#I mean some of them are not even ghost ships (in the drama)

[scarefox]

new ghost ship detected 😏

wait there is more

[izzabela]

I don’t know if anyone has asked this before, but the Lin Kuei trio with a reader who works as a military special forces operator? I don’t know but I’d like to think that on tactical terms the Lin Kuei and a military soldier can work pretty well together so I would definitely want to see how this will play out

When Worlds Collide - Lin Kuei x GN!spec-ops!reader (headcanons?)

in which past meets modern warfare

a/n: bro the fact you requested this and i'm getting into COD is INSANE THE TIMING IS AWESOME

ship[s]: none

warning(s): cod x mortal kombat?? ghost reference? soap ref? gaz & price reference??

You are a spec-ops soldier, working with the most elite soldiers in the world under the guidance of the American military. With the Outworld Investigations Agency opened, they're gonna need some manpower....

Introducing you and TF141, so perhaps this is a mk x cod fic??

- all three of the brothers would be very impressed with your records and awards. you are a decorated member, and the fact you are decently younger compared to your coworkers impresses them further

- Tomas asks you questions. lots of them. where you've been, what you've seen, the kills you have (it surprises you he knows the difference in the terms), he even asks others about you

- Bi Han wants to inspect every piece of modern equipment you have. he asks incredibly well-informed questions about the weapons, he even sketches ones that pique his interest the most so he can show his clan back at home

- Kuai Liang is the lucky brother who gets to hold and try the equipment. you and your team watch over him in the gun range as he shoots down practice targets with ease (ninja precision is crazy)

- Tomas and Soap might get along the best. he'd definitely be thrown off by how vulgar the team gets, but he and Soap are very friendly with one another

- Bi Han, Ghost, and Price. those two would be having a blast together talking about manly adult leadership stuff

- Kuai Liang might get along best with Gaz. Something about these level-headed men having a normal conversation in front of neanderthals is refreshing to you, snd you really appreciate that

- teamwork wise, not including the 141, they'd work pretty good with you. you're a great all around: sniper, foot-soldier, hand-to-hand, you know the drills for the shit they go through on the daily

- specifically, you and Kuai Liang would work together with a knowing silence. something like Price and Ghost since those two knew each other for so long. something about you and Kuai covering each other's asses without saying a word means you guys are in perfect sync. i can imagine it (can't you?)

- working with Bi Han is like Price and Soap, or Ghost and Soap. You definitely would try and liven up the mood as you off enemies left and right. Bi Han might actually scold you mid battle, too, expecially talking about distractions

- Tomas is Gaz, and working with him is like nothing but butter sliding smoothly on bread. Tomas is everything in a package: smart, skilled, quick-witted, and level-headed. Tomas knows when it's the right time to do things

- i think you and Bi Han would get into the worst spats and fights when discussing how to further push into battle. i'd say it gets physical, with you ordering him to stand down as the "professionals handle this"

- Kuai Liang and you could also get into some hefty drama and fights too. i think Kuai would actually apologize too, considering that maybe you might have seen more than him

- outside of the missions, everyone gets along well (maybe). when the three lin kuei bros are out drinking with you and your team, that shit is fire. Tomas probably gets drunk first, but that's after maybe five cups of hard ass liquor

- Kuai is next drunk, then Bi Han

- back to mission stuff, when you and the Lin Kuei trio aren't fighting, you guys agree on strategy rather easily. in fact, they like how you pull your strats. Bi Han takes mental notes to implement to the clan

- yeah, that's it

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

guys i want to write a COD fic soon, but idk who to start with. after my reqs though

also, school started for me, so writing may be coming slower

see yall in the next fic!

[madockisser]

thought dump on new tfota book:

i think the reason that there’s going to be another jurdan book (supposedly) is mostly because Jude and cardan both have very unfinished stories.

you know that deleted scene at the end of qon where Jude and cardan are all sweet laying on the grass together? it was cut for a reason, and replaced w the epilogue in the mortal world.

In that epilogue, Jude herself hopes in her head that cardan won’t lash out at any humans. i always hated that part in her monologue, because it shows that Jude still doesn’t even really know the man before her.

it’s bittersweet that in their time outside of the series after qon, that maybe Jude learned why cardan wouldn’t lash out at humans. or maybe she’s yet to learn it in the new book.

but while i feel like there’s potential for them to do more, not just politically but with their relationship, some things are better left unsaid.

also, i don’t see the series being very romantically focused on Jurdan, only because miss black hasn’t really done that when it comes to her folk of the air series before. it’ll def be more politically driven.

i dreaded the publishing of the stolen heir and the prisoners throne because i worried that it would ruin Jude and cardan for me, and while that wasn’t the case, i still found myself unsatisfied with their story and how the entire family doesn’t really know each other.

don’t get me wrong, i do love family drama, but at the same time, Jude and cardan and oak and vivienne and Taryn have all endured so much trauma, I’d die for them to just be happy.

i assume the political problem will be the one i vaguely remember from the prisoners throne, the croin guy who hates orlagh and nicasia (can we blame him) and his evil sea buddies who attacked that ship oak and suren were on

Anyway i def think madocs dying in the next books, since it’s undersea based, and he had the queen of the undersea shot and whatnot, and while the ghost payed the price for that (sorta but not intentionally) i still think madoc is kicking the bucket.

Someone important is gonna die and i dread it.

on a lighter note, i really wish that miss black would pick up some of her older characters, not just for cameos. (Not gonna happen but i can HOPE)

i want to see Ben and severin, corny and Luis, Kaye and roiben, Val and ravus and their cute little troll babies. i want more info on the greenbriar line, on Val moren, on Locke even, his parents, on Jude’s parents, oriana, grima mog, anyone.

I’d especially like to see oriana and madoc finally have a relationship that isn’t based on obligation, one where there isn’t cute little Oakey pokey to take care of now that he’s grown. especially if it’s like scraps, like random interactions they have from someone else’s pov (idk i just think that’s so cute)

Lastly, all the hate im seeing abt jurdan potentially being the main focus for the next book is halfway understandable but also pretty sucky, as if oak and suren didn’t have their own duology after tcp trilogy. i can understand ofc not wanting them to be the main focus but slandering miss black over it is just rude, let her lock in and create another beautifully written fantasy world with complex characters.

also we know pretty much nothing. what the author said doesn’t even automatically confirm it’s going to be a jurdan book, but conclusions have already been jumped to and half the fandom is super excited and the other half hates the thought of jurdan getting another story.

edit for whoever sent that ask: of course it’s fine to not want them to be the center of the book! i agree, but yknow what they say: “you get what you get and you don’t get upset!” so maybe let’s not say mean things abt the author because that’s not very nice, if you’re gonna criticize, criticize the work and not the creator?

anyway idk i have 0 motivation to post anything decent hence why i haven’t posted an analysis in about 162948392 years only because I’m basing it on my reread and that’s going super poorly bc I’m taking a torturous precalc class

[kaidatheghostdragon]

Has anyone put Ida Manson and Alfred together? Do they even have a ship name?

I just want a fic where Ida affectionately blackmails the Waynes to help Team Phantom.

She and Alfred have been in a long-term and long-distance relationship

Ida definitely knows the Waynes are the Bats but has maintained plausible deniability up to this point

I think it would be out of character if Alfred didn't know that she knows, therefore he does

The Bats don't know that Ida knows and might not even know she's anything more than a distant friend of Alfred's

I'm torn on whether Sam's parents know that Ida has a relationship with Alfred

Ot1h, it would be hilarious that she kept it hidden from them. Maybe Sam knows and relishes in the rebellious nature of her grandma

Otoh, there is potential for Alfred being Sam's bio grandpa, either legitimate or scandalous, as well as potential family drama of hiding an affair with a butler

It could also color the Mansons' perception of the Waynes, too. Instead of the cliche of constantly throwing Sam at one of the Wayne kids to "marry up," they despise the Waynes because their butler defiled poor innocent Ida, or potentially dont want media attention digging into family history and finding that one of Sam's parents is the child of a butler, an affair, or a butler-affair.

If the Martha/Yhomas/Alfred threesome is invoked, things could get messy if Ida was actually part of a foursome, and one of the Manson parents is potentially an illigitimate wayne. Bruce's kids would potentially be Sam's cousins.

The cliche that Sam hates the wWaynes because her parents keep throwing her at them? Hilariously reversed. They're constantly telling Sam not to associate with the Waynes but never explain why. Rebellious Sam is gonna do the opposite, do her research, and demand to know why her parents hate the Waynes who run a meticulously clean company and dozens of legitimate charities that do some actual real good. Why can't you be more like Bruce?!

Enter Danny's accident and the sudden influx of ghosts. Ida sees the signs and requests that Alfred sends the Waynes over to appraise the situation. Could be extremely early on, or the team has had several months to establish themselves.

Suddenly, Sam is informed that Uncle (literal, socially adopted, or affectionate, use of the title is still up to interpretation at this point, but Ida is the only one that gives him that title to Sam) Bruce and his family will be visiting. She's delighted to meet *the* Bruce Wayne, may or may not be confused about him having a familial title. ("What do you mean we're possibly related? I've had a crush on Jason Todd since before he faked his death!" "You confessed your undying love for him when you were nine, Sammykins. We figured it was a phase." "I almost ran away to attend his funeral!" "You WHAT?")

Anyways, canonically, Sam is the one most interested in Danny becoming a hero, so she's going to be ecstatic to learn that her uncle/"uncle" is Batman and he's offering to personally train her. It'll be another massive point against her parents for not liking Bruce, regardless of the fact that they don't actually know that he's secretly a superhero.

I got a ton more points to add about how introducing the batfam like this, and so early in the timeline, could deviate the story, but this was initially about Ida and Alfred. So I'll just finish off by mentioning that any such fic is contractually required to have both the Waynes and Team Phantom utterly grossed out by the "old people romance" going on between Ida and Alfred.

[olderthannetfic]

Okay I NEED to know what the current most popular slash ships are, being on tumblr just feels like slash fandom is dying out, and I'd like to look up some ships because even if I don't like them, following other slash shippers feels so much nicer than seeing people bash them all the time.

--

On AO3, the m/m category is a tag like any other.

That means you can go directly to that tag and look at the sidebar, either in general or filtered for the past year. (No need to rely on those faulty ship stats.)

Broadly, the really massive juggernauts are still going, chugging along on fanon long after their canons have ended or gone to shit. A bunch of fandoms that younger people like are huge. And a lot of older people who used to only be into Western fandoms fell for The Untamed a few years ago and are now into lots of other danmei and BL fandoms. Thai dramas seem to be really heating up lately.

--

Here's the sidebar in general:

Castiel/Dean Winchester (108832)

Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski (68896)

Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter (66461)

Sherlock Holmes/John Watson (66324)

James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers (60107)

Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens) (51611)

Steve Rogers/Tony Stark (44020)

Sirius Black/Remus Lupin (42921)

Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson (42063)

filtering those out:

Bakugou Katsuki/Midoriya Izuku (39754)

Lan Zhan | Lan Wangji/Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian (37086)

Jeon Jungkook/Kim Taehyung | V (36739)

Keith/Lance (Voltron) (32031)

Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester (30843)

Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood (29711)

Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin) (29591)

Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter (28681)

Jeon Jungkook/Park Jimin (28574)

Dazai Osamu/Nakahara Chuuya (Bungou Stray Dogs) (28260)

Or filtered for updating in the past year:

Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens) (14878)

Sirius Black/Remus Lupin (12640)

Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson (10617)

Dazai Osamu/Nakahara Chuuya (Bungou Stray Dogs) (10353)

Bakugou Katsuki/Midoriya Izuku (8964)

Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter (8391)

Alhaitham/Kaveh (Genshin Impact) (8284)

Regulus Black/James Potter (7721)

filtering those out:

John "Soap" MacTavish/Simon "Ghost" Riley (6879)

Castiel/Dean Winchester (6751)

Blackbeard | Edward Teach/Stede Bonnet (6723)

Getou Suguru/Gojo Satoru (6253)

Lan Zhan | Lan Wangji/Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian (6245)

Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV) (6228)

Alex Claremont-Diaz/Henry Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor (5725)

Han Jisung | Han/Lee Minho | Lee Know (5632)

Jeon Jungkook/Kim Taehyung | V (5201)

Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter (4199)

In general, I would look at things with canon gay and/or at big anime, c-drama, and kpop RPF fandoms.

And block dickheads liberally when you see them in the tags on tumblr.

If you want to hang out with oldschool people, you could always come to Escapade con. We should be having an online one some time in the summer. There's also a discord. We're currently doing a group watch of Mysterious Lotus Casebook among other things.

[katoska]

Ok, I know shippers are having a ball with the "psychic link" line, but personally, I don't think it's needed to explain Betelgeuse's new smoopyness (+ I don't like magic-induced/fated love, but you do you).

My personal theory is that Lydia subconsciously hit "block" on him so she can pretend he's gone forever. This is imo substantiated by the fact that she can't/won't see Richard - who's body was never found, and whose death was thus deniable as long as she did not see his ghost - either.

And while Richard was ok with not being seen because he was the kind of chill guy who would be satisfied with seeing his family to make sure they were ok, Betelgeuse... is not that kind of guy.

Betelgeuse is a huge drama queen who wants ALL the attention. He wants acknowlegdement. He's the ghost with the most, and you better not forget it.

So, imagine how he must have felt the first time Lydia showed up in a house he'd been hired to haunt ...and did not acknowledge him. Did not see him, didn't seem to see the monster he turned into that still had his face, nothing stripey or funny or with any of that personal touch seemed to register. Flying books, rattling cutlery, cold spots, all that boring generic stuff she could see, but nothing Juice-y.

He'd get fucking obsessed with making her notice him.

Which would mean making sure that he's there the next time she investigates another haunting, or luring her in by making a house look spectacularly haunted (coming to see her mere presence as a reward for a job well done in the process). And maybe, anytime a client forgot to banish him (do they even all get told how to do that?), he might have, if he was close enough, managed to drop in on her outside work, try to catch her off-guard. Which would mean getting awareness of her personal problems, again, and feeling empathy for her, again.

Cause I think that's the main emotion he felt for her back when she was a weird and unusual, deeply lonely, overty suicidal teen. I believe that very creepy tone he used when talking about "Edgar Alan Poe's daughter" was there to mask the fact that he was feeling sorry for her and felt a kinship with her because his existence also sucked. Cause, like, he's got a reputation to uphold, he can't be seen caring about some Breather's feelings or be seen relating to them unironically.

Except in this movie, Betelgeuse seemed to be in a far better headspace (while Lydia very much was not), so when he realised he still cared about her feelings, he couldn't put it down to projection. He had to acknowledge that he'd become attached. I headcanon that he figured out just how attached he'd gotten shortly after she started seeing Rory, cause... ok, hands up: Who else here, when watching the movie, had the thought "Wow, Rory sucks! She'd have been better off with Betelgeuse." Like, idc if you ship Beetlebabes or not, it's just objectively true that Betelgeuse would be the better option (even if you only think that's because the bar's in hell). I think that same thought would have crossed B's mind, too, upon which he'd have his "Oh. Oh. Oh shit" moment. He later made sure that Lydia too would become aware just how goddamn shitty Rory was, and he technically did not need to do that because Lydia already did not want to marry Rory, but y'know, it'd make B look better in her eyes if he made her aware of and helped her dodge this particular bullet.

Though actually, maybe this had been strategically unwise. Only if Betelgeuse had really planned on coercing Lydia into marriage ofc, which I don't buy in the first place. But for argument's sake: If Betelgeuse hadn't given Rory that truth serum, Lydia could have used the demon deal as a non-confrontational escape from her engagement. Which would have made her less inclined to pull any tricks to get out of her marriage with B, because even if she escaped him there would still be Rory. Ok yeah, Rory eventually got eaten by a Sandworm, but B couldn't have predicted that. But, speaking as a Code 699 truther (tldr: B knew the contract would be voided but either hoped Lydia would marry him anyway, or the whole song and dance was just about him wanting to declare his feelings), he could have predicted his marriage contract being voided. Though personally, I have doubts that Astrid would have been as quick to speak up if Lydia hadn't broken up with Rory and Rory hadn't got eaten.

[ianthe-is-a-bitch-and-i-love-her]

I've found that when I review a book that was on the whole quite good, but the element I was most interested in didn't quite play out the way I wanted it to, I tend to spend most of my word count on what I didn't like instead of what I did, so I'm going to try for a little more parity here. The Stars Too Fondly is a thoroughly enjoyable sci-fi romance with a lot to recommend it. It begins on a near-future Earth, twenty years after what was supposed to be the first of many missions to begin evacuating humanity to a new planet using a revolutionary new technology that would make interstellar travel cheap and easy failed dramatically and inexplicably on the launch pad, resulting in the cancellation of the program. A group of four postdocs who watched the failure live on television as kids break into the now-derelict launch facility determined to find out why the launch failed and what happened to the crew, all of whom vanished without a trace during the catastrophe. However, the ship inexplicably powers up and launches with them on board, and now they not only have to solve the mystery but also figure out how to survive their multi-year interstellar journey and return, with the help of the ship's onboard AI who, for some reason, has been programmed to be a perfect copy of the missing captain of the original expedition.

I really enjoyed the tone and setting of the book, which is much more Star Trek than it is The Martian, with much more focus placed on character drama, mystery solving, and moral dilemmas than logistical puzzle-solving. The influence of Star Trek: Voyager in particular are worn proudly in both plot elements - a holographic artificial intelligence with questions about her personhood, an unplanned years-long journey that the crew is trying to shorten - and smaller elements, such as the use of food replicators and even a direct reference to the show's most famous episode, Threshold.

The characters were solid and compelling, with engaging dynamics unique voices. I also, barring one personal gripe, really liked the book's exploration of queer experiences. If I found myself on an unplanned space mission, I would also be very concerned about how I was going to get HRT meds!

The book makes use of a combination of plausible hard sci-fi theories, which stopped me from giving the concept of a dark matter engine my usual obligatory eyeroll, and bonkers off the wall pseudo magic soft sci-fi. These elements synergized better than I was afraid they would, but the introduction of the softer elements was a little jarring. Also kinda like Star Trek actually.

The plotting was perfectly solid, though not extraordinary by any means. None of the twists and turns were particularly surprising, but neither did they come across as trite or formulaic. The themes weren't anything novel either, but they were well-supported and conveyed. The writing itself was mostly pretty good, with a few of the rough edges and structural oddities that I've come to expect from debut novels.

So now that I've actually given the book its due, I'm gonna dig too deep into what I found disappointing.

I've noticed a bit of a trend between the last few books I've felt really compelled by, and that's the idea of a character falling in love with someone who, by their very nature, they are not going to be able to have an "ordinary" relationship with. It's what drew me to Flowers for Dead Girls, which is about falling in love with a ghost. It's what drew me to Someone You Can Build a Nest In, which is about a psychologically and physiologically inhuman monster falling in love with a human. And it's what initially drew me to this book, which is about a human falling in love with the hologram of a dead woman - a space ghost, if you want, or a ghost in the machine, if you'd rather. All of these books take some pains to explore the rough edges of these relationships, where the participants' desires are stymied by their physical differences. However, where the previous two books end with the characters establishing an equilibrium of sorts where their needs are met, even if their relationship doesn't look like what society or their own imaginations expected them to look like, The Stars Too Fondly just neatly resolves things such that their differences are no longer a concern and they can have exactly what they imagined. And I found that to be cheap and unsatisfying, especially because the resolution only works if you really, really want it to work. When you start digging into it, it starts falling apart.

It's a symptom of a phenomenon I'm calling, "So You Want to Have Your Tragedy and Eat it Too". It arises when an author has an idea for a very compelling and evocative tragic event or outcome that results in rich character moments and strong thematic resonance and very profound emotions that they really want to explore... but it would also make the happy ending they want for their characters impossible, either because the rules they've established for their story mean that the damage can't be reversed, or because the change is such that, even if the conflict were apparently resolved, the characters have now been changed by the event that they can never be as they were before, and the happy ending is now emotionally impossible.

When this conundrum comes up in the writing process, the author has to decide - do they want to explore the rich possibilities of this tragedy, or do they want to go a different direction that allows for their originally desired happy ending. It's a difficult choice to make, and unfortunately, it's not uncommon for authors to think they can take a third option, that they can come up with a way to have their tragedy but still make things work out in the end. And the end result is a solution that doesn't hold up to scrutiny. That's what happens here, to the point that it's hard to read the last couple chapters because the main character reads like she's deluding herself that everything is fine and she's happy. And you know, that could've been a really interesting - and tragic - direction to go on purpose and explore, but it wasn't on purpose, and it just winds up feeling like the book is trying desperately to convince the reader that everything is alright, really! I can't help but compare it unfavorably to the conclusion of Lovelace's arc in The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet, which confronted the fact that nothing could ever be the same again so unflinchingly that it gave rise to A Closed and Common Orbit, one of my favorite books of all time (that I completely forgot when I was trying to list some of my favorite books in a conversation the other day and now I feel like I've betrayed it).

And while I have you here, I also really hate that they made the transfem side character super into astrology. That's a personal bugbear, and while it's one I have grudgingly tolerated the singular time that I have seen a transfem author do it, I really, really wish non-transfem authors would knock that shit off. Find a different quirky interest to give to your transfem characters.

Still, on the whole, I thought it was a really solid book with a lot of entertaining and compelling elements. Unless you are reading it primarily for the logistical and emotional challenges of a romantic relationship between a ghost and a human, I would recommend it without hesitation. If you are, check out any of the other books I referenced in this post instead (except maybe for A Closed and Common Orbit, but if you're the kind of person who would like those other recommendations, I bet you'd like it too).

[welcometothejianghu]

Hey, you! You should watch Hikaru no Go!

Welcome to another round of W2 Tells You What You Should See, where W2 (me) tries to sell you (you) on something you should be watching. Today's choice: Hikaru no Go/Qi Hun/棋魂.

Based on the manga of the same name, this drama is the Chinese live-action adaptation of a story about a boy who plays Go, the spirit only he can see who teaches him how to play Go, and all the friends and enemies he meets along his journey to become a good Go player.

...Wait, no, come back. I swear it's more interesting than that makes it sound.

What it is, is a character-driven tale of a charming young boy who, among a bunch of weird and wonderful people who love him, grows up to be a charming young man.

(You see how his shirt says SWEETIE CUTIE? That is because he is a sweetie cutie.)

It's a sports manga, so you've got Training Montages and The Big Game and all sorts of tense moments like that. But there's also lots of fun, gentle plotlines that are equal parts tearjerking and heartwarming. It is incredibly written, act, and produced, and I can't believe that it's not more popular, because it's so good.

Here are five reasons you should watch it:

1: GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY

Word of Honor is merely the second gayest thing I have ever seen a c-drama do. Hikaru no Go is gayer by an order of magnitude.

I think the way they got it past censorship was by saying, oh no, this isn't gay, it's just a sports rivalry! But come on, what do you mean sports rivalries aren't gay, have you seen how all those Canadian and US hockey players keep marrying one another? This is that. This is the tale of two boys who've been in love since they were seven figuring out that they've been in love since they were seven.

(And speaking of seven-year-olds, the kid casting is amazing.)

I mean:

This is an actual still from the show.

So is this.

So is this.

These are not taken out of context. The context would make them gayer. That's how gay they are for each other.

But you know what the best part is? They're not the only pairing. And I don't just mean this like, oh, here's two other cute boys, you can imagine the times they kiss -- I mean, the show itself has its own ships! Ships you wouldn't expect! Intergenerational gay Go solidarity!

Now here's the catch: You have to wait for it. But oh boy, the payoff had us clutching our heads and screaming as quietly as we could because it was after midnight and we were losing our minds.

That last episode!! You have to see it to believe it!!!

2: EMOTIONS!

Bring the tissues. There are parts where it was kinda hard for me to watch because I was sobbing.

Because it's a sports manga, there are lots of triumphs and tragedies. Not everybody can make it to The Big Game. Not everybody gets to live out their dreams. Sometimes you try your hardest and it's not good enough. Sometimes you play your best and you still lose. Some people have to give up on what they love. Some people who were there with us at the beginning don't get to make it with us to the end.

What really makes it is that the show sits with its emotions. Events will affect people's emotional states for multiple episodes to follow. People who have sadness don't just snap out of it. Loving someone doesn't automatically fix them. Shit's hard!

Of course, this contrast makes the triumphs even more wonderful. I will tell you that the show has a happy ending, but not always the ending you would expect would have been their happy ending. It is overall an incredibly uplifting show. You'll need tissues for that, too.

3: (Nearly) Everything Is Pretty Dang Normal

Part of what I mean by that is that while a lot of the actors are real pretty, they're also done up in ways where, like, if you met this person on the street, you would think, this person is pretty! and not, what the hell fancy-ass magazine cover did you just step off of?

Look at these normal goobers:

There are two exceptions to this. The first is Chu Ying, because he is a ghost energy being from the distant past, and ghosts energy beings from the distant past get astonishing eyeliner.

The second is Fang Xu, because his actor, Han Mubo, is an actual idol. Congratulations on your face, sir.

However, I also mean that the story is delightfully mundane. Sure, there's that one supernatural element to it, but everything else is just a regular story about regular people who have regular human problems. There are characters who disappoint their parents and mentors, struggle to pay their bills, try to balance school and extracurricular activities, have crushes, argue with teachers, flake on responsibilties, get lost in the woods, and do some pretty normal human things. Nobody's avenging anyone or trying to slay anything. It's just people being people.

It's even a bit of a period piece -- the show starts out in 1997, then jumps forward to the late '00s, so everything's just charmingly slightly outdated. Damn, I love everybody's flip phones.

4: Actually Good Television

Okay, if you like c-dramas, you know they can be ... janky. Episodes sometimes end practically in the middle of sentences. CG leaves much to be desired. Obvious cuts and last-minute overdubbing really stand out. You can tell where the censorship mandates got in there and started mucking around with things. That kind of jank.

This show feels different. It feels like someone thought out each episode, start to finish, and then created each piece to fit that vision. Every episode even has a title and beautiful title card. They start and end in dramatically logical places. The cinematography isn't anything particularly artful or experimental, but it's solid and clean and lovely. (And if you're sick of shows so dark you can't see them, you've got no worries here.)

The CG in the show is unobtrusive, and most of it is spent making Chu Ying subtly transparent.

There are a bunch of secondary characters, but to me that never felt overwhelming. Most of them are interesting, three-dimensional characters, no matter how short their screen time is. And while there definitely could have been more female characters, the show itself is pretty open about how sexism in the Go world means that it's mostly a boys' club -- and the ladies that are there are great.

In short, this is a show you can show to people who don't have c-drama brain and thus are less inclined to overlook some of the more cringeworthy aspects of their productions. I bet that your Average American Television Enjoyer Who Can Handle Subtitles would have no trouble getting into the groove of it, which I imagine could be very useful for those of you who have people you'd like to watch c-dramas with, except you don't feel like stopping every five minutes to apologize for one thing or another.

5: Better Than The Source Material?

This is the point where I have to admit that I myself have never read the manga or seen the anime. I came into this with only the vaguest familiarity with the source material. I can only tell you that the live-action drama is good; I can't swear that it's better.

However, @jianghootinandhollerin can speak to this comparison more authoritatively than I:

When I was 20, Hikaru no Go (manga) was my favorite thing, the primary obsession, the source of multiple livejournal themes, custom winamp skins, and a fanfic where Hikaru got a go stone stuck up his nose. Because of this deep love in my history, I was dubious about a live action version and the changes it made, but hey, turns out, those changes were exactly what the 20 years older version of me needed. This version of the story benefits so much from having the full, completed story to work from from the outset. The manga didn't know where it was ending when it started, but this show got to, and the story gets to be richer and the characters' stories get to be deeper thanks to that. And also, very importantly: everyone is older and much, much gayer.

Look, I understand if "but it's not the original manga/anime" is a dealbreaker for you. There are adaptations of things I can't watch because no matter how good the end product may be, I'm going to hold it against it that it's not the source I'd rather be seeing, and that's not a fair standard. That's fine. It happens.

But if you can, give this a go (pun unintended). It does not replace the original thing; it is a different take on the same idea. And yeah, it's one that really speaks to me here, on the other side of forty as I am. Maybe I would have missed it at twenty, but the person I am now really respects its attitude that while Being The Best is all well and good, it is not the only thing, and it is absolutely not more important than being yourself and doing what you love with the people you love. Sometimes you peak and can't advance anymore, so you become a teacher, and you know what, that's better than okay, that's actually pretty great. (Do I overidentify with Bai Chuan? Listen: maybe.)

Have I convinced you to watch it yet?

You can watch it on iQiyi, or you can watch it on iQiyi's YouTube channel. I hope you love it as much as I do.

[migmiy0221]

Hello, MigMiy.

I'm sorry to interrupt your day, but it is important: I'm asking you to not ship Billie with Barnaby.

I'm sure you mean well, so I'm telling you this with informative means.

Shipping a 15 year old AroAce character with a homoromantic and genderfluid 100+ old ghost is considered problematic.

For one thing it's a minor being shipped with a dead adult, which is many kinds of uncomfortable, to put it mildly.

And the other is, you're working with characters that reflect the personal lives of the devs, and they have expressed discomfort when it came to change their characters' identities for shipping purposes, ESPECIALLY when it comes to Billie, who reflects the main writer's childhood.

Some people in the fandom have pointed this out to another one in the fandom who did the same thing, some time ago, and they've recieved harassment from them. For your own safety, I'm asking you to not follow them, because they've been known to have caused drama for their deliberate pr0shipping.

I'm telling you this as a heads up, as it is important to keep the BBU fandom a safe place for everyone, yourself included. I hope this letter of mine has been informative: I don't want you to be involved in any kind of drama.

Please stay safe, ok? I wish you a good day.

I'm sorry but I will not be doing as you say.

I don't want to sound like a bitch for saying this but it's how I want to live as a person. Don't include me on the fandom if you want because I'm literally a quarter away from leaving because of this, and I don't want to ship other ships that you guys keep telling me to ship because I'm not that kind of person and I'm not a commoner.

Barnaby x Fantoccio makes me uncomfortable.

Elaine and some other fucking character when I'm not going to be doing for a bit because Elaine is one I'm still trying to get used to since I still fucking hate her

Arthur x Aristotle, I already shipped this one as seen in my story.

Any other ship I'm not going to hate, because it's a little bit understandable, but Barnaby and Fantoccio? No thank you. If I had the mind of a person that ships those two, I would still be uncomfortable with the thought of everything and "tree sap" up an owl's ass.

I'll try to explain this in a way with an example of real life people that are in the lgbtq+ community.

Imagine you are a parent who is not non-binary or any of that, and it's just normal. You have a kid and they come up to you and they say that they are non-binary. How would you react to that? Would you support them or would you rid them from your life? This is almost the exact situation that we're in right now. I keep trying to tell people like you that I'm not like you and nothing you can do can get me out.

Even if my mindset is not in the one that you wanted to be in, all you have to know is that I'll never be like you.

Another thing is I like to try out new things, cuz sometimes the regular ones don't seem right to me. Sometimes with new things I stick to them as of it was something I never done before and it will never get old for me.

Just so you know I don't fear people like you and I won't hear anything you want me to do. I don't fear whatever the future holds for me. I get just imagine how many people lose their lives everyday just because of people like you. Making them feel bad about who they came out to be as a person.

And I bet people like you don't even know what the words headcanon and AU means. Targeting a minor just for doing what they love is wrong on many levels. And just so you know my day is not going to get any better because of you. My day is getting worse every day and but I would like to keep it great so I can go back to school and just be normal for the year.

and if you bring this up to me again, then No More Mr "Nice Girl". And I'm done being a people pleaser, cuz sometimes I'll HAVE, not need, HAVE to please people over things that I fucking love and that's the last time I'm going to be doing that since I had to learn very hard that sometimes trying to fit in with people is not going to work if you want to figure out who you are as a person, so I'm not going to be a follower I'm going to be a leader. And don't try to feel sorry for me, because I already do for you.

Let me just try and be the leader/follower for a ship that needs more attention than that fucking Barntoccio bullshit.

Thanks to people like you, I get uncomfortable every time I hear "tree sap".

Sorry not sorry.

-A.S.

[amethystunarmed]

Oh Captain, Let's Make a Deal

Word Count: 2,380 AO3 Written for @pulpmusicalsfortnight2024 Alternate Prompt: Possession. Huge thanks to @jackalope-t-m for betaing this for me and for all the beautiful art!!! I am forever grateful!

AJ tries to ignore the pounding in his chest. Even under his orders, the crew is restless, unsure. He can’t blame them. The sight of that fog consuming the other ship... It would have made him quake in fear, if he hadn’t seen it once before.

He steels his resolve, turns to the man onboard he trusts most, and hopes he isn’t sending him to his doom.

“Reese. You have been on the ship more than anyone. You will be her captain,” AJ says. Reese hesitates, but nods.

“Yes sir. May we discuss the specifics in your office?” His tone is pleasant but firm. AJ feels a bead of sweat drip down his neck. He enjoyed having Reese as a boatswain because he wasn't afraid to challenge a captain's decision. Like AJ, Reese values the safety of their crew above all else.

AJ has a feeling this trait is about to bite him the ass. 

But still, he can't deny this request, not without making the rest of his crew even more agitated. They trust Reese, more than even AJ himself some days, and ignoring Reese's legitimate question could break into a full-blown mutiny.

“Of course,” AJ acquiesces, trying to hide his gritted teeth. “The rest of you are dismissed. You'll be receiving your assignments shortly.” The crew begins shuffling away, but he doesn't miss the way they glance at Reese for assurance before they go. Only once he nods to them does the crowd truly dissipate.

(Well, most of them. Herschel and Stratford are having an impressive argument over who will be joining Reese on the ghost ship once he returns. AJ can't help but roll his eyes. It's always some kind of drama with those four.)

AJ and Reese walk to the Captain's Quarters in tense silence. His boatswain has a smile resting on his face, but it is a flimsy thing. It comes with none of the playful banter or laughter AJ has become accustomed to. It feels fake.

The door clicks shut behind Reese, and AJ can tell immediately he was right. Instantly Reese's smile drops and anger overtakes his expression. 

“What the hell are you doing?”

AJ straightens, standing at his full height, six inches taller than Reese. “You dare speak to your captain like this?”

Reese doesn’t even falter. “I do when he isn’t acting like my captain! Amos and Elijah are-” he fumbles over his words. “Are missing, and you want to send more of the crew over there as a sacrifice? For what?”

“I would never-”

“Then act like it!” Reese interrupts, cheeks pink with fury. AJ can count on one hand the number of times he has seen Reese this furious. He doesn’t like being the cause of it. “Because right now,” Reese continues, “it seems like you care more about money than you do the sailors and passengers you swore to protect. If that is the case, I will lead the mutiny against you myself!”

“Ooooh, aren't we testy this evening! Captain, you ought to make him walk the plank!” A familiar voice crows, and AJ feels his blood turn to ice. 

Black fog crawls up the legs of his office chair like vines growing over a cracked wall, writhing and curling. AJ can barely hear Reese gasp over the sound of his heart pounding. His desk chair spins around and Kal is there, leaning forward on his elbows, chin perched on his hands. AJ takes a step forward, placing himself fully between Kal and Reese.

“Get out of my chair, Kal,” AJ growls. He shouldn't be anywhere near Reese, not after his stunt with Amos and Elijah. 

“Kal...” Reese repeats, “Like the man Samuel saw? But that means-” He hears Reese gasp as he puts it all together. “Captain, tell me you aren’t working with this man.” Reese moves around behind him. AJ can’t tell if Reese is going away from him, horrified, or getting closer, ready to attack; either way, he doesn't dare take his eyes off Kal. He doubts he'd like the expression on Reese's face anyways.

“Quite a quick study, aren't you,” Kal purrs. His eyes have a hunger in them AJ doesn't like.

“Officer Reese, I need you to leave. That's an order!” AJ barks. 

“Captain, with all due respect,” Morgan growls, and AJ can hear the implied which is none, “I have a duty to my crew. I will not- mmmf!” AJ turns in time to see a black band of fog lock around Reese's mouth, cutting off whatever it was he was going to say. He tugs at the gag with his hands and AJ can hear his muffled cries.

AJ would try to help if he knew it wasn’t useless. “Is this really necessary?” he asks.

“Sorry, sorry,” Kal says, examining his nail beds. “He just seemed like he was going to go on and on.” Kal groans, like the mere thought is torture. “And besides, you and I have business to attend to. This way we can continue our conversation uninterr-”

There is a click behind them. AJ and Kal turn. Reese is leveling his pistol at Kal's head. AJ’s heart quivers in fear at the sight. He imagines the fog around Morgan’s mouth constricting, suffocating him entirely, crushing his skull with the pressure.

Kal could kill Reese so easily, and AJ would be powerless to stop him.

“Kal, don’t,” he begs.

Kal just smirks at him. He crosses his legs and leans back in AJ's chair. “Cute.”

Tendrils of fog spring up from the ground, whipping at Reese so quickly, AJ can barely follow them. One snatches the gun from his hand and crushes it into tiny pieces. They scatter across the floor in a shower of splinters and warped metal. The other two tendrils loop around Reese’s wrists, binding his arms. Reese tugs as hard as he can against the foggy shackles. AJ still hears him shouting through the gag. Reese winces as the fog tightens; AJ can hear his bones creaking.

“Kal, you swore you wouldn't hurt my crew!” AJ barks and Kal rolls his eyes.

“If they didn't keep getting in my way it wouldn't be a problem.”

AJ swallows. “Is that what happened to Amos and Elijah? They got in your way?” 

Kal tilts his head, seeming genuinely confused for a moment. “Who are you- oh, the sailors on the other ship?” He waves his hand. “Oh, they’re long gone.”

AJ feels the words like a bullet through his heart. He already knew, he thinks. The second the fog swept through the abandoned ship, he knew. It doesn’t make it any easier to hear. Reese’s anguished scream, muffled through the gag, only drives the wound deeper.

Kal pouts at him. “Aw Captain, don't be sad! You have done amazing so far!” He jumps to his feet, popping to attention. “A soldier doing what must be done, following your orders to a T!” He salutes and AJ briefly wishes Reese had shot him. “Your debt is almost fulfilled.”

“Almost?” AJ gasps, “I have done everything you asked. What more could you possibly-”

“Calm your nerves, my dear captain,” Kal says with an easy smile. The sight of it makes AJ's blood boil. “There have been some...” He tilts his head back and forth, humming as he decides on a word. “Complications with getting control of the other vessel. I have a plan to get what I need and you”—He taps AJ’s nose in a damn near playful gesture—“fill a key role in making the whole thing possible.” He holds out the green glass bottle of rum that never seems to leave his person. “I just need you to drink from this, and all your suffering will finally end. Doesn't that sound nice?”

A life without Kal. A life where he no longer spends each day looking over his shoulder, waiting for his debt to be called in. A life where he no longer had nightmares of all the terrible things Kal would ask him to do, a life where AJ wasn't currently doing them-

It sounded like a dream.

“Give me the damn bottle,” he spits, taking the neck of the bottle firmly in his grasp. It is heavy in his hands, near full to the brim. He can smell the harsh burn of alcohol and already dreads the hangover he is sure this will bring. No matter; it will be well worth it if it gets Kal to leave. 

“Don’t you want to know what my plan is?” Kal asks, sounding nearly... demure. His eyes gleam in the candlelight. 

“No, I don’t care,” he scoffs. He can hear Reese’s muffled protests growing in volume and it only strengthens AJ’s resolve. He doesn’t have the time to feed this mad man’s ego. He needs Kal off his ship this instant. He lifts the rum to his lips and-

Morgan Reese snatches the bottle out of his hand. 

The fog binding him fades into the air like it was never anything more than mist. AJ’s eyes widen. 

Why would Kal... 

It doesn’t matter. He doesn’t have time, and he wants this debt over with. Kal isn’t going to hurt anyone else, not if he can help it. 

“Officer Reese, return that bottle to me at once!” AJ demands. He begins to stride forward, planning to take the rum back but- 

The fog grabs him, wrapping around his limbs and tangling him up like the tentacles of an octopus. He tugs against them, but the binds leave him completely immobile. “What the devil? Kal, release me!”

Kal doesn’t even deign to look over to him. He glides over to Reese, towering over him. Reese is younger than he was, all those years ago in Mobile Bay, but AJ gets the feeling this is just what he looked like. A desperate, frightened man clutching a bottle while a demon dangles the solutions to all his problems just out of reach. AJ struggles harder in his bonds. He won’t let Reese make his same mistakes. 

“What do you plan on doing with that?” Kal smirks, smug as a cat with a mouse beneath its paws.

“I’m considering smashing it,” Reese spits, and Kal tsks. 

“You don’t want to do that.”

“Why not?” Reese snaps, “You killed my friends, enslaved my captain, why shouldn’t I ruin everything you're working for?”

“You could,” Kal admits, “and I would be quite angry, true. A lot of work went into crafting that. You would set me back quite a ways. I would make your death slow and painful for the trouble.”

“Kal!” AJ yells, and his distress only makes Kal smirk wider.

“But... even after all that, your death would be meaningless,” Kal says. He reaches out, invading Reese’s space to straighten his hat for him. Reese doesn’t flinch away from him, and AJ wishes he had the wherewithal to be proud. “AJ here owes me a debt. And I will collect.”

Reese swallows, nervously. “You just need someone to drink this, right?” he asks. “Then you'll cancel out his debt?”

Kal smiles at him, patronizing. It is the smile an adult gives to a precocious child who thinks they have figured out how the world works. “That's right!”

“Officer Reese, you will hand me that bottle immediately!” AJ shouts as he strains against the fog’s hold on his limbs.

Reese looks between AJ and the bottle, before he knocks it back and chugs.

“Morgan!” AJ yells, but Kal doesn't free him until Morgan has finished every last drop. 

“There,” Reese says, as he lowers the bottle and wipes his mouth, “Now, you can get the fuck off-”

Reese gasps, and hunches over, letting out a strangled cry. The bottle slips out of his hand, and shatters on the floor. His knees give and he clutches his throat, wheezing and gurgling. AJ clambers to his side, his bad knee be damned.

"Reese!" AJ cries, pulling Reese into his lap, out of the glass. He glares up at Kal. "What did you do, you son of a bitch?"

Kal hums. "Won't be long now."

Reese claws at AJ's jacket and AJ smooths his hair away from his forehead. "Officer Reese," AJ demands, "look at me, you are not allowed to die. That is an order, you hear me?"

"C-Captain?" Reese wheezes, gazing up with glassy eyes. They roll back in his head, and he collapses, completely boneless.

No.

NO!

He clutches Reese closer, cradling his head. He shakes him, twice. "Morgan, MORGAN!"

And suddenly, like a miracle, Morgan gasps. His eyes flutter up, and they are solid, midnight black. He looks up at Kal, and grins. He strokes a hand down AJ's chest.

"Oh Captain, if you wanted to hold me in your arms, you just had to ask!" 

AJ shoves him away in horror, without a thought. That... That isn't-

That sounded like-

AJ looks around the room, and Kal is gone. But surely he couldn't have... That would be-

"Now, now, AJ, don't be so rough!" Reese's voice says. "This body can't take as much damage as I’m used to. You wouldn't want to hurt poor Officer Reese, would you?"

"Get out of him, now," AJ demands. "You made the deal with me, you leave him out of this."

"I would have loved to!" Reese- Kal says, "But your darling boatswain already took the spell. I need him, for now. But~" His eyes flicker back to normal and he grins, and it is so cheery and so bright and so Morgan, it makes AJ feel sick. "You'll help me? Won't you, Captain?" It's the same eager tone he used when he asked AJ to let John, Margaret, and the Stratfords on the Ellen Austin. But it is... Wrong. A shade too slimy, too manipulative, to be the man AJ trusts.

His eyes go solid black again and Kal's smirk looks so wrong on Reese's face. "I'll give him back the moment I'm done, I swear. All you have to do is help me, one last time."

AJ swallows. He knows what he is going to say, and already regrets it. But he has no choice, not if it means saving a member of his crew. 

His hand shakes as he extends it.

"Deal."

[bumblebyaf]

the pricefield breakup was good

just finished double exposure and while the game had many flaws i entirely disagree with one of the biggest complaints i’ve seen both before and after the games release: the pricefield breakup. in fact, the pricefield breakup is my favorite part of the game and one of the most fascinating character writing decisions that defined a lot max’s character for me…so here’s my essay on why max & chloe could never work long term, the breakup was incredibly natural, and how its the only way for both of them to move on. don’t bother reading of course if you don’t want to hear any of these opinions <3 

to start off the bat (and this will be the paragraph people hate the most): max & chloe are one of the weakest lis pairings (and again this is obviously all my opinion). they honestly never even had that much chemistry to me and i probably never would have shipped them had the game come out later but since the game came out when it did and it was the first gay game i’d ever played and they were like the only gay rep i knew it was brilliant & i think nostalgia for this clouds a lot of what people see when they think of pricefield but objectively they never make sense as a pairing to me and i find their scenes together quite awkward or boring. chloe is an asshole to max throughout the whole game (and i am a huge chloe supporter, i understand absolutely where all of her anger and issues were stemming from and it made sense!) and max is either a pushover who just lets her do it or like entirely indifferent to it/ignores it i guess depending on how you play; and max is shitty too i mean we know she ghosted chloe for years and then went back to blackwell for like a month or whatever without ever looking up chloe and who knows if she ever actually would have. which like max doesn’t have an obligation to do that but she clearly wanted to after she meets chloe again and then she spends so much of the game thinking about how chloe replaced her with rachel when max left first and trying to just slot herself back into the exact spot she left (also chloe did not replace her anyway they were entirely different relationships). (unrelated but this is why i hate when people have max add her name to the wall in the junkyard hide out lol) max spends the entire game watching chloe die in several different ways and trying desperately to keep her alive which has got to make a crazy trauma bond/attachment and honestly aside from one or two very obviously written “gay” scenes chloe barely registers as romantically interested in max to me (which…yeah chloe is spending the whole game going through a lot of stuff!) right up until the end where chloe realizes how hard max has been trying to keep her alive/max has been helping her with all the struggles she’s having this week/backing her up with her family drama etc during a time where chloe doesn’t really think anyone cares about her…which i don’t know again seems like a trauma bond to me! and then max sacrifices an entire town for her? of course they get together. you also have to remember that this game takes place during like the WORST week of these two young girls lives it’s just crazy to me how people define their entire relationship/personalities by this time period 

also like i know a lot of LIS fans don’t love BTS because its a different studio and the original LIS writers never wanted a prequel & that for some reason a lot of LIS fans think rachel is the devils fucking spawn BUT thats a different argument (bts being my second favorite game & rachel my third favorite character) but after watching chloe in bts (still with Issues and trauma but less heavy and more shared) and seeing her fall in love with rachel there i could never see her with max the same way

also to be clear i’m not saying at all that i think max & chloe don’t care for each other deeply; i do believe they love each other my argument is just that this relationship could never really last long term and mostly stemmed from the trauma they were going through which brings me to the main part:

max & chloe breaking up makes perfect sense for their characters, especially the reason given as well. chloe telling max that she wants to move forward and live in the future but max is always looking to the past- this single line sold me on the break up immediately i found it fascinating! max does live in the past! its her entire power! her entire game is about rewinding over and over to make the perfect moment etc. max’s character is constantly being brought into question when it comes to how she uses her powers even when she only ever tries to use them for good reason (in particularly i really like the subtle way the comics handled this too, BY CHLOE, but i know not everyone likes the comics either and they’re obviously not canon to the games since they contradict double exposure lore as well. but in the comics an alternate timeline chloe criticizes max on how reflexively she uses her powers to save/help people without considering how rewinding a moment affects everyone around them as well- and how sometimes things go wrong but can work out anyway. this is proven by us also following a second timeline without max there to rewind and we see how those characters navigate the issues max erased and in some instances they turn out even better and i like a happier healthier chloe having this perspective).  i feel like the chloe we meet in life is strange is so specific to that one game (she is going through so much active trauma and it is literally like the worst week of her life) but the pieces of her i’ve seen outside of that game show me how much her character can change when given space to breathe so i don’t think its fair to hold her to just that week. i can very easily see how chloe would want to put everything behind her and try to fully move on/away from everything that has happened and this being the only way she feels she can move forward- similarly how max could spend everyday stuck living with the choices she made and the effects its had on her, how much harder it is for her to separate and move on. 

i also think it makes perfect sense that chloe could grow some resentment towards max for her mothers death- i’m sure chloe wouldn’t act on this but i can see them both knowing it’s there and chloe not really being able to help feeling it. i mean chloe really is fully accepting of her death in life is strange and its max who makes the choice to keep her alive (and yes it’s shitty of chloe to make it seem like a choice at all but that’s also just like…the game having to give the player a choice too). chloe has to live with knowing her mother and everyone she knew died so she could live and max has to live with knowing she directly made that choice and both of them have to just…know and live and think about this everyday they’re with each other how can they move on? is that not suffocating? with some space they can at least maybe start to really separate from it 

i also think chloe’s implied insecurities around max rewinding parts of their relationship also make sense to be honest…max spends the entire game trying to fix every interaction to be the right one like i KNOW she would rewind mistakes because i DID that as her; and maybe you can say max would never use her powers again after the storm but to be honest i don’t think thats true…i think she would never redo grand scale things again (except i guess she does in double exposure) but i just don’t know if i believe she could resist the temptation to keep her and chloe’s interactions perfect- at least in the beginning. i’m not saying she DOES but i GET it- i understand chloe’s paranoia (if it is just paranoia and not fact) because i don’t think i could trust either because i also understand MAX. max who killed an entire town for chloe & their relationship- wouldn’t you feel like you had to keep doing everything in your power to make sure it works? to keep it good, to keep chloe happy?  it’s a really complicated feeling for both of them i’m sure

and i think chloe is right when she says max is always living in the past because we literally see her doing it during the game. she’s still journaling to chloe, she keeps chloe in her wallet & on her wall, we keep having flashbacks to arcadia, max keeps a box of arcadia with her (even though we know she’s also been traveling/on the road most of her adult life), she’s never discussed any part of her past with her friends, her photography focus is about the lonely and abandoned. the entirely of double exposure is about max learning how to really stop living in the past and the harm it could do (through what happened to maya and safi and how its still happening four years later because no one ever really dealt with it etc) and that’s why this undercurrent and the pricefield breakup is my absolute favorite part of this game and the best part of it

i also think it’s really worth pointing out what a lot of people seem to have missed (in the complaints i did see); max & chloe didn’t have some horrible explosive ending and they hate each other forever now and the two are forever ruined or whatever…chloe simply saw she could never truly move forward with max and maybe more importantly she saw max could never move forward with her (how could max move forward from the worst choice she’s ever had to make in her life when she’s also sharing a bed with it?) chloe still loves and cares for her, max still loves her, they could be on friendly terms very easily- in fact i think the only reason they don’t talk right now is because of max (which is for the best during this time i think anyway) and chloe would be absolutely open to their friendship whenever max is ready. chloe wants the best for both of them & chloe’s text at the end of the game proves she’s still thinking of max & open to talking again whenever max is. max also has feeling by the end of the game that’s ready to really start moving forward from arcadia now and one day she will be ready to confront chloe again and i think whenever that happens the two will be really good friends again- like they always were.

[pwnyta]

HUH

So no one was gonna tell me about The Old Guard?

I was supposed to just find it on a random ass Halloween 4 years after it aired... aight.

I mean I thought we were cool but I see how it is.

Anyways I watched it and I loved it IF YOU EVEN CARE.

Opinions-

Andy- Phenomenal. Never seen Charlize Theron look so damn hot. Even with her spooky eyes. Crazy butch bisexual(?) wielding a labrys sometimes. Love. Her church fight was sick as hell... im in denial about the stab tho... you can pry her from my cold dead fingies Netflix.

Booker-Like... OK. Like I get he was sad but its so hard to feel bad for him sometimes and like.. I dont hate him at all but just... I do wanna strangle him a little. JUST A LITTLE. I dont want him to be gone and never see Andy again... I hate that. I hate this movie.

Nicky- Great side profile, terrific nose... what in the Ben Linus is going on with the eyes tho? Those pale buggy eyes... This is your man, Joe? This Italian priest Templar knight with ghost eyes? Aight. Ribbing aside... I love him. Even if hes got spooky eyes.

Joe- Mortal enemies to immortal lovers is diabolical work. If you give me friends to lovers... it better be Crusade era enemies to begrudging companions to understanding friends to soul mates or fucking dont talk to me about it. NGL Joes kinda my favorite. Hes a silly little guy. Maybe my love for Sayid has made me soft for hyper-competent, deadly, romantic, shiny eyed Muslim men IDK.

Nile- LOVE. ..Ya know when Andy was like 'shes just a baby' I was like I sure hope this movie dont make me ship them cuz the fandom is probably gonna be annoying about that line but their plane fight was so hot... SUE ME. ANYWAYS... I love her. Apparently theres a second movie coming out & I cant wait to see her get to be a silly lil guy with the fam cuz she is silly lil guy. I love her relationship with Andy & I hope Andy gets better so they can be together forever & there can be some messy lesbian love triangle nonsense when Quynh.

Quynh- Dont got like... the deepest opinion of her just yet but her and Andy were like the Sapphic Nicky & Joe but in reverse.. like Nicky & Joe killed attacked each other then became lovers and it seems like Andy & Quynh were close and might become enemies? Of course IM GONNA IGNORE THE BAD STUFF AND PRETEND THEY JUST FIND EACH OTHER & ARE IN LOVE FOREVER. So...

Copley- Similar to Book I get his mindset but also I wanna strangle him a little. He is beautiful tho... so... Im interested in how hes gonna fit in with the gang... Im hoping for some drama at the start maybe them being like '...ya but hes not Booker...' and then Copley like... having some big hero moment saving the team or at least one of them and they get real close and then more drama because their new family is also just a normal guy & theyre gonna hurt to lose him some day. ANYWAYS.

MISC stuff I like-

The difference in how Nicky and Joe hug Andy.

Everything about this scene tbh. I just wanna see these types of scenes from now on. Silly lil guy moments.

Also Andys baklava addiction. Baklava is one of those things Ive always wanted to try... like boba and churros... ONE OF THESE DAYS.

This sick ass take down. Actually all the fight scenes were pretty sick. I like seeing them fight baddies all together... ODA TAKES NOTES. Also... full offense to guns but seeing Andy Nicky and Joe wield their old-school weapons is so much cooler... who brings a knife (labrys, long sword, scimitar) to a gun fight? THE COOLEST PEOPLE. THATS WHO.

Joe spitting out a bullet that he got shot in the face with.

'Shes just a baby!' (me with the whole team) Also TBF to Andy... Nile has such a cute baby face.

The development of Andy and Niles relationship. THO TBH I was bothered about Nile getting shot in the head because the exit wound woulda fucked her braids up.... I had a hard time focusing cuz I couldnt let that fact go lmao... It was driving me nuts...

The girls are fighting! (gone sexy)

Eepy not-boyfriends

Ancient head bonks of desperate affection. I hope all three of them head bonk Nile in the next movie. If this doesnt happen... im killing everyone in this room (its just me) and them myself.

This silly bitch in this moment.

Joes 'Hes not my boyfriend' speech. Incurable romantic indeed.

Honestly the soldiers tryin to insult Joe by mockingly asking if Nicky was his boyfriend and getting way more than they bargained for was fucking funny.

I just wish we coulda seen the faces of the guy driving the van as he heard the massacre in the back LMAO. Just keep drivin bud... aint nothin you can do about your boys in the back.

Immortal not-boyfriends gettin silly!

This is a nice plane! Theres a TV Joe!

lmao. The sillies.

Andy and Nile continuing to make me ship them.

Reunited and it feels so.... something but they were fighting together and it was real cool.

THEMB.

'You shot Nicky... you shouldnt have done that....'

Joe- Im a silly lil guy but (suplexes a man and breaks his neck)

Whyd he look so devastated after?

She wont jump out of a plane... but....

You betray Miette? You betray her like the bastard? Oh! OH! BANISHMENT FOR 100 YEARS!

Joe lookin at Booker the whole time... :c

[chromotps]

Hello! Been in the OP fandom for more than a decade (i miss the days where ace/luffy were a normal ship) and finding fics have been difficult.

Do you have any luffy/ace fic recommendations? Wishing you a good night!

hello! I wish I had been around for early acelu days... I was reading OP fic back then, but it was mostly zo/san 😅. I get what you mean, it's tough to find stuff for them these days that's not just luffy-harem stuff (which is fine! just not what I'm looking for) or ooc

I prefer fics that are mostly sweet and not too angsty, so my list won't include some of the ones that are really bittersweet/dark/endgame-tragic, even though they're beautifully written. I'm sure if you ask another acelu fan, you'd get a completely different list... I'm just a big weenie! 😭😂

I'm also really disorganized, so I'm probably forgetting a bunch!!! I need to keep better bookmarks omg

SFW Fics:

spinning on that dizzy edge by to-a-merrier-world (wayward_wolves) fav fav fav (helps that this was sort of a gift? based on some art I drew;;? hhh i love it so much) A sweet!!! and playful, relaxed scene between Luffy and Ace—who's joined the Stawhats!

this short fic by 002yb a really lovely, atmospheric piece of writing about the boys just being cute and speaking through touch

forget me not by 002yb a touch more bittersweet, but I loved how insightful this little look at Ace's last night with Luffy in Goa was

to be deserving by 002yb (after acelu week I need to have a separate section for 002yb!! tbh consider this a blanket rec for all their fics) adorable!! very nuanced, quick look at some courtship (or lack thereof) (but hope for some in the future?) between ace and luffy in an omegaverse AU

Bridesmaid Blues by Anonymous so much fun!! a rom-com style take on Luffy and Ace eloping in canon. Hilarious, and just makes me adore all the characters even more

In Your Heart Shall Burn by kayura_sanada oh my god. so it's a fix-it fic that involves a mysterious mirror and wishes. the tone feels just like canon with maybe a hint more bittersweet hopefulness, and the heartfelt moments between ace and luffy in this MELTED ME INTO PIECES. this will be one of my forever favorites.

oxytocin by ruche Gen fic but the author has other great shippy acelu work; this one is, post-marineford-ace-lives scene with Ace being worried and grateful for Luffy... the characterization is amazing

Near Death Experiences by monch_monch (WIP) This is a reincarnation AU, and it's got one of my absolute favorite acelu scenes in one of its flashbacks... I love everything about this fic—the way the other characters are brought in, and how cute and heartfelt Ace and Luffy are... I can't compliment it enough

The Same As You by PeachyStud (WIP) (jksgfhd oops i put this is sfw when the latest chapters have some messing around in it, but... i'll just leave it here) This one's a very sweet and fun modern AU—I reread it when I just need some feel good acelu fluff.

Next Stop, Everywhere by NewWonder This fic is the 2nd part of an "Ace lives and sails with Luffy" series, but it's my favorite of the 3 parts because it focuses a lot on Ace getting to work through his heartache 😭

Together Again by Swinky Swanks (SpobSpucci) A sweet, short piece about when Ace visits Luffy in canon

I'll Always Want You by PeachyStud This is part 1 of another "Ace lives in canon" series—this fic focuses on Luffy asking Ace to join his crew during their 2 years training and is SO cute and lovely. Part 2 is also a treat (and rated M 👀)

Arrangements by Sully-van I feel a little crazy for including an FF.net story on here, but this little royalty/arranged marriage AU just made me smile.

Find the Hat by authenticaussie  funny, slightly bittersweet AU where luffy's a ghost in ace's university library. i know, unusual concept, but a quick, fun read

(Ir)Responsible by oumriel (WIP!!!!! probably permanently from the looks of things) okay I have to recommend this one—it's a modern AU with drama/slow burn, and some incredibly heart-warming moments and really interesting characterizations. it does end on a heart-breaking cliffhanger, but... acelu seems to be a little bit cursed with WIPs, in the end, haha

Sleeping Habits by RainyCatharsis surprisingly fluffy soulmate AU where a soulmate who's died stays in their partner's dreams until they're both ready to move on. short and sweet!

on brotherhood by LadyCrimsonAndBlack another gen fic; age-swap! older Luffy runs into Whitebeard and makes sure Ace is happy on his crew

Lock; Key by Anonymous (SFW.... for now. since there's only 1 chapter up) very interesting modern, omegaverse AU with cool worldbuilding

NSFW Fics:

Hatchling by Anonymous good old-fashioned "not too loud or dad will hear us" modern AU incest. haha. really, this one is a nice mix of cute and dirtyhot, with a looooot of teasing smug ace

and what do they say about dreams by ruche uhh. a smut fic that... focuses on Ace's narcolepsy? it's surprisingly cute and funny—mind the tags, but I really enjoyed it!

Tearjerker by necroesthe OKAY so I love a lot of Necro's acelu fics... They do tend to skew darker, so that's a good thing to remember if you go browsing. This fic, though, is an adorable and fun and hot modern AU, with Ace thinking Luffy looks cute when he cries.

for the asking by irrelevant  another modern AU, I love the relaxed dialogue and vibe of this one. There's something about Ace and Luffy acting like dumb brothers while also being devoted to each other that gets me every time.

You're Built from Motorcycle Exhaust, Cigarette Smoke, and Starlight by Novicecomics Modern AU, really atmospheric story about biker!Ace and Luffy going on a little adventure and being in love

born hungry by ruche hard to summarize... i guess, modern AU, drunk/troubled ace has surprisingly sweet sex with luffy. this author always captures such a like, darkly funny, wry attitude with ace, and their luffy is a treat. still good to check the tags!

the blood of my brother by fizzyren another maybe odd one. uh. short summary is, acelu period sex with trans luffy. i'm not usually into those kinds of fics but this one got me down, what can i say

Lake Pontchartrain by necroesthe definitely read the tags for some of these dead dove recs i'm sneaking in here. anyway uh. the first chapter in this is, modern au, preteen luffy catches ace watching porn aaaaand then there's fallout

Virtue by necroesthe ditto above w the tags. um. 15yo luffy wants to ride ace. i'll add, necro's darker fics are more psychological-hot to me than like, silly-yummy-smut hot? if that makes any sense haha

I'd also like to recommend my own Once Piece fics... I think they're all pretty sweet, and not too bad if I do say so myself. :3c

Anyway!! Hope this helps! And pls feel free to tell me your thoughts on any of em............. 👀

[heretherebedork]

>=] I'm here with an evil request. But only slightly evil. Maybe a lot evil. I don't know you decide. Can you rank all of the currently airing couples? Ghost ships are obviously allowed (JangYos supremacy)

...

... This is truly cruel and I don't think I can because there are SO MANY.

I am watching 13 shows. Most of them have at least two couples and some have more. Some are love triangles AND ghost ships!?

I can't keep track of that many couples! I don't even know where to START and the Vietnamese BL where I genuinely don't know one of the characters names?! Auuugh.

Okay.

Okay.

Let me try this. From least to greatest.

Thien Bao x Din Huy because the assault is gonna be hard to forgive

Gia Hoa x Lam because Gia deserves a better boyfriends

PhumPratrick because I love the actors but it's just not giving what I want so far

The secondary lead in Under The Oak Tree and the main character who are only doing anything because the main character is being manipulated and it's just sad, honestly.

ViMook because I dislike how Mook is pushing her around and, frankly, would very much like to save her. She was so flustered and frustrated!

MutRak because I rarely vibes with this kind of 'bully but everyone says it's not' thing tbh. If you're gonna bully romance, go all the way! Don't make him perfect to everyone else EXCEPT his love interest.

AlmondJumper because it's obviously not gonna work.

WanKim because, I mean, have you see them?

MarwinKim because it's not gonna happen but could queerplatonically still be better than Wan.

TaeYos because Tae is still leaving Yos out of things and Yos is still the one coming and comforting him when he's sleeping and Tae might be in pink but the love and care still feels one sided!

Shirasaki x Hayama because the show just isn't pacing itself well for me and that makes them a bit frustrating tbh.

Toon and her girlfriend because they got together off screen and denied me seeing them be cute and flirting

JoeNicky because I like them but also don't know what to expect, honestly.

SenRun because they're cute and I do like them but the whole show just isn't hitting the way I wish it was, honestly.

FreyaMeiji because the show just isn't quite vibing for me, honestly. I get it and I see it but it's just not quite for me.

AlmondLatter because I'm not sure how this is gonna work tbh and I wanna know but I also have many fears.

DangKhanh because they have tons of potential and I just hope they get through this whole

PeakThanwa because I'm not sure what the show is gonna do with this.

KongthapAtom because I love them but they have not developed enough to get me truly excited.

QToey because, honestly, they development is not keep me engaged. Cute but kind of... empty? It's odd.

JangYos because I do like them a lot but I also know it's never going to happen and I do acknowledge that Jang telling on Moo about the no dating thing was rough.

PhumPeem because they're working and they're cute but they're just not quite there yet for me

KangMoo because they are adorable but HURTING ME RIGHT NOW and would be higher if they hadn't broken up.

ChainPun because they need more screentime but they use what they get SO well it's honestly amazing.

YakDee because I am deeply worried about their pain this upcoming week and whatever drama will carry us through the rest of the show with these boys. Love them but fear.

TanFang because they are my most beloved of all time and I adore them so much please please give me more of them being in love and happy.

MingJoe because, look, they are EXACTLY my flavor of toxic and the show knows it and the show is gonna show us growth that will make me so, so happy.

I hope I didn't forget anyone.

[verdantlady]

Prompt: You are a ghost or demon who is about to be exorcized. How will you avoid this horrid fate?

My greatest downfall with writing prompts is my inability to write a short story instead of the beginning of a novel. I clearly need to work on getting to the point faster. I barely covered the prompt whoops. Here's a 20 minute writing prompt from writing club yay!

The editing on this is v minimal

~~~~~~~

Jenny’s head was a terrible place.  She was so bogged down by anxiety and self ridicule it was like a never ending barrage of bad thoughts.  Ghost hadn’t meant to fall into it.  He had just been minding his business, opening a few cupboards while he waited for his unfinished business too well… finish.  

It was really rather hard being a ghost.  You could only watch TV when someone else was and you could never choose what you wanted to watch.  Jenny was a Soc major which meant she had an affinity for documentaries and crime dramas.  That was okay. For Jenny. Not for Ghost. If Ghost wanted to watch stories about real people it would involve some drink throwing and designer bags.  But alas here he was sitting on the couch next to Jenny.

She was crying again.  Large crocodile tears rolled down her face and Ghost cringed as they went into her bucket of ice cream.  He thinks her boyfriend had dumped her again?  Honestly the first year of college was always so tumultuous for these freshmen.

He could barely remember what his had been like.  It had been so long ago.  And now he was just stuck here.  Haunting this year's freshman.  The reality of college was definitely less exciting than most people thought.

But the thing about Jenny was that she had the loudest dreams. They were vibrant and colorful and sometimes at night he could hear them leaking out of her and becoming real, tangible.  A sound, a smell, even a flickering image would broadcast into the room and ghost would be swept away for a moment. It was a miracle she had a single dorm.

He really really didn’t mean to go inside her head. It really was an accident. But one night, he couldn’t resist the lure of whatever was going on in this sad girl's dream.  

After she’d finished crying and passed out on the couch in a sad lump.  It was almost like a voice was beckoning him to float closer, to peer into her head.  And he leaned closer, trying to hear, and closer still.  And with a whoosh he was sucked in.

A ship was built around him.  Tall billowing sails, swearing pirates, the salt in the air.  He breathed deep with real lungs.  Oh God it was like being alive again.  Ghost looked around the deck and there he saw her.  Crouched in the corner of the ship was Jenny.  Still crying even in her sleep.  Her eyes were closed and it seemed as if she wasn’t aware of where she was.  Critical mean dark words floated around her.  Telling her that she wasn’t good enough.  That she would never be good enough.  That no one would love her.  Ghost sighed.  He supposed if he was going to be an interloper in this girl's inner world the least he could do was try to bring her out of this misery.  He said excuse me to a pirate who was swabbing the deck as he walked towards Jenny.  

He crouched down in front of her laying a hand on her shoulder.

“Hey.”

Jenny’s eyes snapped open.

“You know that this hurt isn’t forever right?  It will pass. And things will get better.”

Jenny’s brow scrunched and a big gust of sea air tossed her hair around her face. “That’s just what everybody says to make losers feel better.”

Ghost sighed and sat down next to her. “Take it from someone who thought that too and then made some very brash decisions.  I’ve watched many young people go through the same stuff as you and guess what?  They all turn out okay.”

“Oh,” Jenny looked off into the sea, staring at a gull gliding in the wind, “Are you like in one of my classes?”

Ghost sighed again. College freshmen were all the same.  He swears there was a script for small talk.  “No, I'm quite literally a ghost who fell into your dream.  Which by the way is great but you’re just pouting in the corner.” He gestures widely at the ship.  “You should be thankful you can dream at all.  Dead people don’t dream.”

Her eyes widened as she looked back at him, “You’re dead?”

“Uh yeah. Sorry for being in your head by the way.”

And then she woke up.  With him still in her head. He could hear her thoughts rattling around. He watched through her eyes as she stared at herself in a mirror, thinking bad thoughts. Stop that.  He chided.

“Oh my God who said that?”

Uh.  Oops? Sorry. I’m still in here.

“Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. Get out of my fucking head dude!”

Sorry I don’t know how to do that. While I’m in here I have a couple TV recs for you.

~~~~~~~~

Once her self image gets better he is able to leave her head and his unfinished business of helping somebody like him is finished.  The end. :)

[pygmalimoon]

Hola! I saw your recent reblogs of POTO! So GLAD you're part of this fandom too

Besides that, what do you think about Douxie/Claire in a POTO AU? not only follows the original plot of POtO with them being Phantom and Christine, I mean the mentor and student, the mysterious music angel and the girl with her belief in music but also how Douxie came to Claire and after that their relationships, magical tutorials. It just fits them so well What Ovo

Of course ignoring the ending... but even that makes sense to some extent, the part where Christine loves someone else (yet still has complex feelings for the Phantom), and they didn't end up together :/

Do you have any other AU headcanons you like for them btw

WOW THANK YOU FOR ASKING^^

Yes I love POTO super hard!! I do enjoy it and I'm a erikstine shipper you are not wrong XD

And yes I do have this AU for them, I think you're looking for this, but in musical/drama actor version ⬇️

Dreams come true haha XDDDD

Personally I think there are still huge difference between these two ships I would say... but I like your descriptions of this AU. E/C does somehow reminds me of D/C when I watching the musical^^

For the other AUs, I’m still considering The Mortal Instruments and Nutcracker AUs for them ^o^ I might release it on specific holidays ^^

Thank you for the asking anon, I love to talk about them and you made my day ;3