#I've had a fantasy show in my target language bookmarked for years

[ghostjelliess]

Listen, sometimes you outgrow your favorite creators, and it sucks. When you've matured past what they can create, it feels like a really long breakup, and you keep trying to find excuses to love it, but the passion, or interest, or growth, or connection just isn't there, and it starts to make you angry and confused instead.

It's not the same as intentionally misunderstanding a theme or choice, or consuming content meant for a less mature audience, or hyper dissecting every detail, or when a character's poor choices are cringy but still make sense. When you find yourself growing more frustrated with the characters or development, when a creator seems to make the same story or give their characters the same flaws or excuses or arcs, it's okay to walk away. It's okay to be upset about it and eat a breakup cake and feel let down. It's okay to still appreciate that content from a distance. It's okay to have a small existential crisis, to doubt your judgement for a minute, to look for tangible reasons why you don't like it anymore. This is how growth happens, in small changes, in self-reflection, but it won't always have a neat reason—you don't need to defend it to yourself. You liked it and now it makes you mad or bored or pouty, and maybe you'll check in with future spoilers, but it's okay to be disappointed, to walk away AND still value the creator's efforts. It's conflicting, but it's not a story for you anymore, and that's okay.