#I’ve never seen such cope over a canon ship

[longing-for-rain]

You know, I actually really didn’t mind kataang/Aang at first, but over the years, one thing that always stood out to me was the way that the same people who mocked and bashed Katara’s character were so defensive over kataang.

It’s less prevalent now than it was pre-2020, but people used to relentlessly mock Katara for mentioning her mother, call her rude and bossy, and that she was the most annoying character. You can still see it on platforms like Reddit and YouTube with predominately male user bases; they are much more mask off.

It couldn’t be more obvious how these people view Katara. To them, Aang deserves her because he’s the hero and he wants her. That’s as deep as it goes. What matters to her is irrelevant and the show and fans of that ship make it obvious with their behavior. This new wave of kataang fans pretending they love Katara is a very recent phenomenon and all the old fans know it.

[peggingeddiediaz]

Is kinda sad that can't cope with bucktommy getting so much support and probably being endgame due to fan reaction that you have make a weird af polycule to deal with it

I’ve been getting so much anon hate lately that I really feel like I’ve made it 😎 I’m gonna humor you anon.

I think I’ve said it before but I don’t hate Tevan (bucktommy), I’m incredibly happy that we just got two canon queer characters on the show and that Eddie’s coming out was at least planned at one point and hopefully it’s still in the plans.

The “fan reaction” at least on tumblr and AO3 is more of a thirst reaction really, because fanon bucktommy just did what fanon buddie did but with two episodes of content.

The headcanons for the ship can be summed up in: thirst tropes for Tommy’s actor (dom top Christian grey cosplayer) sounds familiar right? (latin lover trope eddie is in the background laughing) and then you have Evan “self insert” Buckley, in a new ship but never beating the 3 tropes in a trench coat allegations.

I’ve even seen bucktommy fans use pics of Buck during season 1 so Tommy has a “twink to take care of” ???? Buck who is as big as Tommy, a twink...

And is that last part the whole problem with bucktommy as a ship. The fans are willing to pretty much ignore Buck as he is in S7, replace him with his S1 character so they can again, repeat the Top (masculine, big, dominant) Bot (skinny, childish, submissive) dynamic and rinse and repeat the same boring cycle of: character they find hot (Tommy)/ thinly veiled female coded self-insert (Buck) Same thing that happens with fanon buddie.

It is kinda sad to think that if Tommy had been a female love interest, the fan reaction would’ve been very different. I didn’t completely hate Taylor Kelly but it’s very obvious why Tommy, who also did questionable things before, gets forgiven and elevated to “best love interest” in just 2 episodes and 3 scenes.

Tommy Kinnard is just as an undeveloped as Buck's previous female love interests but he's getting a pass from the fandom because he's hot.

Fanon bucktommy is just tropey headcanon over tropey headcanon. You can enjoy that. But I hated fanon buddie for the same reason so I won’t really be entertaining fanon bucktommy either.

All of this to say I’m coming out as a Buck stan as well. He deserves to be a character and not just a flanderized headcanoned trope. So, if you ever want to hang out with the buddietommy crew give me a follow.

[sailormoonsailorstars]

Hello tumblr :3 I have some thoughts for both the Sailor Moon / TBHK-JSHK fandoms and the OSDDID community.

For clarification I am a host of a dx’d DID system. Traumagenic.

tw for like… idk ranting, abuse mentions, and things along those lines!

I have felt since system discovery that the take of “this character trope, this character in media is not accurate representation therefore this is bad and you supporting it is bad and you are bad” is kind of … stupid?

For one, everyone experiences dissociation or plurality differently. Saying people cannot enjoy Touko Fukawa & Syo as a system because it’s bad rep is weird. Saying people cannot headcanon Izuru and Hajime as a system is also weird. Personally, it’s none of your business what people find comfort in especially if they are a system or plural.

Anyways, I’m starting off with this because I think people forget that you do not have to literally interpret things like possession, mind control, or illness in media as those things. I think you can see those things as symbolism for being a system if you want.

Case 1: Hotaru Tomoe (& Sailor Saturn with Mistress 9)

In Sailor Moon- no matter which adaptation you consume Hotaru Tomoe is clearly shown to be separate from Saturn and Mistress/Messiah all while residing in the same body. In order to access herself as Saturn she has to literally meet her and be reawakened. This is a really similar experience to my system discovery and I think other systems might see it too! Mistress 9 is one of the stereotypes that people would disagree with since in canon she is a demon possessing Hotaru- but even that I feel like could be interpreted differently.

Saturn is protective of Hotaru and her friends. Hotaru is sweet, and kind. She is there most of the time. And mistress 9 could be interpreted as a persecutor. I’ve always seen Hotaru in this light.

And for anyone that wants to go by the DSM: Hotaru has severe childhood trauma. She lost her mother in a fire/explosion that she was apart of. Her and her father were possessed by demons- her father was straight up neglectful and abusive medically. And his “partner” Kaori was abusive towards Hotaru.

Case 2: Aoi Akane (and her “fake” personality.)

This one is less implied, more of a headcanon but- Aoi has outright said she puts up a front for people around her. The Aoi people know vs. The Aoi that she is are completely different. On top of this, when Hakubo (No.6) gives her that potion she acts completely different than either side of that spectrum.

And again for DSM truthers: I’m not sure how much of this is canon to the main timeline but Aoi has a neglectful and shitty dad in general. It’s never out right stated that she’s been abused but I would think she is. On top of that, she’s extremely popular and has to live up to the standards that people put for her… which she can’t ever reach because they’ll always get higher and higher.

Case 3: Mei Shijima (and Shijima San of The Art Room)

This one has always grinded my gears tbh.

Mei and Shijima are shown to be two separate people from the start. Shijima being Mei’s own creation to cope with what is most likely cancer / terminal illness and the fact that despite her passion she is going to die soon.

But people get upset or confused when it’s posted that they are separate characters? And get even more upset about shipping them together. Like, I don’t know how to tell singlets this but inner system dating is not unusual. They also hardly look the same which seems to be most peoples problems. They don’t have the same hair color or eye color and also just all around are physically and emotionally different.

Shijima is extremely protective over Mei and became very very upset when people made rumors spinning Mei’s illness related death into Mei hurting herself over her parents.

I think they’re a beautiful representation of plurality. Mei forgives Shijima for persecuting her, because she knew Shijima was just trying to keep what Mei actually stood by while she was alive there.

Anyways I’m sorry this became a super long info dump. TL;DR let systems or any plural person have their headcanons. They are not hurting anyone. And also keep an open mind to things in media! Hotaru’s character is very special to me but I often don’t talk about her being a system to others because the sailor moon fandom is very very tricky. Especially the millennial side of it.

[noellemadrigal]

Noeluno 💚✨

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking recently. As a lot of you have probably seen, I’ve been pretty indecisive and keep changing Noelle’s backstory. And I’ve realised for me none of her stories feel right and I want to return more to the self ship side of things. A lot of the little head canons and art pieces you see are based on daydreams of myself and Bruno. I created Noelle to be able to show these moments to the world, but mainly for myself. And then I tried to give her a back story to keep up, but it never seemed to fit. It meant changing her completely from myself.

So I’m keeping it much more simple. 😍

Art by my wonderful friend NS artwork who has literally been bringing my head Bruno to life 💚✨

8 years into Bruno’s self exile in the walls, a bubbly English girl called Noelle randomly appears to him one day. There’s not necessarily an explanation other than perhaps magic or the universe itself made it so. At first there’s shock, confusion and I thought maybe it would be fun to add an initial language barrier. These moments keep randomly happening over the next few weeks and neither understand how or why. At first they both believe they’re just imagining things or dreaming - Bruno comes to the conclusion that he must have finally gone mad 🤣 But as time goes on these moments become stronger and more prolonged. They both begin to fall in love, and Noelle begins to teach herself Spanish in order to understand Bruno (still undecided for this part, I watched love actually and felt inspired to add this in 😍). They discover that each other are both real people and learn to be able to control their connections. At some point Bruno is able to gain the confidence to cross into Noelle’s world for short periods of time, especially her home in the woods.

Art again by NS artwork 💚

Around year 9 of Bruno being in the walls they get married - a simple ceremony with the rats as their witness and a very old priest 🤣 Once Bruno is reunited with the family they do eventually renew their vows at the church and throw a celebration for everybody!

Art pieces above by @glendybluebird & @giulscomix 😍💚✨

When Bruno is reunited with his family there is a period of time where Noelle isn’t able to connect. He trusts she will be back one day. And in the mean time he tries to open up to his family about her, but they assume he just imagined her to cope with living in the walls. A few months after the events of the film she manages to reconnect, and Bruno introduces her to a very shocked family! 🤣 She is able to find a way to stay with Bruno and the family.

Below are some art pieces that sum up their relationship and the things they like to do together 🥹💚✨A lot of my future art pieces will be showing post wall moments and their life in the Encanto. The time where Bruno has finally achieved the happiness of being back with his family and is getting all the love and happiness he deserves 😍✨

Artists NS artwork, @glendybluebird & @meepxii 😍💚✨

[wormsin]

Different anon here and I’m sorry for derailing the topic with this ask and making it more into a gen or possibly including other ship territory, but your answers made me curious on how (do you think) his relationship to his mission contributes to his inner turmoil and his relationship (this codependency) with Dick, especially when his mission is oftentimes conflated with Joker which then extends to this codependency to him (Joker)? I suppose, I’m trying to reconcile these two points, since I’ve always been focused on the latter (his unhealthy relationship with Joker) and have seen many people pointed its evidences in canon, and rarely the former (his unhealthy relationship with Dick, and whenever I see a post about it, it’s always confined in a very fixed nuclear father-son relationship) until I see your answers and now it has intrigued me

no worries! I also like gen Bruce & Dick, and other ships of theirs. well some of them 😅

if I'm understanding your question right, what is the ven diagram overlap of Bruce's codependency with the Joker and codependency with Dick? how are these dependencies reconciled? I actually have been researching this and have a conspiracy theory about how it all works in Bruce's brain. (had to figure it out for my fic It's Never Over Until it's Over. as some of the theory is spoilers for the rest of the fic, I won't get into it all now. but I will write the meta after the fic is complete.)

first of all, yes, a lot of Bruce&Dick dysfunction meta I see is through the lens of parental abuse. imo there's some of that in comics but the vast majority is just Not Parental.

Dick Bruce Joker Codependency Triangle

there's not a lot of comics that I've found that address both of these relationships, but some moments come to mind:

Joker shoots Dick, Dick nearly falls to his death, and Bruce fires Dick.

Dick kills the Joker, and Bruce revives him.

Dick, Damian and the Joker fight side by side (sort of) against Dr. Hurt while Bruce is "dead".

Dick goes to Bruce after Jason has died.

a simple understanding of these dependencies are that Dick and the Joker are the angel and devil on Bruce's shoulders. Dick keeps Bruce in the light and saves his life; Joker drives him towards madness and suicide. the Joker represents the line Bruce can't cross (murder, which would make Bruce evil) and Dick is the version of Bruce who doesn't need that line.

I think it's more complicated than that. there are too many overlaps between Dick and Joker, and the Robins in general and Joker. some of this might be just because Dick and the Joker are the oldest continuous characters for Bruce and writers love to iterate on those relationships. but there are some really interesting comics that delve into Bruce's psyche and Dick, Joker, Batman and his parents play huge roles in his mind.

the mission in general is both Bruce's maladaptive coping mechanism, which strains all his relationships, and his potential to be the best version of himself. this makes it very difficult for Bruce to be a balanced person. I think Dick is one of the few people who sees both sides of the Mission, and helps Bruce be a balanced Batman.

the Joker on the other hand, only sees one side of Batman. he is maybe THE person who drags Bruce into the worst version of his Mission. and I think Bruce having a healthy relationship to Batman necessarily involves untangling his self from the Joker, which he arguably has started to do in the last few big Joker storylines.

[mamapyjama]

I love how the entire bnha merch is LITERALLY bkdk in the center of everything.

Not All Might. Not Deku. Not All Might and Deku, or even Deku and Uraraka.

JUST bkdk.

Thanks for the comment Anon! They really are though. I honestly couldn’t cope with the lack of canon and merch content that other ships have to deal with. My imagination is not nearly good enough to fill the gaps, I think I’d get bored and end up drifting away from the ship if I felt like fandom was doing all the heavy lifting. Not to mention the constant disappointment of seeing your otp split up and paired with others. I’m not in this for pain!

I think one of the things I enjoy most about the bkdk fandom is how often we’re given content, and then seeing so many incredible, creative people bounce the ideas around and watching it all add up in the art and fics. It’s amazing!

I’ve honestly never seen a ship so consistently well fed, and I’ve been an anime/manga fan for over 20 years. 🥰 We’re very very lucky.

[cloudbells]

4, 9, 18, 38 for your mcu ask game! ILY❤️

HI THANK YOU ILY TOO MWAH MWAH <3

4. NOTP (Least favorite ship)

I have a couple answers to this that I can be normal about hating…but I fear the facade of me being not absolute bonkers coo coo crazy has long faded. So I will answer this with truth.

If I could mentally eradicate the existence of WinterIron from the minds of every single person who has contributed to its success…I’d wallow in the ethics of that for about 5 minutes and then immediately do it #mindwipingiscoolactually #giveMEthemindstone. I truly, truly, despise that ship with everything in me. And this isn’t a secret! Anyone who has ever spoken to me knows I hate this ship. Just the mere sight of it makes me sick to my stomach oh my goodness. Everyone knows to the point where I'll get disclaimers about any hint of winteriron in fic recs (also i love you guys who do this y'all are so REAL). And it’s not even for, like, morals reasons. I just hate it so much because of how I’ve seen it portrayed. I wish I could say the ship not making sense is the reason I hate it most, but it isn’t! Even though I firmly believe it makes no sense. That’s not anywhere near my main problem with it because I have plenty of ships that don’t make sense (Never ask user cloudbells what her current favorite ultra-sparkly rare pair is [the two characters aren't in the same fandom or even sister fandoms]). 

I hate it for petty reasons. And I hate that it’s so popular. Why is it one of the most popular ships?! Why do people like them? Well, I know why people like them, but I wish I could live my entire life with never seeing it ever again. Every time I’ve ever saw it, it involves some weird ass Steve characterization. But also, I just hate the idea of taking Steve’s top ships and making them in love with each other and then all the weird hateful undertones when it comes to Steve? Plus, in no way are Tony and Bucky ever getting together. I can’t even stand them as besties if we’re gonna get real lmao. I can handle them becoming friendly…maybe friends eventually, but anything further than that and I need Ativan or something to chill out. Omg, I can’t think about this anymore, someone get the straightjacket. I’ll admit myself to residential. But I do always love the chance to talk about things I don’t like. 

9. Favorite fight scene

Gotta say I’m a sucker for the scenes in CATWS where Steve fights Bucky. I love them so much. I love how you can clearly see the way his body twists, the way his muscles tense and release, the way his strikes flow - how sharp his jumping, punching and kicking are. UGH. It does everything for me. I loooooove Steve’s fighting choreography. He fights so clean…at least to me, someone who isn’t a trained fighter. Hm, well, maybe with this in mind, I should say I love the elevator fight. Or Hell - Natasha’s fight scenes. Side note that has nothing to do with the MCU: this just reinforced how much I love hand to hand. I remember when I watched Naruto and used to complain constantly over the lack of good taijutsu fights. I like seeing contact!!

18. Things you'd do if you're one of the MCU writers

Erm…SteveTony canon? Just kidding. But I wouldn’t say no to adding more undertones.

In all honesty, if we’re not talking about re-writes…I would absolutely give more weight to the Clint and Natasha relationship. I just mentioned this to someone, but I would do anything for a movie or mini-series or something just to see the moment where Natasha came to kill Clint and he instead decided to take her in, convince Fury to help, assisted with deprogramming her, ect. I’d love it. Seeing Natasha learn to trust again, seeing Clint struggle and being active in her healing. Natasha coping with everything she’s done, ect. Their bond forming…I need it. If any has any fic recs…

If we’re talking about Steve specifically, I would single-handedly force everyone to keep his deleted scenes and find somewhere to put them. I just wish we had more context on Steve himself. Like, I don’t need to see him having a self vs self angst we see with many other characters, because he’s not the type that needs that - but his external circumstances are fucking shitty and I’d love to see those explored more. I’d rewrite CACW to be more blatant on Steve’s motivations. I mean Hell, they were pretty damn clear to me, but apparently I can’t use myself as the leading authority on things like this (boooooo) and since it’s a CAPTAIN AMERICA movie, it should center around him. I shouldn’t have to defend Steve from the fandom concerning his own damn movie. 

I have some more thoughts but this post is getting long omg, I might not have enough space.

38. Favorite and least favorite villain

Favorite? I really like the potential Kang has (though he wasn’t really…great to me in Ant Man tbh). But anyways, my favorites are Alexander Pierce and Killmonger. I’ve mentioned why I like Pierce as a villain before, but it boils down to how calmly and near seamlessly he executed his power. I’ve always loved a villain that is so outwardly calm and calculated and manages to manipulate even the most suspicious of people, precisely because from his view, his goals aren’t very different from some heroes’. And because he believes in his evil so deeply, it makes him more patient and determined to carry forward. I like that. Chills!

My like for Killmonger is more…it’s a little removed from the MCU verse. I’m a black American, so I really understood where his anger and sense of betrayal came from. I mean, we're also from the same exact city. And I grew up with all typa diaspora wars between black people and African people that felt reflected in the movie…it all just really connected with me. He’s still the villain no doubt for how he went about it, but I truly, truly got his resentment. His emotions and motivations make sense! And I love a character that makes sense. 

Least favorite? The Howard guy in WandaVision. Ouuuuu, put me and him in a room for 2 minutes and he’ll be handled, permanently! I don’t even think he’s a badly written character because he (unfortunately) makes sense. But oh my goodness, I hate him so much. Now, least favorite as in boring or bad? Ultron, in my opinion. He could have been so much cooler, much more formidable, much more terrifying…but if they really dived into it, Ultron’s reign wouldn’t have started and ended in just one movie. But damn, was he disappointing.

Oh! If Namor counts as a villain (he does) I really like him. And NOT just because he's sexy and I have had a period of time where I had a very guilty and shameful crush on him.

Thank you for the ask!! <3

[drleggman]

lexi!!!!

1. i love you and miss you whenever you’re gone <3

2. what are your main self ships? and can you give me a tiny glimpse of each of the relationship dynamics?

Kae 🥹 ilyilyilyily

My top self ships are probs me/bokuto, me/reiner, and me/tamaki (i got so excited when i saw u and aleks talking about him yesterday! he’s so underrated) !! They’re all like my og self ships too and I’ve kept our lore stored away for years atp, so I’ll talk about them!

Bokuto!! He’s like the stereotypical golden retriever boy, and that’s usually not my type but… Here we are lol. We’re very complementary, he’s the sun to my moon etc etc. We met when I was hired on to be a translator for the jpn national team, and he asked me out after the Olympics were over. He just. Approached me and said “You’re pretty :D I think it’s so cool that you speak two languages :D I wasn’t gonna ask you out bc I thought it’d be unprofessional, but then tsum-tsum called me a pussy, and I’m not a pussy, and” I have to cut him off and we agree to go on a date and hit it off immediately! We both tend to get pouty when something doesn’t go our way and we love to baby each other when it happens. He encourages me to do things I’d usually be to nervous to try, and I encourage him to rest lol. He introduces me to his friends and invites me to hang out with him and the boys on the national team and brings me out of my shell. Our friends think we’re annoying bc of how sappy and affectionate we are. Especially if we’ve been drinking! Just hanging off of each other constantly and arguing about who loves the other more. We never leave the honeymoon phase and spend our whole lives after getting together absolutely obsessed with each other.

Reiner and I, in both a canon and modern setting, kinda trauma bond and become inseparable (boys w mommy issues love me and I love men who cry and are so miserable). We both are in the middle of identity crises and struggle with our sense of self and our place in the world and how to cope with the horrors we’ve partaken in lived through, but we make each other feel so seen in a way we’ve never experienced before. The people in our lives want to tell us that maybe we shouldn’t be in a relationship while still in such vulnerable mental states, but they’ve also not seen us so happy in so long, so they keep their mouths shut. We’re a bit toxic at first in a codependent way. We can’t function without the other and we fuel each others grief and isolate ourselves from the people around us, but after years together, we slowly start to get over ourselves lmao. We grow tired of pitying ourselves and start to be better together, and we both firmly believe we’d have never snapped out of it if it weren’t for us encouraging each other. Which maybe isn’t true, but nobody would ever tell us that.

And Tamaki!! My sweet Suneater <3 This is one of the rare instances in which I initiate everything in the relationship and take on a more dominant role. I was just like him when we met, but if there’s one thing that will snap me out of my anxiety, it’s seeing someone who is just as anxious as me struggling to do things it helps that I think he’s so cute. We meet at Fatgum’s agency, and I wanna be his friend soooo bad, but I know how overwhelmed he gets, so I go slow and am very soft with him. I tell him about how I manage my anxiety, teach him my coping mechanisms, and show him my fidget toys and then buy him some of his own - all unprompted. He was kinda unresponsive at first bc he was confused about why I’d wanna talk to him, but he warms up to me pretty quickly after he realizes that I have the same struggles as him. He starts to see through the false confidence after that, catching me when I’m anxious and picking up on my ticks, and he’ll remind me of the techniques I taught him to help him get out of his head. I’m the “he asked for no pickles” partner, while he’s clutching my shirt and hiding behind me w his face pressed into my shoulder. If he sees me getting anxious, especially when talking to someone, he also gets nervous lol but his need to help me emboldens him. His favorite move is to just like physically insert himself into the situation. Like stand between me and the person and whisk me away to somewhere quiet. I’m much cockier when we’re alone, and I love to tease him and get him all flustered. He loves praise but it gets him so worked up and I looove to shower him with compliments and pet names. I’m one of the few people he lets his guard down around when he’s not in action mode, so he’s just like. Normal when we’re alone. Still soft spoken and sweet, but after being together for a while, his relationship anxiety and worries about looking dumb in front of me fade. anxiety4anxiety all the way but we make it work

[doberbutts]

#op i haven't thought about this this way until now#and i love it#that's one of the things i never really got into with cloud's party#i never really felt like cloud would end up with someone in the way most fics try and sell me that#but also#there is so much to explore between the different relationships he has with the larger cast and i want to explore that!!!!

@paradigmanomaly

I really agree with you on all this. Even when I was playing the original as a kid, I never shipped Cloud with anyone. I shipped Tifa with Barrett over anyone else, and it felt like Aerith was a familial figure so I never shipped her with Cloud, either. Now, I haven’t played the remake or any of the sequels or anything like that… but yeah. Romance wasn’t something I though too much about while playing the game.

@bearb0i​

Both of these, good food.

Again obv idgaf what other folks interpret Cloud as or who they pair him off with, I have seen him paired with just about everyone and if it’s well written/drawn then people find ways to make it work and if it’s not then I move on since there’s no draw to it for me. BUT.

I think it is interesting to explore his relationships with the crew without the need to pair him off. Knowing that he views himself as damaged goods and tends to be prickly and aloof as a coping method. Seeing his friends knowing it’s hard for him and staying anyway, as he does his best even if he falls short of what many would consider “good friends”. He bristles and he huffs and puffs if anyone calls too much attention to his affection but he also answers “there’s nothing I don’t cherish” while thinking of his various friends he’s made along the way. He doesn’t answer the phone but he listens to the voicemails and he doesn’t delete them either.

Tifa/Barrett is an interesting one that I’ve seen and personally I think makes thematic sense- she’s helping raise his daughter, she presumably also keeps a room for him as a result, and they, too, went through something fucked and traumatic together. I think just as much as one could argue that Tifa is holding out for Cloud to heal enough to truly see her, one could also argue that Tifa and Barrett falling in together would be a very natural progression of their pre-established relationship. Or, like, poly, lmao. I actually have a friend-of-a-friend who is in this sort of relationship where it is a married couple and their One Friend Who Needs Them (he’s very mentally ill and needs someone as an anchor to reality at all times or he’s going to have a Bad Time), I could very much see this being their dynamic and it would make a lot of sense to me with the established canon.

But in the end I think that Cloud’s canonical deep and intimate relationships with all of them despite his attempts to remain distant are interesting enough to explore on their own. So I don’t ship him with anyone because I think it works better for his character development at the point we leave the story to not have him seeking that out. Maybe he will later. Maybe he won’t. Who knows what the Remake will do.

Anyway the question that always gets asked whenever I reveal that I'm not actually into the Cloud/Tifa thing is who do I ship them with if not each other.

The answer is a little more complicated than all that because from the start I considered their relationship something closer to a QPR before I even knew what that meant. I was calling them platonic life partners back then. People who don't feel any romantic love for each other but have chosen to stay regardless, or perhaps because.

I think, before, Cloud thought he wanted to be for Sephiroth what Zack wanted to be for Angeal. A puppy-like affection, a mentor/mentee comradery, and a close connection. I think Sephiroth would have hated it. He was cold and standoffish to Zack until circumstances forced them together, and even then he only really opened up due to Zack's connection to Angeal. I don't think having his own "puppy" would have been welcome at all. And I think Cloud would have been forced to come to terms with reconciling his hero worship with the reality of everything.

He and Zack were friends, but Zack was actively dating Aerith at the time, and Cloud didn't know Aerith existed back then. And within the narrative, Zack and Aerith are "parents"- with how often Aerith is referred to as a mother with Zack standing beside her, and Cloud is among those who repeatedly mistake Aerith for their mom. Zack does it once within the complilation, before he meets her for real, Cloud a few times, *after* he knows who she is. Clearly even when [redacted], Zack and Aerith are intended to be read as a couple, but then that once again removes an option for Cloud.**

The others... eh. I could be pursuded with the right argument but within canon itself it doesn't hold much water. Once we eliminate those four, he's got affectionate negging with Barrett, a quiet respect for Vincent, and a mutual back-scratching with Reeve. He's vaguely willing to play ball with Reno and Rude but not willing enough to let his guard down, while he treats the other Turks with some distain. He mostly tolerates Cid and Yuffie he both treats like and calls a child- she's the youngest so fair, but still removes her from the playing field. Anyone else connected to Shinra he actively dislikes, so Rufus and his flunkies are out.

We've got confirmation that he doesn't remember Kunzel and if Tseng remembers who Cloud is, he's being characteristically tight-lipped about it but Cloud certainly doesn't remember him. The OG Avalanche crew all died, even though Biggs lived in the Remake, and they weren't close. The Remnants of course mostly wanted to kill him the entire time. Deepground barely acknowledges his existence. Angeal died before Zack met Cloud and Genesis was too deep in his own shit to care.

So like. That doesn't really leave anyone.

Personally I think Cloud has way too much unresolved grief and trauma that he still has not worked through. It's years later in Advent Children when he's finally able to begin to move on from [redacted], and despite that even more years later in Dirge of Cerberus he's still notoriously distant and moody and prone to flaking. He's still questioning who he really is, can he actually trust his own memories and senses, and how much guilt is he willing to shrug off his shoulders for his actions while under someone else's control.

And I think being a distant moody asshole that pushes your friends away because you don't know if they're actually real or not is a difficult mindset to be in while also trying to be in love. So he doesn't try. His friends do love him anyway however exasperated they may be with him at times when he shuts them out while Going Through It. But it means he's not really building anything with any of them either.

Except Tifa, who keeps a room and a bed and a desk for him when he decides to come back, whose bar he calls home, who adopted a scared little boy with him, who watches their friend's adopted daughter with him. Who takes a family photo of the four of them together, which sits on that desk. Who quietly sorts the research papers as he hunts for a cure for an incurable disease affecting their son. Who yells and scolds him not because he left and stopped coming home, but because he gave up and shut her out when he contracted the same disease rather than letting her help.

"You don't answer the phone, but I don't see you throwing it away."

Out of all the voicemails on his phone, it was hers saying Reno had dropped by the bar looking for him and being vaguely threatening with the kids that got him to go see the Turks. He did not followup on Reeve's invite to the WRO. He didn't go chasing oil with Barrett. He didn't visit Yuffie in Wutai. But Tifa says "Reno was here being his usual weird self, I think something was wrong", and he went to investigate.

I don't ship it. I think he believes he's too broken for romance. And I think she's very patient to wait for him and give him the space he needs. Maybe they're FWB. Maybe it's entirely platonic. But the compliation has shown us that it's *something*, even if it's deliberately vague on what type of something.

**I do sort of like the "first this guy [redacted] my boyfriend, then he [redacted] my girlfriend, after trying to [redacted] my childhood best friend and succeeding in [redacted] my entire village and also my mom. This Sephiroth guy sucks" paired with Sephiroth's "tell me what you cherish most, give me the pleasure of taking it away" vibes of Cloud/Zack/Aerith don't get me wrong, but also as said Aerith and Zack were dating at the time but Cloud does not know who she is (or even that Zack has a girlfriend) and it is Very Important that Cloud not know the name Aerith until after Zack [redacted] which would imply sort of shadey behavior on Zack's part. And I don't really see him as the type to cheat, so.

[takaraphoenix]

Ship game!! What about Nico and Will?? It’s pretty popular, but I don’t think I’ve seen you write much of it…

That's an interesting one in that I have vocalized my reasons for disliking it way back when it first became popular but instead of just linking that, it has been years so I think it's time for an updated version.

Firstly: This post is gonna be properly tagged and not crosstagged so if any shipper comes across it and feels the need to bitch about it, just don't; your lack of curating your own tumblr experience is not my problem! ;D

Now, there are three key factors that play into my dislike of this ship: How it was written, what it represents, how the fandom around it acts.

1. It’s rushed and uncomfortable

In BoO, it was incredibly rushed. They had literally five sentences of interactions before they walked into the literal sunset together. Five. It was just entirely born from Riordan's Noah's Ark Complex, where he just can't let people be single. The series was ending and he needed Nico to have an endgame so he rushed into some random romance with zero build-up.

The way their interactions went down was also severely uncomfortable for me. Will was acting so offended by Nico not wanting to go to camp and be friends in an entitled way that he had no right to be, he downright guilt-tripped Nico about how he had wanted to be friends. Nico has been just so severely traumatized at such a young age and his coping mechanism, as unhealthy as it was, was to run away and hide. Will acted like Nico not wanting to form attachments to people who could potentially leave him again was somehow just an Edgy Emo Decision and not a direct reaction to his trauma. His entire approach to Nico was basically all these hippie posts of "Don't have depression!! Just go out into the sun and stop being depressed!", which is already a bad take with non-medical people but he's supposed to be a doctor (and let's not get into the shadiness of him technically being Nico's doctor).

There is also an inherent "I can fix him" angle to this ship and to me, only few ship dynamics are more uncomfortable than that. If you want to fundamentally change a person's behavior and personality, you... don't actually want to be with this person.

Now, here's where my points overlap, because the following parts of their writing that bothers me also stand for what this ship fundamentally represents.

2. Solangelo is a queer ship written by and for straights

I'm a queer woman and as a queer woman, I want queer wish-fulfillment, not what straights want out of queerness. I'm kind of tired of that, I've been sitting through it for enough decades now. That's, of course, not to say that no straight writer can give proper queer representation, but far too often do straight writers - even the most well-meaning ones - project straight desires of queerness into their queer representation.

Let me explain that closer through this ship.

Nico's been in love with Percy for years and I'm going to do my best to not hijack this post with some Percico agenda; that's not what this his about, this isn't some "my ship is better than your ship" ship-war nonsense. It's simply a canonical fact that Nico has had romantic feelings for another character for years.

A character who, in this medium, is heterosexual. And if you're queer, you've been there. In love with your straight best friend. It's a cliche, but it's a cliche for a reason.

We have also all been well-meaningly rejected by said straight friend.

And here's the straight desires for you: The queer person who was in love with a straight person just immediately stops having those feelings and will then as quickly as possible fall in love with the next queer person they meet to be happy and no longer uncomfortably in love with a straight person, because that thought makes the straights uncomfortable.

Queer wish-fulfillment would be for Percy to return those feelings, for the queer character to get his first love, to not be rejected. That thing queer teens always dreamed about for themselves.

Aside from the wish-fulfillment angle, the pacing is another problem. Let me repeat, Nico was in love for years. But a five sentence conversation with Will once causes a crush on Will and we see him physically turn away from Percy and toward Will just immediately to rebound and actually fall out of love with Percy and in love with Will. Anyone who's ever been unlucky in love will attest to just how unrealistic and ridiculous the pacing here is.

It's also straight queerness in another respect; Nico has been the first ever queer character we meet in that world. He loves a straight guy - and to get over that, we introduce the second queer character. Because heaven forbid there are multiple queers to pick from. No, in straight-written queer romances, there is always that one main queer and then they introduce a second one and the two just immediately hit it off and develop a romance like all a queer person needs to form attraction to someone is the confirmation that the other person shares your sexuality.

Also the notable gay guy on gay guy ship here, whereas the more queer-wish-fulfillment option would have also included more nuance to the queer experience, because Percy doesn't have to be heterosexual just because he has only been with girls so far. It's a very old-fashioned - think 90s and early 2000s - kind of straight-written queerness that there are only exactly two homosexuals and that those two homosexuals then pair up.

And, listen, I'm not immune to these outdated straight-written queers entirely, I have many such ships that I grew up with that I am still fond of because they were groundbreaking at that time and they weren't outdated yet back when they happened in said 90s and early 2000s. I am however a grown woman now and just like I have grown, so has queer rep so I am not as easily baited into falling onto my knees in gratitude for canon rep. You have to go with the times. And this ship, by all that is given to us, is just entirely outdated straight-written rep.

Which, I mention earlier that even straight-written rep can be good. If the author tries. Riordan doesn't really try though; he does the bare minimum when he writes any of his rep - and there have been many, many more qualified voices being very vocal about his depiction of people of color and, as a woman, I've been vocal about his depiction of women. I don't want to derail this post with all of that, but I do think that it bears mentioning that Riordan doing rep but only doing a bare minimum and not putting in the necessary work to deepen the representation he wants to give is a repeating pattern that has been pointed out many times by now.

(I’d also like to point out that no, it is not just the ship and not just the listed instances that make it straight-written rep for straights. It’s Nico’s entire queer arc, starting with his forced coming out. A severely traumatizing event that is completely brushed over because the straight author doesn’t understand the impact this has on queer people. Not to mention the framework; Nico’s coming out isn’t Nico’s story, it happens in Jason’s POV, it is given to us through the POV of the straight bystander who gets to be Best Ally by assuring Nico that being gay is okay. This kind of coming out is not a queer wish-fulfillment, it’s a straight wish-fulfillment of getting to be the straight savior, the ally to show the gay the light of acceptance. And, additional to the ridiculous pacing of how fast Nico gets over his love for Percy, Nico also gets over years of internalized homophobia just because of, I don’t know, Jason’s few encouraging words and the fact that Will paid attention to him? For a gay kid who was in the closet all his life, the nonchalant way in which he publicly confessed his crush to Percy at the end made absolutely no sense and was written as basically a joke, finished off with Nico literally high-fiving Percy’s girlfriend despite those two never having seen eye to eye before but this is straight wish-fulfillment so all straights are Super Allies, because that’s the way straights want to see themselves, even though Annabeth has shown before just how jealous she can be and she most definitely wouldn’t go around high-fiving people who confess to her boyfriend. Nothing about Nico’s queer arc in HoO felt natural or queer or satisfying.)

Sure, Solangelo on a surface level is big because it's a canon queer couple in a YA book-series and kudos for that and yay for the kids who get to grow up seeing queers in YA books, but I actually do think that kids growing up with books written in the 2010s shouldn't grow up with 1990s levels of representation, because the 2010s overall are actually at a far more nuanced and better level of representation when it comes to queerness. And I do reserve the right to quit on too straight-written and too outdated queer rep in a landscape where I can get more satisfying representation elsewhere; we don’t live in times anymore where you necessarily have to love every bit of rep because it’s the only one you get.

Now that we've gone through my first two gripes, let's wrap this up with the final point, because it also directly ties into this.

3. The new wave of antis hiding behind this ship

A huge part of the fandom is so busy kissing Riordan's ass solely for giving them queer rep at all they think that both the author and the ship are beyond flawless and that kind of attitude is not good. Just because an author includes rep doesn't make either perfect. Absolutely no one is beyond critique - especially not when said critique comes from the very people the author is representing. And even beyond any "valid" critique on the ship, quite frankly, someone should also be allowed to just not like it, without any reasons given at all.

But there is a certain... protective obsessiveness about this ship that doesn't allow a not liking. Very similar to how PJO bore this mindset around Perc/abeth already. It's okay to have OTPs, even OTPs that you have a blindspot for and just don't want to see any flaws in. It is however not okay to then go around attacking people who don't like the thing and mind their own business.

Solangelo's bred a new generation of antis in this fandom. And, particularly with the fact that this post too receives an "anti" tag, I feel like there needs to be a clarification (because tumblr likes to forget what actually makes an anti). Not liking something doesn't make you an anti, venting in properly tagged posts doesn't either; it's the people who harass others, who seek out the content they dislike to then complain that it even exists and who actively try to make others stop creating for it - those are antis.

And with Solangelo's popularity, there was a high rise in Percico antis, who sought it out, were unnecessarily nasty about it, harrassed creators and tried to enforce some kind of "Solangelo supremacy" that won't allow other ships for the characters.

I've been in fandom long enough to be perfectly aware that not all Solangelo shippers count into this category and that there are completely normal and nice Solangelo shippers, but this is a Venn diagram where the overlap between Solangelo shippers and antis is too large to not widely associate the nasty people with the ship itself. (I've been there myself, shipping the very ship behind which a fandom's antis all hid. The second-hand embarrassment of having these people give the ship a bad name is horrendous and I do feel bad for all the normal Solangelo shippers.)

The more often I encountered these people, who made Percico bad (sometimes in wildly ridiculous manners that bent and deliberately misinterpreted canon) and who in the same breath praised Solangelo high, the more tired I grew of that ship. It's a simple game of association, really. You see that linked to the gross and nasty behavior and you start associating the ship itself with that gross and nasty behavior - and with all the things I said before that already weighed into my dislike of the ship, this just was the final tipping point, really.

And that's it. That sums up why I dislike Solangelo. It was hastily rushed, uncomfortable in its execution, it is outdated rep that very much feels as straight-written as it factually is and it does not feel aimed at me as a queer person but rather at the straight audience and it has gathered a cult following of quite uncomfortable people who on their own would be reason enough to avoid it so you can avoid them.

Send me a ship and I will explain why I do or don't ship it

[tomatograter]

New to the fandom, Could you explain June? 💯 Love and support her. But homestuck 2 doesn't have her and I'm just confused?

June Egbert precedes the concept of homestuck^2! I’ve seen a lot of people be confused about this because they weren’t active on the fandom at the time the epilogues dropped, when reading her as a trans woman got a lot of discussion going and eventually lead to multiple confirmations.

So here’s an attempt at contextualization:

Throughout Homestuck, a few key ideas about Egbert’s identity and motivation to push forward with her hero’s journey are dropped like breadcrumbs. She’s meant to play the default straight-man protagonist. Her defining traits are ridiculously… generic, when compared to how all the other kids present themselves and stick to exaggerated bits. She’s a perfectly normal, regular suburban kid with normal, suburban issues. 

She may not leave her room a whole lot. She may not have a lot of real life friends in the neighborhood. She holds a comical irritation for the concept of birthdays, even though her father is extremely supportive, and is delighted to see his son grow up nice and healthy. There’s no reason for her to be so irrationally upset at cakes and gifts, and that’s what makes the setup funny! June doesn’t even know why she’s annoyed with half of the things that annoy her, what the heck.

But under all that playing around there is a sense that her life is so normal, so blasé, so unexciting and limiting and hollow and fake that she’d give anything to not be herself, even if only for ten minutes. This goes way, way back. It’s why June needs SBURB to happen.

June lives as though her life hasn’t started yet. She’s stuck in the Tutorial stage. I would argue while most kids (and trolls) play SBURB to escape a shitty environment or the end of the world as they know it, June plays for a simpler reason: She needs to escape herself, and she needs to do it before it is too late. 

Being thirteen means crossing the homeric abyss between being a child with no care for the world sporting a generic hand-me-down identity and becoming a Teen (capital T) who needs to figure out how to cope with atrocious bodily changes while building the adult they’re meant to be AND deciding what the fuck they want out of life, and how they’re going to work to get it, forever and ever.

When you’re trans, and you don’t yet know you’re trans (or that this is a thing you’re even ALLOWED to be) the above feels a lot like serving a life sentence for an intangible crime.

You know what you’re supposed to do. You’ve seen it on tv, you’ve heard it from your dad, you know what are the normal trials and tribulations. You know you'll grow a few pimples and stubble and you'll need to learn how to shave, obviously, because it's basically a tradition in your family, and no one is really happy to be a teen. You know at some point you'll find a nice girl and you'll grow a hat out of your skull and then you will have to pay taxes and maybe you will have a baby daughter? You'd like it to be a daughter for no particular reason. And when you get a daughter you're going to name her Casey and she's going to be adorable and this is something you've dedicated a lot of thought to. Maybe its because you thought Nic Cage looked really cool with those long flowing locks in con air, the movie who featured a trans woman as a minor character for a few minutes (and she gets quite a bit of compliments, regardless of how the movie has aged), and he had a really exciting life, but goddamn did he love his daughter. There is no purer love than the bond between a father and his daughter. 

This absolutely has nothing to do with your father and you, or how you hold no excitement for becoming an adult man, or how your father's excitement for you becoming an adult man in your stead feels a little stifling.

But i digress.

June spends her time on SBURB mostly hassling karkat, and readily following the instructions of zany, dangerous, COOL girls that seem to know what they're doing. June lets Terezi lead her to certain death without blinking. June lets Vriska dress her up as soon as opportunity presents itself. June thinks its really funny to trick this troll Who Types Really Oddly into believing she's Rose, and also into believing that she's a very silly girl. You may even say Homestuck employs a few of jokes pertaining to how her name looks like EGG !

June has a ball playing this game until it starts to get shitty. She's never able to mend her relationship with her dad, as he's one of the first causalities. She has to spend a lot of time waiting around with jade on a ship until things get cool and exciting again, but she never stops growing during those three years. Its fine, though, because there's always more things to be done and more people to fight.

Until there aren't, and they make a new earth, and while everyone cheers and claps for the birth of a new planet June realizes all her excuses are over. Her friends begin to grow up. Rose gets married. Jade is living her best life. Dave has a not-boyfriend glued to his hip. Jane has a job. Jake is on TV for some reason. June doesn't want to leave home. June's birthday is around the corner again. Here come all the congratulations for becoming a strong lad for yet another year! Vriska is gone. Terezi is gone. SBURB is over. Wacky hijinks have been swapped for real-ass, boring-ass Regular life. We watch her unsuccessfully chase after the glory of days gone by when Rose presents her the possibility of going back into the game, when things were cool and mattered, or her flimsy decision to settle down with a nice girl she hasn’t really made an effort to know and become a father and be absolutely miserable for four decades as she asserts nothing is real, not anymore, and this is just how it is.

Depersonalization, depression and general apathy towards the world are all pronounced aspects of dysphoria that seem like unrelated incidents for someone who hasn't came out yet. June's trainwreck of a life post-game, specially her feeling of hollowness and chasing after anything that could fill it struck a chord with trans readers who left the epilogues to read HS again and discovered this has always sort of been here. June being a trans woman who doesn't have the proper vocabulary to express she is a trans woman makes a lot of earlier bits from the comic click into place, now in a broader context. We settled in the name "June" because it's what she imagines Vriska is calling her at some point, amid laughs, but even that was discussed for a lengthy period last year. What would she want to be called, what are possible tags for this, etc. But it was mostly for fun and games, because the prospect of the protagonist of a 10 year old beloved cult series being ACTUALLY confirmed as a trans woman just wasn't something that was done.

Until word got around to Andrew Hussie and he was reportedly so pleased with this interpretation of events he’d be making references to it, and some time later, a box of toblerones was left in a cave as a gift for fans to find. The first person to find a toblerone thought it would be funny to dedicate it to June, because now she was an ongoing reference that was fun to make. Instead of it ending there, Hussie logs on twitter for the first time in a long while to say 'Oh yeah, i'll make it happen' and that's when the whole thing exploded. I have a post detailing this made a year ago (with pictures!) so i won't keep you here.

In the year since, June has been vaguely alluded to in Pesterquest (in jade's end card, she's having her nails painted by rose.) Has been widely adopted by the community, those making their own fanventures and continuations, and the team behind Homestuck^2. In every way that matters, she's already thriving within the community that brought her to light a year ago. But her coming out in canon is something that will take time and a proper narrative arc to happen, one that is still being set up. We know it'll come eventually, the only question is “how”.

Not that the wind waits for anyone.

[toxicfucksaround]

1. I came here straight from security breach, I’m specifically from TikTok, where there was a lot of self ship content that drove me nuts /pos

2. Sun and moon are literally everything I love. Clowns/Jesters, Kidcore vibes, morally grey characters, Kellen Goff as the voice actor, schrunkly energy, what more could I ask for?

3. I’ve been here since the very beginning! I watched Mark’s playthrough and then was vibing with the content on TikTok. The. I started getting recommended dca content and saw how rabid the fans were for them and was so ecstatic!

4. I have not played security breach, but my brother has! Horror games are really cool but playing them fucks with my anxiety. Plus the game is broken for us, the music man section is bugged so bad it’s unbeatable. Maybe that’s what we get for getting the PlayStation version tho

5. I don’t really make sun and moon content, but I did sell some stickers at a con and gave them to Kellen Goff, which was amazing.

6. I don’t really have a specific answer for that one, I love all the content. Horror, creepy, yandere, cute, fluffy, romantic, sexy, pure smut, it’s all so good!

7. I don’t have a favorite au, because I enjoy all the ones I see so much that it’s hard to pick a favorite! And also because I don’t see as much dca content here on my tumblr feed anymore, which is sad

8. I don’t have any dca specific ocs, because I don’t think I’d be able to come up with a unique design at this point. I do, however, have an oc I made to ship with the dca and then never used them, oops! That oc is Razzmatazz!

9. I love the dca’s canon appearance! They’re extremely schrunkly! I do, however, draw them differently, with my own design preferences and making them simpler to draw.

10. I’m just that feral for the dca, I’m totally excited whenever I see stuff of them! Whenever I have a thing for a character it’s usually life consuming. I sacrifice a piece of my soul to each fictional character I drool over.

11. Hmmmm…. That’s tough, because I love them both dearly. Especially the meaner sun we see in Help Wanted 2. But,,,, I guess moon! I got a thing for spooky bois.

12. If this is referring to SaMS, I’ve never actually seen it. Blasphemy I know, I just struggle to watch videos like that. Plus it seems mostly oc based at this point in time, and the lore I’ve heard confuses me. However, If this is based on Canon Eclipse, I love him, he’s my darling angel and I hope he gets the happy ending he deserves, my little meow meow.

13. Pre glitch sun sounds interesting to me, because I don’t know exactly how he is, but he was totally a theater bot before running the daycare, which is very interesting! I also love how clearly unprepared he is to work with kids in a daycare setting, because honestly a mood.

14. Pre glitch moon is so interesting because like, if he’s a theater boy and was always in this “villain mode” for his role, then that means the glitch just amplified his personality into being actually dangerous. Or worse, he was able to differentiate between villain role and caretaker role, but the glitch made him stuck in villain mode. Which is so tragic! They’re just little guys your honor!

15. I personally believe they’re two ai in one body, but I’m not gonna lie I love the idea of Sun projecting all his bad traits and urges into “Moon” as a coping mechanism to have someone to blame. As we’ve established I’m not a very decisive person lol

16. I love seeing self insert and self ship aus! It. It makes me feel so safe and loved in the community!

17. I would personally like to see less of SaMS au stuff, as it mostly just confuses me. This doesn’t mean I want people to stop making that stuff! Quite the opposite, do what you love! Just please tag it! I just have personally blocked that tag is all.

18. I’m just looking forward to seeing more of the DCA in future games, as Steel Wool would have to be crazy to leave their story like that when so many fans would buy the game just for them.

19. I don’t think I’d get along with the dca that well irl. I think Sun might hurt my feelings, and Moon, well… if it’s post glitch I really don’t stand a chance xD

20. This was super fun! I had a great time answering these! Also, I guess just random side tangent, I kinda miss the early days of the fandom on TikTok, when everyone was going feral for security breach and its characters. A lot of that energy has died, hell I haven’t seen a single security breach video pop up in months. And when they do, is definitely not Dca ship content like it used to be. But I’m happy to see the community alive and well here on tumblr! Definitely makes me feel a lot better.

alright dca fandom, here's some questions bc i'm curious. the funky jesters make our brains go brr, but why? treat it as an ask game or answer in the tags if you feel like it! :)

how did you get here?

why these characters in particular? what was the hook for you?

how long have you been here?

have you actually played fnaf sb?

if you make content, what's your favorite piece you've contributed?

what's your favorite sort of art or fic? what genre/flavor/style?

what's your favorite au?

do you have any ocs, or have any ocs you're fond of?

what do you think of the dca's canon appearance? Scary? Cute? Something else?

what keeps you in this fandom despite the very small amount of canon content the dca had?

be honest: if you had to pick only one, sun or moon?

thoughts on eclipse?

thoughts on pre-glitch sun?

thoughts on pre-glitch moon?

do you interpret sun and moon as two sides of the same person, or truly two separate beings in one body? does it matter?

what's something in the fandom you'd like to see more of?

what's something in the fandom you'd like to see less of?

anything you're looking forward to?

do you think you'd actually get along with the dca if you met them irl?

free space! talk about whatever's on your mind!

[lunar-years]

The pro-St*ncy argument “Steve could change his mind about some or all of his dream over the next several years, making his plans more compatible with Nancy’s” is frustrating to me. I don’t fault anyone for imagining it would go like that and that they’d both be happy, but some people act like it’s wrong to give his current plans any weight even though the show puts them front and center. And they don’t extend the same logic to other characters. Jonathan being evasive about college and being afraid to leave his family and getting high sometimes are fixed character traits, even though he’s clearly going through something. I’ve also seen them be snotty about non-canon gay ships, like nobody ever explores their sexuality during young adulthood. And do they want Steve to have to change so much about his perfectly fine goals? A lot of them don’t seem to like Nancy that much so I don’t get it.

Yeah. I mean the nice thing about fandom is that there’s space to both debate what we actually think is going to happen canonically on the show and also to go beyond canon and have fun and ship whomever we like. If people want to imagine st*ncy riding off into the sunset with their suddenly perfectly aligned plans…I mean by all means go for it! One thing I’ll readily admit is that if jancy doesn’t end up together in canon I’ll be right here on tumblr headcanoning that they reconnect and do get back together somehow, someway, lol.

That said…when we’re talking about the context of the show, it definitely is important to put weight on their current plans and what’s being presented to us in canon, and I’m not sure how people could say otherwise? And what’s currently being presented is that Steve envisions himself with six kids and a Winnebago, and Nancy thinks that six kids sounds like a nightmare and is still expecting to go to college with Jonathan. We probably know the least about Jonathan’s plans, because yeah, he’s lying to Nancy about Emerson, but it’s also unlikely that the Byers are going back to Lenora for him to go to LCC, and underlying all of that, he didn’t seem to be making either of those choices for himself in the first place. So it’s unclear what he himself actually wants for just himself.

The writing for the love triangle is s4 was a little all over the place and I’m honestly not sure where they’re planning to go with it. But you’re very correct that people never give Jonathan the same benefit of the doubt they extend to Steve. Even with being sidelined, Jonathan does have an arc happening here and it is clear that he’s going through something. He’s not just lying to Nancy for fun and getting high all the time for kicks and giggles, he has a lot of familial and personal issues he still needs to work through and he’s been coping with that in not the best ways. But yeah, some people will just reduce all of that to “Jonathan’s a going nowhere stoner now” and then make excuses for Steve telling an ex he dated in high school two years ago (who’s currently in a relationship with someone else, mind you) that he wants to have six kids with her. And then somehow also say that really Nancy doesn’t deserve either of them? It’s all very frustrating.

People being snotty about non-canon queer ships is a whole extra can of worms that is a problem in no way limited to pro-st*ncy fans, so I don’t want to get into that . But it’s very true that many pro-st*ncies can be particularly unfair to Jonathan and as you point out, *some* don’t even seem to like Nancy, or claim they do but then push aside what we do actually know about who she is and what she wants in favor of fitting her better with Steve.

[ambeauty]

My Five Favorite Fics

This is funny because I’ve only published five on AO3 up to this point, so y’all can learn about what I like about each one. Thank you for tagging me bestie @selinascatnip and sister @jonskory

1. Show You The Stars in the Daylight - First Fic, First Multichapter, First Everything. I reread this one recently and fell in love all over again. It just screams me. I love to travel, especially to tropical locations, and I love DK. So put the two and two together. I started writing because there was so much I wanted to see for this ship and we have a lot of talented writers, but I personally needed more fun. So that’s why I wrote it. I also discovered here that I like writing romantic comedy, which is funny because I don’t actually watch a lot of romcoms, but I’m a sensitive Scorpio that uses humor to cope, so it tracks. This one is just a lot of sexy and fun, the perfect vibes.

2. Is This Real or is it In My Head - Wanted to challenge myself with incorporating a villain, and I heavily disclaimed that I knew nothing about him and this is when we had very minimal information except casting news. It was tough for me to write, because I was like what is the purpose, where I am going?? And it seemed like SYTS just spilled out of me (I had four chapters written in one night). However DK needed all the help they could get and why shouldn’t BB use his mind control for good and bring our babies together, idk. I don't know if my besties just love me or what, but it was better received than I had thought it would be, again because I struggled a bit pulling it all together and making it make sense to me.

3. It’s Like Two Stars Colliding - Oooo the pregnancy fic. I’m at an age and stage in my life where my baby fever is at an ALL TIME HIGH. I’ve never been pregnant myself, but when the time comes, I definitely look forward to it. So this was a way for me to work through all that baby fever. I LOVE pregnancy fics (obviously) and had only seen a few in the DK fandom so I was like ugh I gotta write one. Feral Dads, Obsessive Dads, Smitten Dads, I need it ALL. And this turned into a multichapter so that was fun too.

4. Love Me Like We Don't Have Tomorrow - I was listening to Zayn and crying in the car about DK like I usually am and got this angsty idea which was also really sexy and just started to write. I have been listening to a lot of contemporary adult romance, special shout out to my baby sis @jonskory and Book ClubTM and I was like I gotta step my smut game all the way up. So this one was a smut challenge. I really love this concept and the smut was so beautiful and fun even though the undertones were angsty. Like damn you wait until the last night to admit to the person you love how you feel and then they leave(maybe), fuck kill me now. Also I had just finished my s3 rewatch and I was pissed at how other characters were beating my beloved down about how he compared to his father, but the love of his life did not! So I had to give them their moment. Definitely proud and love this one!

5. No One Loves You Like This - I will keep it simple. I just wanted to see the hot people f*ck in a nightclub. 🤣 We got those set videos of what appears to be a nightclub and I was ooooo I know what to do. My bestie @escapism-through-imagination had given me a little taste in one of hers, and with her blessing, I was like let me see how far I can take this. I also love creating looks for characters that we may not get to see in canon, so this was inspired by that as well. I got to collab on some amazing art with my dollbaby @not-so-mundane-after-all like how freaking dope is that! I've also been told that this has been my smuttiest work yet and I truly don't know how that happened. I guess it's just the power of the ship!

tagging @not-so-mundane-after-all @wonderbatwayne @ambelle @blackloislane @meerakory and anyone else who hasn't done this already

[sunmoontruth-stiles]

Ok this is gonna be long. I’ve literally been slowly working on this for… too long. I’m just in a mood to have a long discussion about ships. I’ll be looking at canon and not, so bare with me. I don’t ship all of these personally. I’m mostly just picking the most popular ones. I chose to leave out a few that I just don’t want to talk about. I tried to keep this loosely chronological, but that quickly went to hell. None of this is meant to be hate towards anyone’s ship, just my personal opinions on each of them.

Canon:

Scott x Allison: True Classic

Scallison is so sweet as it is truly the epitome of young love. Romeo and Juliet, except Romeo is even more of an idiot and Juliet is a badass who dies for a cause. They’re moral and ethical codes are both highly valued by themselves, even if they don’t align with others very often. They loved with everything they had. They were beautiful. We’re they soulmates in the end, or just the first love who will always hold a special place in your heart? Who knows, but I’ll always love these immature kids who thought their love could change everything.

Stiles x Lydia: The Long Awaited

Stydia is as slow burn as you can get. Unfortunately their actual getting together was slightly rushed in my opinion. They didn’t have time to find their own as a couple because Stiles just wasn’t in the show enough at that point. I know the reasons behind it, but it did leave this couple at an awkward stage of official-but-not-shown. The idea that Stiles loved her as a kid, immature and infatuated, and he saw her for who she really was, will always be cute. Then they grew, changed, became friends, and found other people. Them finding each other later on, having real love that’s developed slowly, is a wonderful arc. Though, a part of me will always believe they should have pursued other story lines in the wake of Stiles’ absence from the plot. They’re finally together! …but we don’t get to see it.

Jackson x Lydia: The Image

Oh Jackson and Lydia. Honestly, I love them. Their connection at a time in their lives when they couldn’t open up to anyone else, just hits me right in the feels. I mean, god that HUG. You know the one. Always brings me to tears. I’m so sad their relationship was almost entirely depicted during Jackson’s kanima time when he couldn’t think nor truly act for himself. Those small moments of scared vulnerability when he wanted to protect her from himself… I’ll miss these two. They deserved to find other people and remain life-long friends. I loved their moment in the last episode. I wish they’d gotten to see each other grow. Also they had such bixbi solidarity vibes, and I’ll die on that hill.

Scott x Lydia: Leaders

Ok, I’m gonna be honest here. I ship it. The power couple they would have been?? Also them coming together after they lost Allison would have actually made sense. A part of me kinda wishes the writers had moved on from Stydia as a romantic relationship and leaned into them growing as friends and Stiles moving on from his childhood crush. Scott and Lydia actually would have had good chemistry. They were both very headstrong heroic types, but Lydia would have balanced Scott out well intellectually. They had the history, and I think it could had worked if they wrote it right. Plus, Scott and Lydia would have been a better endgame that Scalia.

Scott x Kira: New Beginnings

These two were adorable. Kira was a badass, don’t get me wrong, but she let herself be soft in a way Allison was always afraid to. This couple was truly Baby. Absolute dorks. I can definitely see the lasting quality between the two of them. They saw things very similarly, and had a ton in common. I do think Kira deserves more characterization outside of their relationship, like more of her friendship with Malia. Overall, her departure from the show will always be sad to me. It was bad writing. Scott was over her far too quickly.

Aiden x Lydia: Pretty People Herd

I honestly didn’t see much between these two other than mutual attraction. The best thing to come out of this relationship was Lydia’s line, “You’re not just a bad boy, Aiden. You’re a bad guy. And I don’t want to be with the bad guys.” Good character development moment.

Ethan x Danny: Step to Redemption

Danny really was the thing that made Ethan look outside of the pack for what he really wanted out of life. They had a few cute scenes. Gotta love Danny’s final remarks, “Dude, it’s Beacon Hills.”

Allison x Isaac: Unexpected Rebound

Ok, I like these two. Isaac could match Allison’s snark in a way Scott couldn’t. They both fought the progression of the relationship slightly. They didn’t expect to fall for each other. They were less willing to let someone in close. I’d love to have seen more… but unfortunately their time was limited. On a side note, sometimes their relationship did feel like ‘we both are in love with the same guy, let’s cope with each other’, but I find that completely valid. I’ll talk about Scallisaac later though.

Stiles x Malia: Anchors

Ok but, them <3 I love what they did for each other. Stiles was able to help Malia connect to her humanity and other people. He never tried to isolate her in their relationship and encouraged her growth. Malia offered Stiles the emotional support he never asked for. She defended him, fought for him, and loved him fiercely. Stiles needed that so much after season 3. I think they were a love that wasn’t meant to last, but the impact of it was forever. I wish we’d gotten to see a real end for them where they agreed that they needed to grow as individuals but would always still care.

Liam x Hayden: Three’s a Pattern

These two’s characterization stopped whenever they had storylines together. Their relationship was built on Scallison references. Hayden’s character could have been interesting, but they never really gave her a moment to shine. Liam has the worst plots when they revolved around her. Cute couple, poor writing.

Derek x Braeden: Gaslight, Gatekeep, Girl Boss

Derek deserves to be happy so much. Kate and Jennifer were just... jeez. Him and Braeden were cute and deserved more screen time. I think her intensity allowed for Derek to let go of control a bit more comfortably. Let Derek Be Soft. Anyway, love them.

Corey x Mason: Gotta Have That Rep TM

These two could have been cute if they were shown for more than two seconds at a time. I highkey forget Corey even existed all the time. Kinda just felt like a relationship to fill TW’s gay quota.

Jackson x Ethan: The Callback

Honestly? Loved them. Loved the chemistry. Loved the dynamic. Best twist. I know it was probably written in like that because Colton came out during his time away from the show, but it absolutely fit his character. Jethan is top tier.

Melissa x Chris: BAMF Parent Duo

Ok, so like, Melissa deserved this plot. She deserved someone to care about her. However... what the hell? Chris? In canon, his wife died like 2-ish years prior? His daughter died 1 year prior?? Is Chris really in a position to pursue a new relationship?? Also, like, Scott and Allison dated and loved each other up to her death. Kinda weird to have their parents hook up. I don’t hate it, but I don’t ship it…?

Scott x Malia: Lead up? What’s lead up?

These two came out of nowhere I stg. Like, 6B really tried to tell us this was something that had been slowly developing in the background? Also, I understand that they are their own people, adults, and completely in charge of their own romantic pursuits: but did Scott seriously never call Stiles? Like, Malia wasn’t just his first girlfriend. She was his first. Like, dude that’s your best friend?? Not even a head’s up? No, ‘hey would this bother you?’ Oof. Plus Malia was way too chaotic for Scott. She existed in gray morality that always prioritized her immediate circle, and Scott was a very black/white type of heroism. I just didn’t feel like they fit.

Non-Canon:

Scott x Stiles: Childhood Best Friends

Ya, sorry, I don’t ship Sciles at all. I get it. Like, I totally understand the ship, and I mean no judgment at all. I just see them as friends. I really value good male friendships in media because I feel like we don’t get enough, and I always liked these two.

Stiles x Derek: Enemies to Lovers. 100k. Angst. Hurt/Comfort.

God these two really are what fanfiction was made for. I could write a much longer discussion about Sterek, and I probably will eventually. I’ll try to keep this brief. These two weren’t always on the same side, but their approach was the same. They were very similar at their core. Plus, wow the chemistry. This should have been canon. Jeff’s a coward.

Allison x Lydia: Powerful.

This ship is so great. They really had a great dynamic, and a romantic plot would have easily fit the established narrative. Lydia’s confidence in herself and Allison’s confidence in her own abilities crossing over to each other because that’s what the other lacked? Iconic.

Danny x Jackson: He Gets Him

Danny really saw Jackson for everything he was and still cared. I wished we’d gotten to see more of them. I  want more background with Jackson’s eventual coming out and his friendship with Danny. Like, they ended up dating the same guy. What did Ethan have to say about that??

Stiles x Jackson: Bastards

Ok these two had a super fun dynamic. The asshole-energy between them was, great. The snark was always so entertaining.

Melissa x Noah: Family

How were these two not endgame? Their sons were practically brothers already. They had amazing chemistry. The flirting? Not to mention, their timeline would have made way more sense. Missed opportunity.

Chris x Peter: The Opposite of Love is Indifference, Not Hate

Ok so like, this was definitely one of those ships that I had absolutely no knowledge of before I was pretty into the fandom. Like, this was not something I would have guessed just after watching the show. That being said; my god the chaos alone…

Scott x Isaac: The Disaster Duo

Okay ya I love these two. Two dumb asses who act like idiot puppies. Such a fun dynamic. Plus?? Chemistry??? Hellooo

Scott x Allison x Isaac: Three Heads Are Better Than One

This ship is definitely one of my personal favorites. I very rarely poly-ship. I just feel like most of them are just love triangles with an ‘easy solution’, when two of them have no real connection. That is so not the case here. I feel like all of them have such great chemistry with each other. They also have a great dynamic as a group. Season 3A was really just Scallisaac rights.

Stiles x Isaac: I Hate You, jk…Not Really

Ok I loved their banter, but I really just don’t see this ship. Idk, I don’t personally ship it. Would have loved to see their friendship develop more tho.

Erica x Allison: Duo that would stab you with a stiletto

I don’t ship it, but I do wish we’d seen them become friends. I feel like they had a very artificial ‘girls fighting over a boy’ dynamic? They could have been such a badass duo.

Stiles x Erica: Batman x Catwoman

Ok I’m not sure exactly how to express my feelings for these two so bare with me. OMG I love their dynamic so much, and they are sooo cute. Their energy? Amazing. Chemistry? Great. History? It’s there and has so much potential. 10/10. Love them. But, no, I don’t ship it lol. Just really love their friendship, but with the underlying history of crushes.

Boyd x Erica: Was This Not Canon?

How can anyone not love Berica? Ugh they are adorable. These two deserved so much better.

Boyd x Cora: Survivors

Honestly I don’t really see it? Like they definitely had a connection, but it never felt romantic. I really feel like they just had to lean on each other and bond to make it through captivity, and it just lasted.

Boyd x Erica x Cora: The Pack

I literally learned this was a ship a couple days ago. Similar feelings towards this as Bora, but with the added hesitancy of we never actually saw Erica and Cora interact.

Cora x Stiles: Slow Build Up

These two were clearing being lined up to be a thing before Cora ended up leaving. I can’t say I’m disappointed they never happened. Kinda felt like they just wanted to straight-code Sterek.

Cora x Lydia: Mean Lesbians

Not much interaction to actually go off of, but yes I 100% support. They have very different approaches to problems, which is fun. Very ‘opposites attract’.

Malia x Kira: “Maybe you could date the coyote?”

Another one of my favorites!! They really complimented each other. Also, how full circle would they have been? They were introduced in back-to-back episodes. Malia stalking her as a coyote? The line from Kira’s dad about dating it? It would have been so funny if that ended up happening.

Malia x Lydia: Beauty and the Beast, but make it wlw

These two were fun. I liked their friendship, but I don’t really ship it. Though, rip Stiles that would have been hilarious.

Parrish x Lydia: The Cop and The Minor

Must I say more? Like, Parrish’s character, so sweet and big rule follower, did not make sense for what went down with Lydia. I love Parrish, but the dynamic just felt off. It didn’t feel consistent with the rest of his characterization.

Parrish x Stiles: The Cop and The Minor, but gay?

Ok, same reasoning as above, but also they had absolutely no connection romantically.

Scott x Theo / Stiles x Theo: Sometimes The Villain is Hot

Ok I’ve put these together because I have the same opinion for both. I don’t ship it. Neither had any rebuilding of trust, and Theo really hurt both of them. I just don’t really think they work.

Mason x Liam: Sciles Puppy Pack Edition

Similar to my feeling about Sciles, I just don’t ship these two. They had a good friendship, from the little we saw of it.

Theo x Liam: Anchors 2: Electric Boogaloo

Another personal favorite! I really don’t even understand why this didn’t go canon?? The elevator scene was just, so intense. They helped each other grow in 6B, and I really loved their dynamic. They should have hooked up.

Honorable Mention?: 

Parrish x Laura: What’s canon?

I’ve seen this in fanfic a lot, and I actually really like it lol. I thought I’d add it in here because I do love the creativity of fandoms.

[clonecumber]

For the character ask game: Fi

First impression : Clown. Sad. Sniper and medic, which I thought was a pretty nifty skillset. Impression now : Fi’s a bit like Mereel, in that trying to talk about him is very difficult for me to do concisely. Not even Fi seems fully aware of Fi’s depths, but I really appreciate how utterly fucking complicated he is, and primarily that complication mostly only comes about because Fi seems to really like subverting tropes common to his type of character. He’s funny and friendly, but one of the more callous members of Omega when it comes down to it. He acts laid back and a bit ditzy, but he has problems when he’s not in control of his environment and is sharp as a tack, which is easy to miss because Fi doesn’t seem aware of how smart he is, either. His coping mechanisms are avoidance and shoving his feelings into boxes to deal with maybe never, and he’s one of the ones most likely to pick a fight right behind Atin. He’s incredibly loyal, though, and for all his ability to puzzle out just about anything in the galaxy given enough time, he has a blind spot in regards to people he loves, and tends to forgo objectivity altogether when it comes to them. They’re Good and Right and Fi will fight you in this street if you imply otherwise. Very ride or die. His “love language” (as good a term as any) seems to be acts of service, so on top of Fi’s tendency to all-or-nothing devotion, he seems like he will do just about anything for people who love him. (Even when it’s maybe not good for him.)

Favorite moment : There are a thousand and one I could pick, honestly, but I’m gonna say it’s that one in Triple Zero where it turns out the plan they were running most of the op was Fi’s. He’s the one who figured out the Separatists would have needed another supplier, and came up with the idea to bait them with Ordo’s cache. It’s really clever, for many, many reasons I can’t quite get into without running this way too long, but the reason I point to it is because while Fi’s particular knack for inferring new information from past experiences comes up a lot, I think it’s about the only time in the series Fi’s brain is really noted. He even managed to surprise Skirata. Idea for a story : Fi doesn’t actually tend to pop up in the stories I tell myself, weirdly enough? Let’s see. Niner’s spinal injury isn’t so easily healed, or he manages to re-injure it and it can’t be fully healed again. They get him to Mandalore and not a hospital, in-keeping with canon, and Fi tends to chase everyone else off if they make a single proprietary or pitying remark about Niner’s injury and subsequently becomes primarily responsible with helping Niner during his recovery, up to and including helping him learn to handle a space!wheelchair and maybe eventually walk with a brace. (He’s at least as qualified as Parja was to help him.) (Atin is going to single-handedly make this whole-ass planet space!wheelchair accessible, btw). Corr helps too, which is also his reintroduction with Fi. With them working together, no one gets within a stone’s throw of making weird, manipulative comments about Niner owing anyone anything for his recovery. (Niner and Corr find out about the weird, manipulative comments Fi was subjected to about owing someone Parja something marriage for his recovery and hit the fucking roof.) (No, I will never be over that.)

Unpopular opinion : (I don’t think this series really has popular opinions, but we’ll work with what we have:) Uhhhh. UHHHHHH. I don’t know if not liking the Fi/Parja ship would count as unpopular or not? I don’t even really like them as a “beard” relationship, the way I’ve seen it done. I like Parja okay, just...not that relationship. Favorite relationship : Niner. Hear me out. Niner’s like an anxious sheep dog who starts herding anything that moves when stressed, and Fi keeps good-naturedly letting Niner herd him in circles around the yard into infinity, while feeling genuinely reassured that Niner cares enough to fuss at him. It’s a cute-ass dynamic, for all that I generally can’t stand relationships where one person uses another like a stress ball. It’s so blatantly harmless in the books though, that I eventually relaxed and started thinking it was cute instead, not least because Niner has canonically tucked a fifty-year-old man into bed without so much as a by-your-leave, so I don’t doubt for a second he’s fussed at his squad similarly, nor do I doubt that Fi loves it. I just feel like there’s a lot of opportunities there for Fi, who is a black hole for affection and validation but also expresses affection through, as stated, acts of service, and Niner, who needs to take care of people but does best when someone’s taking care of him right back, to genuinely be good for each other, and I wish it had been explored more in the books. Favorite headcanon : UHHHH. Oh, right, Fi’s 100% gay, sorry. Forgot that wasn’t canon for a second.