and index finger. Carbonation escaped with a fizzy hiss as the lid clicked against the ground and rolled under a prop dresser. Pastel soda foam poured over the lip of the bottle like a baking soda volcano before Jake turned the capsule upside down, letting all the Red Dew come down like a bloody waterfall with several glugs in rapid succession.

[tonydaddingham]

The people expecting the Derringer thing to come back and be relevant are the funniest people to me bc if you knew anything about Derringers you'd know that they probably SPECIFICALLY picked that one for Aziraphale because Derringers are absolutely useless. No one with an ounce of common sense would own one, because you'd have to be standing RIGHT in front of your target to have any chance of actually hitting it. And even then you only get like. Two shots. They just look cool to have and can be easily concealed.

Short disclaimer that I've never used a gun in my life, I just know how physics work, I've listened to my grandfather talk about them, and I learned about them in class when we covered Lincoln's assassination. Because the only way Booth was able to actually do any damage with the Derringer was by standing literally directly behind him.

hi anon!!!✨ okay ive stewed on this a while, and let's get into it. ultimately - no, i have no idea how the Derringer thing will play into s3, either!!! i have some knowledge of firearms, but tbh my mental Derringer file doesn't go beyond what you've already said.

now, neil did say in an ask that he imagines that aziraphale picked up a hollow book at an estate sale and found something to put in it (ie a gun, bc of course, why not), or accidentally bought the gun inside the book already, and later got the license to legitimise it. the line that is more intriguing for me however, is "...in case i get into a scrape". this could support that aziraphale either kept the gun for protection, or bought the gun for protection. either way, a deliberate decision was made to keep it when - let's face it - he doesn't bloody need it.

the thing that's bugging me is that i cant think of, nor find, a single literary reference to a book safe/hollowed book for a gun in literature that would predate 1941 - someone may know of one, come shout at me! - that aziraphale would take inspiration from. crowley even says, "you read too many books!" so, if he did come across a hollowed book, why would his mind jump to filling it with a gun? based on this, i think it's more likely he probably accidentally bought the whole thing as a set, and just resolved to keep it and get a license.

aziraphale has so many opportunities to crack out the gun if he truly needed it; the novel mentions the shady people that kept turning up to try forcing him to sell the bookshop, then you have the lockdown video that mentions the burglars (tho, personally i don't fully hold the video as canon... but i know some do), then presumably glozier and harmony came into the bookshop to recruit aziraphale... of course, all instances where the gun was arguably not warranted, but regardless, it literally isn't - he doesn't need a gun to protect himself. ✨it's the aesthetic✨ but actually, isn't it arguably more crowley's aesthetic than his?

another question for me is which book it could be; aziraphale (pointedly?) doesn't say which one. the trope, from what i can recall of other recent literary/screen examples, sometimes will use the bible - it's particularly droll because characters will comedically refer to it as protection, and aha, there's a gun inside! it's used in much the same way that someone will get shot, especially any clergymen, in a film and the reason they survive is because the round is caught embedded in a tiny, concealed bible, or its buried in a crucifix necklace, etc.

so essentially, at the end of all that rambling, im personally no clearer. one thing we do know is that muriel is now custodian of the bookshop, and may likely find it buried away somewhere. it could be very comedic that they might bring a gun to a... miracle? fight, and it basically be utterly useless, but funny for the "you need a license for that!" or similar line. but that's hardly a chekhov's gun of any meaning, right? someone came up with, somewhere, a very funny hc that aziraphale might swap out the BOL with the book containing the gun, which also has potential to be very funny, but im not sure that the BOL is in fact a book.

tldr: i have no idea on where the gun thing could go. anyone else have any ideas?✨