#Okay so for anyone who wasn't in the fandom: when people say the movie gave us no one to ship the Once-ler with they were LYING

[ask-artsy-oncie]

I was reminded of the time that tumblr tried to make "monster high but with tumblr sexymen", and one of the characters was (obviously) the daughter of the once-ler.

And the funny thing to me about that is that in the canon of the illumination lorax movie, the once-ler is heavily implied to have an estranged daughter. I don't know all the sexymen off the top of my head but I think he might've been one of the only ones referenced in that trend who actually had a daughter in his own canon.

[bobbydagen24]

Barb and Crimp are not Redeemed characters and its odd how their films gave them happy endings.

lets start with Barb for one she led armies attacking other Tribes destroying cities and imprisoning countless people all so she could get the strings.

and wipe out all other cultures deciding only her own should Remain and anyone who didn't conform to that culture would be turned into a brainwashed zombie. some people try and argue she has good intentions but frankly her intentions aren't all that good compared to everything she did and this wasn't even a problem in the first place its not like all the Tribes were at war or anything.

they were fine living separately so combining the Tribes is a nice idea but going to these extremes is not excusable in any sense given there was no legit reason for her to take such extreme action. and in the end she gets beaten she doesn't have a last minute change of heart and decide to do the Right thing ( tho to be clear this wouldn't mean it would suddenly be okay for her to face no consequences one posotive I'll say about Veneer's arc in TBT is that he was still held accountable in the end despite having a last minute change of heart because Redemption doesn't mean someone gets let off scott free if anything it means the opposite )

and after her defeat Barb is instantly forgiven for no legit reason like I know story wise you could argue its because she's queen and they don't want more conflict with the Rock Tribe. but from a basic story point of view its wrong especially for a kids film Barb isn't only let off scott free but Poppy light heartedly befriends her. and makes it clear there's no ill will so yeah showing a film where a villain who causes this level of destruction simply because they believe they are right is let off scott free is not very satisfying story telling imo.

and its bad in a kids film Teaching lack of consequences and accountability for your actions no matter how bad.

like don't get me wrong I like Barb personality wise and that's deffo why a good chunk of the fandom don't have a problem with her being let off the Hook.

but obviously villains being likable doesn't mean they shouldn't face consequences loads of people love Velvet but most of her fans can accept that she deserved to go to prison at the end for kidnapping and torturing someone. and then there's Crimp she's less of a bad example but still an example she went along with kidnapping and torturing someone simply because she didn't want to lose her Job. she came and went as she pleased only being held against her will right at the end and just because her bosses were mean to her doesn't mean she isn't still a villain. the movie acts like this makes her a victim and someone who shouldn't be blamed for V and Vs crimes when frankly yes she should she was complicit. she turned a blind eye to someone's suffering because she didn't wanna lose her pay check she's just a cowardly Henchmen not an out and out victim.

and she should have still been held accountable in the end for being an accomplice.

and I'm sorry but to circle back to my guy Creek the morality of the movies is all over the place in this regards. the fact that the movies consider characters who actively chose to do evil things of their own free will as still redeemable and deserving of happy endings. even with no actual work put in to better themselves yet Creek the literal Hostage tortured and threatened into doing a bad thing was lumped in with the actual big bad villain in the end. and was seen as deserving of a gruesome comeuppance is frankly a Horrifying sense of morality and justice in my opinion.

yes he came back in the tv show but I'm only talking about the movie cannon.

and this way of thinking in Regards to what villains do and don't deserve to be Redeemed is Honesty arsed backwards. characters who do evil things because they decided that they should get to make choices that effect and change other Tribes filled with large populations of people simply because they think their culture is better than other people's. and characters who do evil things simply because they don't want to lose a Job no matter how much they may need it are infinitely worse.

than a character who simply gave in to the very human fear of not wanting to die horrifically and who was basically forced into the role of villain due to having literally no other option other than lie down and die. I love Trolls but man these movies have a terrible sense of morality and they do not do Redemption Arcs well. 😅😅😅😅

[respondedinkind]

Okay, okay, so... the new year isn't here yet, but 2023 is coming to an end very soon and I have planned to make a post - so here it is.

What this post is about? You!

I just want to be here and say thank you to everyone who has joined me here on my blog, even though I haven't been around for long. I am insanely grateful for each and every single one of you being here, for all the good memories you allowed me to make, and that so many of you welcomed me - and my muse - with open arms. I am so happy that you gave - and still give - me opportunities to explore my own writing and my muse's behaviors, and I just cannot stop saying it enough: THANK YOU!

I met some incredible people over the last months - some of which are people that I have RPed with before and where I was oh-so-excited to have them met again, after all these years of me having been separated from my Khan-muse because of fandom-changes, interest-changes, whatnot; For those of you who don't know, I first started to write Khan in 2012, BEFORE Star Trek into Darkness even aired, solely based on speculations and a teaser trailer lol. It wasn't very serious, but then definitely developed into what is my most-written muse after the movie finally came out and Khan just invaded my brain like some kind of parasite.

Since then, I have made a few blogs, kept writing Khan for a couple of years, then went on hiatus - remade, revamped, wrote for a few more years, disappeared... and now here I am again, with an AU-Version I was very, very scared to just put out here but now I am so, so glad I did. Thank you all for allowing me to write it, and yeah, I'm repeating myself, but... the opportunies I got and still get? So wonderful. Thank you so much for giving my Khan a chance.

Besides that, I also expanded my horizon a little and made two more blogs: One is on a little hiatus right now, while I am very active on the other thanks to some wonderful human beings who basically set my love for that character into flames. I hope that, and I mean that with the utmost sincerety, my choice of 'second and especially third muse' is not taken as a will to replace anything or anyone, but rather me being so immensely starstruck by other writers that have given me such a great insight and made me want to explore the depths as well.

Okay, okay, this is already insanely long and I am so sorry (I am unsure if anyone will ever read this lol), but now I want to give a shout out to ALL OF YOU, who are here, writing with me! All of you are so, so amazing and I am so glad to have met you, and I hope we can continue to write for as long as our muses and our creativity will let us. Thank you, again, and please take a look at those awesome people in case you aren't already following each other:

First of all, amazing writers and amazing people in general that I look up to (in no particular order), who are inspiring me in so many ways, make me feel a bit like a teenager gazing at their favorite star (lol) and just... are great people, yes, that I just want to mention separately for varying reasons:

@ssolessurvivor (Friend! Omg! When you first followed me, I could never imagine how things would ever develop - and how well Logan would fit to Khan, how their story developed into what it is now, so deeply plotted and filled with so many sub-stories and little moments that push both our muses along, allow me to explore my Khan on so many levels... it's insane how attached he is to your Logan, and I am so, so happy about us being in so much contact and just keep plotting and talk about everything! You are such a friendly mun and I am so, so grateful that you indulge me, even over on Stephen (hehe). I hope we can keep writing for a long time; Thank you so much for letting me throw in all my ideas about Khan, all the quirky things about him, I am so, so grateful!!! ♥)

@darehearts (I felt insanely welcomed by you, giving my Khan *and* my Bones such a chance to interact with Kirk ♥ Thank you so much for that, and thank you so much for indulding in my Khan-joins-the-crew idea as a Kirk-writer. That's definitely not something you need to do and yet you allow me. Ahhh! I was so blown away when you asked me if I wanted to become mains sdfasadfasd. Still am honestly because I am just a potato haha. Thank you for being here and being such a kind person ♥)

@strxngetimes (seriously, I was so nervous approaching you first but I am so glad I did; I do look up to you like you're some kind of superstar (haha) and I am still amazed that you gave me the chance of exploring things the way we do. Thank you for indulging me AND enduring me (and my muse lol), and you really, really inspire me in so many ways when it comes to your Stephen, it's amazing. You actually caused my interest for him to go back up into flames and for me to join the MCU fandom lol (and I would also bother you on your tony BUT i am SO UNWORTHY hahaha). Thank you - I hope we can keep writing for a while longer ♥ And I look forward to everything that might further develop between Khan and Stephen. Very much <3 Love them a lot!)

@mehrere-musen (Ok but really, of course I have to mention you. The way you accepted me, the way we started to write and things just??? Happened??? I love interacting with you and your Stephen and I love the way he works with Khan too, and I am so happy that you allowed me to be with the two where they are. Our thread has almost 800 notes by now which is insane, and with how we keep having ideas, it might go further than that lol. Thank you so much for indulging me - and thank you to Stephen to make Khan so insanely happy. :) ! I hope we can continue to write for a long time! ♥)

@fasciinating (SPAWK! I know we don't do a lot of OOC chatting in any way but our thread??? You are so good for just throwing us into that mess and for you to be like 'lmao ok here let Khan do whatever' and where are Spock and Khan now??? A NIGHTMARE LOL. I love the creativity and how you maneuvered us into that mess of a situation and how we can just seriously fuck moments up and go 'ah yeah somehow there's a rabbit also the world explodes'. I also love the way you write Spock! Thank you so much for giving my Khan a chance, despite his 'AU-ness', and that I get to explore such an interesting storyline! I was also very happy to have found you again, because I remember you from a long time ago (even though we didn't write much back then I think? But I remembered your name!)).

@sxbaist (MY BELOVED! God, you have no idea how insanely happy I was when I realized you were still there. Vega has stolen Khan's heart back when we first wrote so many years ago and when I rebooted him with his AU Version, my heart almost stopped when I saw you were still active and around. I was so, so nervous to approach you - but you welcomed me back, so did Vega welcome back my Khan, and honestly... I love them so, so much, and I adore you so much as a person. Thank you for doing all of that, for allowing me back, for Khan to have his wonderful woman back and for them to enjoy each other. It feels like as if they never got separated at all and I cannot express my gratitude enough, really. You as a person are so awesome as well and I will forever wait for your return! You are also the only other Khan I write with, so I will mention your @paramounticebound here too because your Khan is insanely great and I look up to him so, so much, people need to know!!!)

@vuulpecula (OK but listen, I know we also don't do much OOC chatting at all BUT!!! I just have to mention you here too because the things we do are just so??? SO??? HNNG like lmao we just write each other like 'ok what should happen' AND THEN DOOM HAPPENS to either Khan / Fox and Stephen / Fox LOL as if we got no chill really! I enjoy it a lot to explore those plots and see where things will go! Also you are such a kind person and so easy to talk to!!! Thank you for also indulging me on Stephen hehe ♥ and also all the things on Khan ofc!)

If I could, I would write every single one of you such a text, but alas... if I were to, I wouldn't be finished in 2025 (lol), so I hope you take my gratitude and my love for you as a combined package as well; You are all wonderful people and I am so glad to have you here, and it has been a joy - I hope it will continue to be a joy in the future too, and I cannot wait to see how things will develop (once again, in no particular order):

@whydotheykeeptakingmine ♥ @noblehcart ♥ @resignedworkaholics ♥ (also over on Stephen) @he1msman | @spacesk1pper | @entrpz ♥ (also on Bones) @ensnchekov | @cosmiicheskaya ♥ (also on Bones) @vulku ♥ @onlybonesleft ♥ @wtsns | @agntross ♥ (also over on Stephen) @goodheartedfool ♥ @oceansfirst ♥ (also over on Stephen) @kingofthewebxxx ♥ (also over on Stephen) @fallenregent ♥ @danversiism ♥ @nursc ♥ (also over at Bones) @nightmdic ♥ @brooklynislandgirl ♥ @defectivexfragmented ♥ (also over on Stephen) @haiiling ♥ @gcldenratio ♥ @hiippocrates ♥ @tangleweave ♥ (In case I have forgotten someone: I am so, so, so, so, sorry!!!!)

Also, last but not least: Should you not be named on this list, this does not mean I am not grateful for you or don't appreciate you! I thank you for being here, especially if we have already written something... and even if you follow me and I do not follow back, I am still immensely grateful that you're here in the first place, even if you might not stay ♥.

Thank you so much for every single one of you, really - everyone I mentioned here, everyone I did not. Because of YOU my experience on this (and my two other blogs) is what it is. Without you I wouldn't be where I am now, I wouldn't be able to explore my Khan, my Bones, my Stephen, and I wouldn't be able to have such a good time.

I WISH YOU ALL THE BEST FOR 2024 - MAY GOOD LUCK, LOTS OF LOVE, HAPPINESS AND FORTUNE COME YOUR WAY! No matter where you are, or what your plans are... you are valid, you deserve to be here, you deserve to do what you want to do and you deserve all the good things coming for you.

THANK YOU.

L. finally over and out. (and if you read up this far, you'll get a cookie from me!)

[tobiasdrake]

I have had his song stuck in my head for two days now and I just. Okay. I need to gush about Ken. Heavy spoilers for the Barbie movie here, which would best be experienced unspoiled if you haven't already.

"When I found out that the Patriarchy wasn't about horses, I lost interest." Ken says this at the emotional climax of the film, when he's finally breaking down and being emotionally vulnerable. It's a funny joke, but it's also a wild statement to make, given that Ken bringing Patriarchy to Barbieland has been the main point of conflict for half the film.

But that's it. That's exactly how Patriarchy spreads.

Like other Alt-Right groups, the Manosphere recruits through fandom spaces. They show up wherever they aren't explicitly barred from being. They're in Star Wars spaces and Marvel spaces and fucking My Little Pony spaces, offering comforting rhetoric. Telling boys that the reason they're unhappy isn't their fault: It's them. It's the women holding them back.

And they're hearing this from people in their shared fandom spaces, people they effectively have community with and whose opinions they've come to trust. I think Spider-Man is cool, you think Spider-Man is cool, so I might be inclined to trust your opinion when you say that girls not liking me is a personal failing on their part. Especially if we've been having lively conversations about Spider-Man for weeks/months, and we're only discussing this now because I'm confiding my insecurities in you.

That kid just wanted to talk about Spider-Man. Now he's in a cult and doesn't even realize it.

Throughout the film, this is the only time Ken actually expresses that he wants something he hasn't been conditioned to pursue. Even before he knew about Patriarchy, his insecurity and pursuit of Barbie was driven from purpose more than anything else. The thing the film keeps bringing up is that he's "And Ken".

It's not that Ken wants Barbie. It's that Ken feels his purpose is to be with Barbie. He believes he isn't valid unless he's acting in his intended role as Barbie's Boyfriend. And for anyone who's had similar struggles with identity and masculinity, this rings so incredibly true. He's hurting himself and hurting Barbie, not because he wants to be a lover, but because he thinks being a lover is the only way he can be valid as a person.

And the Manosphere offers him... Not ways to achieve that illusory sense of validity, but harmful and hostile excuses for why it isn't his fault that he can't.

The real breakthrough? It's right here. It's this joke. Ken doesn't want to be Barbie's boyfriend. He doesn't want to be King of the Manosphere. He just wants to be a horse boy.

It's okay to just be a horse boy. I need everyone to understand that it's okay to just be a horse boy. You are valid for pursuing your interests regardless of what you think society expects from you. It's okay not to follow the roadmap that someone else made and gave to you. It's okay to be a horse boy.

That can be Kenough.

[ultfreakme]

Hello, I'm new to the jujutsu fandom, I've already watched season 1 of the movie and I'm in season 2 of jujutsu, I also follow the jujutsu manga, I liked your tumblr and started following you, I like your analyzes and you make me understand more jujutsu, thank you. I have a question, don't you think Sukuna is a boring villain, sorry, but he's too annoying, even Mahito is more interesting than him and it's impressive that Mahito gave more weight to the work than Sukuna, Sukuna killed Gojo and his death It had no significance in the work, it's something terrible, I think the author got lost.

Ah thank you so much! Glad the blog could add to the JJK experience!

Personally, I am getting a little tired of Sukuna never being phased. I'd understand his constant victories if we got more insight into his Cursed Technique but we still have no explanation for what he is and how he came to be, very little Sukuna info has been unlocked since the beginning so it feels kind of frustrating for me.

I can't tell what the author is thinking, but I think the number of deaths is getting to us as readers. People just keep on losing and dying with little impact on those that are alive. Deaths had a huge impact at the start of the story. Like S1, Junpei's death shook Yuuji so bad that he entirely changed his way of thinking. But he only knew Junpei for like a day. So when characters like Nanami, Nobara, Gojo and many more people that Yuuji has known for months die, I think equal levels of impact is expected on Yuuji.

But that doesn't happen.

We don't know Yuuji's mental state after witnessing his teacher die. The excessive focus on fights without slowing down to let the characters grieve or process what they've seen is likely impacting how we see Sukuna, his fights, and his powers.

Like why wasn't Yuuji freaking out more when Higurama died? What was he really going through when he saw Higurama and got reminded of Nanami? A moment's pause, just focused on the grief of that could up the stakes and make Sukuna, if not interesting, at least someone we can hate more.

Emotions and character interactions are what gives a story stakes. We care that Gojo died not only because he's the only person who can stand up against Sukuna, but also because he is someone we connected with emotionally from S1. His death will make characters we love devastated.

When you take away the emotion, the sense of loss and don't show that, the fights become boring. Yuuji's still moving and seems to hold the same attitude as the beginning of Culling Games while fighting Sukuna right now after witnessing multiple deaths.

You could say he's hardened his heart and has gone numb to everything but that's speculation as readers, it'd be way more meaningful if we see Yuuji falling into that kind of state, or be shown to have some kind of emotion and reaction.

My one big critique for JJK is pacing. It's fight after fight after fight. Okay, bad take when the manga is literally called "Sorcery Fight" but I am no stranger to manga/anime entirely focused on fighting (I've read a weirdly high amount of martial arts and hand to hand combat manga). Even in most fight-centric stories, we get breaks, we get characters talking to each other. Like how come we STILL haven't gotten a proper, extended interaction between Yuuji and Yuuta that isn't a fight? Has Yuuji even spoken to Maki? How does Ino feel about Choso?

I think it's why I enjoyed the Yuki v Kenjaku fight more. The fight was interspersed with moments of character interaction.

No stakes and impact makes it boring. Sukuna's the most dangerous villain now and he keeps defeating people without proper explanation or faltering in any real way so like, why would we care? Sukuna's going to win against anyone that isn't Yuuji, so what's the point? It used to be fun for me to try to understand how Sukuna does the things he does. I still enjoy watching him beat the shit outta people but i do admit it's getting tiring.

Sure, the CT and Domain expansions whenever an improvement is shown are very cool but it'd help if we could slow down a little and talk about the character interactions. Honestly Sukuna himself can remain a mystery but our MCs should get more backstory and emotional moments.

[bcbdrums]

Was Kigo always a controversial ship in the fandom? Or is the controversy fairly recent? Is Shego really on her mid twenties?

it has always been controversial. as stated in my previous posts, it's so controversial in fact that depending on who you talk to it can be toxic on both sides. I have friends who have been so attacked, they won't post/reblog certain things for fear of the wrath of the kigo shippers... i have friends who won't reblog this post on the off-chance it could enrage some of them.

kigo shippers control the KP wiki, they edit articles to make it sound like kigo is canon, and they edit articles to hate on Ron and make him seem like the worst possible person to ship with Kim. others who try to edit the wiki to be strictly factual find themselves eventually blocked and their edits removed, and kigo opinions returned.

on the flip side, I've seen kim/ron shippers here on Tumblr viciously attack kigo shippers. and in at least one instance when I tried to help out a kigo person just by saying "ignore the trolls and eventually they'll go away," I got attacked by that person for not outright supporting them and called homophobic because I don't ship it too. apparently my saying they have a right to ship peacefully wasn't enough; they demand you also ship their ship, which is not fair. seen the same toxicity with johnlock... you can't even be neutral. if you're not with them, you're against them and must be destroyed, in their view. at least, that's the reputation certain people have created for that entire side of the fandom (johnlock and kigo... sorry i'm still salty about mid0nz getting bullied offline.)

thus, I have learned my lesson and I try to stay out of any ship war when I see it. I gave up on the wiki years ago and I don't get involved except to say "don't like, don't read" and DNI with trolls and ppl who behave in a toxic way.

however, yes. Shego is CLEARLY an adult. which makes kigo a ship between an adult and a minor, which is not okay. and making Kim "legal" just doesn't work for me, morally. it's kind of sickening to me that people think a birthday going from 17 to 18 suddenly makes something okay. but that's just me.

that's one of the things I LOVE about the live action movie. it clearly showed that Shego is VERY much an adult. and Kim is very much a teenager. my friends and I talk about how the reason we think a lot of people hate on the movie so much is because it destroys kigo by revealing the ship as inappropriate. I don't want to assume a person is pedo, but...if you know Kim is a literal child and you still ship it...there's a serious problem there.

I saw a comment on someone else's blog recently that claimed Shego is "minor-coded" and a friend and I were just...astonished at this claim. she is 100% NOT and it is very much the opposite in fact, and we want that person to bring up their proofs because...no. the show plainly and repeatedly shows Shego as an ADULT. personally I think mid-late twenties based on canon and real-world evidence, and I've made many posts about that but I'll be posting about it again in the near future.

all in all... I still say. "don't like, don't read." if you feel like you need to go on a crusade to destroy another person's ship, leave me out of it. let everyone ship their ships in peace. they're gonna ship it whether anyone likes it or not, so please just let fandom be peaceful.

that's one of the things I love about the drakgo fandom... we all have different opinions about the age gap, about when they get together, about whether they remain evil or turn good... yes there is lots of headcanon crossover but there's also massive headcanon divergence. and yet we all exist peacefully and happily together. and if we don't like, we don't read. plain and simple.

so once again, for the umpteenth time... let people ship their ships in peace. don't get angry if someone else doesn't ship your ship. just ship and let ship and DNI if it bothers you, and don't be a troll.

[bluelolblue]

Master and his Guard dog

Rating: Explicit

Fandom: John Wick

Relationship: Santino D'Antonio/John Wick

Chapters: 1

Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence! However I'd say it's mild, just John killing and torturing people Santino told him to. Smut, as well. See the tags on AO3.

Sumarry: John started to get the "obsessive behavior" over Santino, he gets jealous whenever Santino is talking or hanging out with anyone. Since John is his bodyguard, he is constantly near him or near his sight since that's his duty. However, with Santino's flirting and teasing, it was hard for John to suppress himself, waiting for his master to give him the permission. Yet, they're both obsessed over each other, Santino just didn't gave that away so easily.

Snippet⬇️

John becoming Santino's bodyguard was kinda unexpected.

Santino didn't bother with anyone's comment, he knew why he did that. Everyone's heard of John, so seeing him with Santino would be more intimidating.

Since Santino and John know each other for a long time, they get along alright even though Santino has his moods and moments when he snaps at John but John is used to that so he doesn't really react, it's better to just stay quiet when Santino is like that. He doesn't want to piss him off even more.

And since John has some kind of...attachment issues, his feelings grew stronger towards Santino.

John was standing in a dark corner of the huge room, he kept his focus on Santino who was talking with someone. It wasn't anyone from the High Table which was already a bad sign to John.

Seeing the way Santino smiled at the man and how he returned the smile made John want to kill the man.

It was some kind of a business talk, as far as John could understand since he was too busy fighting his own demons in his head.

"John?"

He heard Santino's voice calling for him. He quickly snapped back to reality and looked at Santino. He walked up to him, "Yes?" He asked, his voice soft and quiet. "Please escort our guest. We had a nice talk." Santino said with a smile.

'I could kill him outside.' John thought as he glanced the man and nodded at Santino's order.

Santino knew John was thinking about something. And he could guess about what but he likes that about him.

When John returned, Santino immediately went up to him and patted his shoulder. "I got what I wanted. Well...not quite yet. I have to do something for him." Santino explained, a slight blush appeared on his face when he said the last sentence.

"What does he need you for?" John asked and immediately regretted forming a sentence like this. He sounded defensive. He quickly cleared his throat when Santino raised an eye brow in confusion at him. "I-I mean, if he needs you to kill someone I can do it for you." That's a bit better.

Santino chuckled, "No, no. He doesn't need that." He said, smiling at him and nervously scratched his nose. "Don't worry about what he wants me to do."

What Santino needed to do was...well, something that made John's blood boil.

...

Read the rest on AO3

Notes here for Tumblr: Okay so this one is long and it took me a while to finish it. This was supposed to be for Kinktober...but I couldn't finish it. Now it's here and I hope it's good enough :).

I'll write fluff with them one day dw.

[bitletsanddrabbles]

You know, the more I think about it, the more this is kinda the one point that's really killed me on Thomas/Richard as a ship. I mean, in 2020 I gained a lot of Tumblr....well. We'll call them friends. Some of them were. Some of them were nice enough when I asked them for help or complimented their fanfiction but otherwise...

Well.

Thing is that for all they liked my meta and fanfiction and all of that, they were so very good at subtly making it clear that I wasn't one of their circle. I didn't think like the rest of the group, I didn't agree with the rest of the group about the really important things, I wasn't one of the people whose thoughts really truly mattered, and it was okay! We were just disagreeing and after all, fans do that. It didn't bother them one whit that I didn't fit in, that I didn't agree with all of the cool kids, I could be as weird as I liked and they'd still read my work and enjoy my comments and be amused by my little idiosyncrasies - those places where I tried to make a point and would have made a point, but I over looked some super important and obvious little detail which normally boiled down to "We don't like Julian Fellowes".

It was like being back in elementary school with the kids who were my best friends as long as I had the right cookie for lunch, but otherwise smiled and snickered behind my back or snidely asked me if I knew what makeup was. At age 12.

And you'd think that someone in their 40s wouldn't be effected by things like that, but there are ways in which we never grow up, aren't there? And when you were the kid who was always told to give people other chances and to see things from everyone else's points of view and that getting upset was just you making yourself angry and to accept other people's faults because they accepted yours (except they never seemed to uphold their side of that bargain)...well.

At least their continually reminding me that I wasn't part of the clique didn't upset anyone important.

The second movie hadn't even been suggested then.

And when we got the script for the first movie and I went "Oh, so that thing Richard gave Thomas was a key ring? Gottcha" there was one person - exactly one person - who said "I thought it was a watch fob and that is my head canon" and I kinda went "Okay, yeah, I can see". It was still early and I wasn't so very aware that I wasn't actually an accepted part of the group so much as an accessory.

Now I'll be reading a thing by something written by....someone else. Someone I've never even talked to outside of telling them I like their fiction, if that, and I'll be enjoying it and then...

There it is.

The watch fob.

That one detail that, rightfully or wrongfully, my brain associates with one of the Bright and Shining leaders of the clique, who was always nice to me when I had the right type of cookie and found a million, passive aggressive ways to let me know how much of an outsider I was when I didn't. The thing that reminds me that I'm not part of the fandom hivemind and never will be, unlike the important people.

And logically I can say tell myself that more than one person could have thought that. Or that even if it spread from that one person, people could have picked it up from other people. I can tell myself that there are people who didn't read the script or the companion book or the wiki and just picked it up from exposure. But when most of the people I see highlighting the watch fob are the same people who are screaming blue murder over the second movie, who come out of the woodwork to tell me off for daring to complain about their glorious supportive (to them, not so much to me, but when have I ever been an important part of the group?) friends, who tell me to have compassion for the poor persecuted shippers who have been done nothing wrong (at least not to anyone important) but have none the less had the fandom turn toxic toward them, who basically sound exactly like that one person...

...well, it doesn't take very well.

And maybe this is just the fact it's late February and my S.A.D. has had three months to gnaw at me and maybe it's just my internalized self hatred having gone to town on me for the past three days and I want a break. Maybe it's just that I live in a place where growing up is actively discourage so I've not figured out how not to be a juvenile little twit, no matter how much I want to, or maybe it's that I've been looking over my unfinished pieces and remembering how much unfinished Thomas/Richard stuff I have and wondering if it's even worth finishing it or if I'm just inviting a bunch of backhanded 'compliments' from the clique. Who knows why, other than I just stumbled across it again, but it's bugging the ever loving hell out of me right now.

That moment when one member of a fan group has influenced the other fans so much that you wind up picking up a piece by someone you’ve never encountered before and almost immediately going “Oh, you’re one of that person’s minions”.

[sk1fanfiction]

the many faces of tom riddle, part 4

-attachment, orphanages, and yet more child psych: time to add yet another voice to the void-

FULL DISCLAIMER THAT THIS IS JUST MY OPINION OF A CHARACTER WHO DOESN’T HAVE THE STRONGEST CANON CHARACTERIZATION, AND THUS ALL THIS IS BASED ON MY CONCEPTUALIZATION.

I'm going to be super biased, because my favorite portrayal of Tom Riddle is actually Hero Fiennes-Tiffin as eleven-year-old Tom Riddle, in HBP and I get to chat about child psych in this one, sooo here we go.

First of all, I’m just so impressed that a kid could bring that much depth to such a complex character.

This is the portrayal, I feel, that brings us closest to Tom’s character. Yes, Coulson’s brought us pretty close, but by fifth year, the mask was on.

We don't really get to see Tom looking afraid very often, but it's fear that rules his life, so it's really poignant in our first (chronologically) introduction, he looks absolutely terrified.

The void being the fandom's loud opinions on a certain headmaster. I wouldn't call myself pro-Dumbledore, but I'm certainly not anti-Dumbledore, either. (Agnostic-Dumbledore??)

Since I'm not of the anti-Dumbledore persuasion, I decided to poke around in the tags and see what the arguments were, so I don't make comments out of ignorance.

Most of the tag seems to be more directed towards his treatment of Harry and Sirius, but a few people mentioned that Dumbledore should have treated Tom with ‘exceptional kindness’ and tried to ‘rehabilitate’ him.

As I said in Parts 2 and 3, I am 100% in favor of helping a traumatized kid learn to cope, and I don’t think Tom Riddle was solidly on the Path to Evil (TM) at birth, or even at eleven. Not even at fifteen.

Could unconditional love and kindness have helped Tom Riddle enough for the rise of Lord Voldemort to never happen? Possibly, but...

Yes, I'm about to drag up that Carl Jung quote, again.

“I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.”

The problem with this is that if you’re going to blame Dumbledore for this, you also have to blame every other adult in Tom’s life: his headmaster, Dippet, his Head of House, Slughorn, his ‘caretakers’ at the orphanage, Mrs. Cole and Martha, and possibly more. In fact, if we're going to blame any adult, let's blame Merope for r*ping and abusing Tom Riddle Senior, and having a kid she wasn't intending to take care of.

Furthermore, you cannot possibly hold anyone but Tom accountable for the murders he committed. (I should not have to sit here and explain why cold-blooded murder is wrong.) And if you like Tom Riddle's character, insinuating that his actions are completely at the whim of others is just a bit condescending towards him. He's not an automaton or a marionette, he's a very intelligent human being with a functioning brain, and at sixteen is fully capable of moral reasoning and critical analysis.

I've heard the theories about Dumbledore setting the Potters up to die, and I'm not going to discuss their validity right now; but he didn't put a wand in Tom's hand and force him to kill anyone. Tom did it all of his own accord.

And while yes, I have enormous sympathy for what happened to Tom as a child, at some point, he decided to murder Myrtle Warren, and that is where I lose my sympathy. Experiencing trauma does not give you the right to inflict harm on others. Yes, Tom was failed, but then, he spectacularly failed himself.

We also have no idea how Dumbledore treated Tom as a student.

In the movies, it’s Dumbledore who tells Tom he has to go back to the orphanage, but in the books, it’s Dippet. We know that Slughorn spent a lot of time around Tom at Slug Club and such, yet I don’t really see people clamoring for his head.

I regard the sentiment that Dumbledore turned Tom Riddle into Lord Voldemort with a lot of skepticism.

But let's hear from the character himself -- his impression of eleven-year-old Tom Riddle.

“Did I know that I had just met the most dangerous Dark wizard of all time?” said Dumbledore. “No, I had no idea that he was to grow up to be what he is. However, I was certainly intrigued by him. I returned to Hogwarts intending to keep an eye upon him, something I should have done in any case, given that he was alone and friendless, but which, already, I felt I ought to do for others’ sake as much as his."

Now, assuming that Dumbledore's telling the truth, I'm not seeing something glaringly wrong with this. No, he hasn't pigeonholed Tom as evil, yes, I'd be intrigued, too, and it's a very good idea to keep an eye on Tom, for his own sake.

“At Hogwarts,” Dumbledore went on, “we teach you not only to use magic, but to control it. You have — inadvertently, I am sure — been using your powers in a way that is neither taught nor tolerated at our school."

Again, it seems like he's at least somewhat sympathetic towards Tom, and is willing to at least give him a chance.

More evidence (again, assuming Dumbledore is a reliable narrator):

Harry: “Didn’t you tell them [the other professors], sir, what he’d been like when you met him at the orphanage?” Dumbledore: “No, I did not. Though he had shown no hint of remorse, it was possible that he felt sorry for how he had behaved before and was resolved to turn over a fresh leaf. I chose to give him that chance.”

Now, I think Dumbledore is pretty awful with kids, but I don't think that's malicious. Yeah, it's a flaw, but perfect people don't exist, and perfect characters are dead boring. I am not saying that he definitely handled Tom's case well, I'm just saying that there's little evidence that Dumbledore, however shaken and scandalized, wrote him off as 'evil snake boy.'

It's also worth taking into account that it's 1938, and the attitudes towards mental health back then.

Why is Tom looking at Dumbledore like that, anyway? Why is he so scared? What has he possibly been threatened with or heard whispers of?

"'Professor'?" repeated Riddle. He looked wary. "Is that like 'doctor'? What are you here for? Did she get you in to have a look at me?"

"I don't believe you," said Riddle. "She wants me looked at, doesn't she? Tell the truth!"

"You can't kid me! The asylum, that's where you're from, isn't it? 'Professor,' yes, of course -- well, I'm not going, see? That old cat's the one who should be in the asylum. I never did anything to little Amy Benson or Dennis Bishop, and you can ask them, they'll tell you!

Tom keeps insisting he's not mad until Dumbledore finally manages to calm him down.

I'm really upset this wasn't in the movie, because it's important context. Instead we got these throwaway cutscenes of some knick-knacks relating to the Cave he's got lying around, but I just would have preferred to see him freaking out like he does in the book.

There was extreme stigma and prejudice towards mental illness.

'Lunatic asylums,' as they were called in Tom's time, were terrible places. In the 1930s and 40s, he could look forward to being 'treated' with induced convulsions, via metrazol, insulin, electroshock, and malaria injections. And if he stuck around long enough, he could even look forward to a lobotomy!

So, if you think Dumbledore was judgmental towards Tom, imagine how flat-out prejudiced whatever doctors or 'experts' Mrs. Cole might have gotten in to 'look at him' must have been!

Moving on to the next few shots, he is sitting down and hunched over as if expecting punishment or at least some kind of bad news, Dumbledore is mostly out of the frame. He’s trapped visually, by Dumbledore on one side, and a wall on the other, because he’s still very much afraid. uncomfortable, as he tells Dumbledore a secret that he fears could get him committed to an asylum (which were fucking horrible places, as I said).

It brings to the scene that miserable sense of isolation and loneliness to that has defined Tom’s entire life up to that point (and, partially due to his own bad choices, continues to define it).

And, when Dumbledore accepts it, his posture changes. he becomes more confident and more at ease, as he describes the... utilities of his magical abilities. 

"All sorts," breathed Riddle. A flush of excitement was rising up his neck into his hollow cheeks; he looked fevered. "I can make things move without touching them. I can make animals do what I want them to do, without training them. I can make bad things happen to people who annoy me. I can make them hurt if I want to."

Riddle lifted his head. His face was transfigured: There was a wild happiness upon it, yet for some reason it did not make him better looking; on the contrary, his finely carved features seemed somehow rougher, his expression almost bestial.

I do think Harry, our narrator, is being a tad bit judgmental here. Magic is probably the only thing that brings Tom happiness in his grey, lonely world, and when I was Tom's age and being bullied, if I had magic powers, you'd better believe that I'd (a) be bloody ecstatic about it (b) use them. And, like Tom, I can't honestly say that I can't imagine getting a bit carried-away with it. Unfortunately, we can't all be as inherently good and kindhearted as Harry.

Reading HBP again, as a 'mature' person, it almost seems like the reader is being prompted to see Tom as evil just because he's got 'weird' facial expressions.

So... uh...

Nope, let's judge Tom on his actions, not looks of 'wild happiness.'

To his great surprise, however, Dumbledore drew his wand from an inside pocket of his suit jacket, pointed it at the shabby wardrobe in the corner, and gave the wand a casual flick. The wardrobe burst into flames. Riddle jumped to his feet; Harry could hardly blame him for howling in shock and rage; all his worldly possessions must be in there. But even as Riddle rounded on Dumbledore, the flames vanished, leaving the wardrobe completely undamaged.

Okay, one thing I dislike is Tom's lack of emotional affect when Dumbledore burned the wardrobe, in the books, he jumped up and started screaming, instead of looking passively (in shock, perhaps?) at the fire. Incidentally, I can't really tell if he's impressed or in shock, to be honest. I think they really tried to make Tom 'creepier' in the movie.

This is one of the incidents where Dumbledore's inability to deal with children crops up.

I think he was trying to teach Tom that magic can be dangerous, and he wouldn't like it to be used against him, but burning the wardrobe that contains everything he owns was a terrible move on Dumbledore's part. Tom already has very limited trust in other people, and now, he's not going to trust Dumbledore at all -- now, he's put Tom on the defensive/offensive for the rest of their interaction, and perhaps for the rest of their teacher-student relationship.

Riddle stared from the wardrobe to Dumbledore; then, his expression greedy, he pointed at the wand. "Where can I get one of them?"

"Where do you buy spellbooks?" interrupted Riddle, who had taken the heavy money bag without thanking Dumbledore, and was now examining a fat gold Galleon.

But I'm not surprised Tom is 'greedy.' He's grown up in an environment where if he wants something, whether that's affection, food, money, toys, he's got to take it. There's no one looking after his needs specifically. I'm not surprised that he's a thief and a hoarder, and I don't think that counts as a moral failing necessarily, and more of a maladaptive way of seeking comfort. It would be bizarre if he came out of Wool's Orphanage a complete saint.

Additionally, I think given that the Gaunt family has a history of 'mental instability,' Tom is a sensitive child, and the trauma of growing up institutionalized and possibly being treated badly due to his magical abilities or personality disorder deeply affected him.

And there are points where it seems that Dumbledore is quick to judge Tom.

"He was already using magic against other people, to frighten, to punish, to control."

"Yes, indeed; a rare ability, and one supposedly connected with the Dark Arts, although as we know, there are Parselmouths among the great and the good too. In fact, his ability to speak to serpents did not make me nearly as uneasy as his obvious instincts for cruelty, secrecy, and domination."

"I trust that you also noticed that Tom Riddle was already highly self-sufficient, secretive, and, apparently, friendless?..."

And while this is all empirically true, these are (a) a product of Tom's harsh environment, and (b) do not necessarily make him evil. But the point remains that child psych didn't exist as a field of its own, and psychology as a proper science was in its infancy, so I'd be shocked if Dumbledore was insightful about Tom's situation.

But I've gone a ton of paragraphs without citing anything, so I've got to rectify that.

Let's talk about Harry Harlow's monkey experiments in the 1950-70s.

If you're not a fan of animal research, since I know some people are uncomfortable with it, feel free to scroll past.

Here's the TL;DR: Children need to be hugged and shown affection too, not just fed and clothed, please don't leave babies to 'cry out' and ignore their needs because it's backwards and fucking inhumane. HUG AND COMFORT AND CODDLE CHILDREN AND SPOIL THEM WITH AFFECTION!

I will put more red writing when the section is over.

This is still an interesting experiment to have in mind while we explore the whole 'no one taught Tom Riddle how to love' thing and whether or not it's actually a good argument.

Andddd let's go all the way back to the initial 1958 experiment, featured in Harlow's paper, the Nature of Love. (If you're familiar with Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, him and Harlow actually collaborated for a time).

To give you an idea of our starting point, until Harlow's experiment, which happened twenty years after Dumbledore meets Tom for the first time, no one in science had really been interested in studying love and affection.

"Psychologists, at least psychologists who write textbooks, not only show no interest in the origin and development of love or affection, but they seem to be unaware of its very existence."

I'm going to link some videos of Harry Harlow showing the actual experiment, which animal rights activists would probably consider 'horrifying.' It's nothing gory or anything, but if you are particularly soft-hearted (and I do not mean that as an insult), be warned. It's mostly just baby monkeys being very upset and Harlow discussing it in a callous manner. Yes, today it would be considered unethical, but it's still incredibly important work and if you think you can handle it, I would recommend watching at least the first one to get an idea of how dramatic this effect is.

Dependency when frightened

The full experiment

The TL;DW:

This experiment was conducted with rhesus macaques; they're still used in psychology/neuroscience research when you want very human-like subjects, because they are very intelligent (unnervingly so, actually). I'd say that adult ones remind me of a three-year old child.

Harlow separated newborn monkeys from their mothers, and cared for their physical needs. They had ample nutrition, bedding, warmth, et cetera. However, the researchers noticed that the monkeys:

(a) were absolutely miserable. And not just that, but although all their physical needs were taken care of, they weren't surviving well past the first few days of life. (This has also been documented in human babies, and it's called failure to thrive and I'll talk about it a bit later).

(b) showed a strong attachment to the gauze pads used to cover the floor, and decided to investigate.

So, they decided to provide a surrogate 'mother.' Two, actually. Mother #1 was basically a heated fuzzy doll that was nice for the monkeys to cuddle with. Mother #2 was the same, but not fuzzy and made of wire. Both provided milk. The result? The monkeys spent all their time cuddling and feeding from the fuzzy 'mother.' Perhaps not surprising.

What Harlow decided next, is that one of the hallmarks being attached to your caregiver is seeking hugs and reassurance from them when frightened. So, when the monkeys were presented with something scary, they'd go straight to the cloth mother and ignore the wire one. Not only that, but when placed in an unfamiliar environment, if the cloth mother was present, the monkeys would be much calmer.

In a follow-up experiment, Harlow decided to see if there was some sort of sensitive period by introducing both 'mothers' to monkeys who had been raised in isolation for 250 days. Guess what?

The initial reaction of the monkeys to the alterations was one of extreme disturbance. All the infants screamed violently and made repeated attempts to escape the cage whenever the door was opened. They kept a maximum distance from the mother surrogates and exhibited a considerable amount of rocking and crouching behavior, indicative of emotionality.

Yikes. So, at first Harlow thought that they'd passed some kind of sensitive period for socialization. But after a day or two they calmed down and started chilling out with the cloth mother like the other monkeys did. But here's a weird thing:

That the control monkeys develop affection or love for the cloth mother when she is introduced into the cage at 250 days of age cannot be questioned. There is every reason to believe, however, that this interval of delay depresses the intensity of the affectional response below that of the infant monkeys that were surrogate-mothered from birth onward

All these things... attachment, affection, love, seeking comfort ... are mostly learned behaviours.

Over.

Orphanages, institutionalized childcare, and why affection is a need, not an extra.

His face is lit the exact same was as Coulson’s was in COS (half-light, half-dark), and I said I was going to talk about this in Part 3. I think perhaps it's intended to make Fiennes-Tiffin look more evil or menacing, but I'm going to quite deliberately misinterpret it.

Now, for some context, Dumbledore has just (kind of) burned his wardrobe, ratted out his stealing habit, and (in the books only, they really took a pair of scissors to this scene) told him he needs to go apologize and return everything and Dumbledore will know if he doesn't, and, well, Tom's not exactly a happy bugger about it.

But interestingly, in the books, this is when we start to see Tom's 'persona,' aka his mask, start to come into play. Whereas before, he was screaming, howling, and generally freaking out, here, he starts to hide his emotions -- in essence, obscure his true self under a shadow. So this scene is really the reverse of Coulson's in COS.

And perhaps I'm reading wayyy too much into this, but I can't help but notice that Coulson's hair is parted opposite to Fiennes-Tiffin's, and the opposite sides of their faces are shadowed, too.

Riddle threw Dumbledore a long, clear, calculating look. "Yes, I suppose so, sir," he said finally, in an expressionless voice.

Riddle did not look remotely abashed; he was still staring coldly and appraisingly at Dumbledore. At last he said in a colorless voice, "Yes, sir."

Here's an article from The Atlantic on Romanian orphanages in the 1980s, when the dictator, Ceausescu, basically forced people to have as many children as possible and funnel them into institutionalized 'childcare', and it's absolutely heartbreaking.

There's not a whole lot of information out there on British orphanages in the 30s' and 40s', but given that people back then thought you just had to keep children on a strict schedule and feed them, it wouldn't have a whole lot better.

The only thing I've found is this, and it's not super promising.

The most important study informing the criteria for contemporary nosologies, was a study by Barbara Tizard and her colleagues of young children being raised in residential nurseries in London (Tizard, 1977). These nurseries had lower child to caregiver ratios than many previous studies of institutionalized children. Also, the children were raised in mixed aged groups and had adequate books and toys available. Nevertheless, caregivers were explicitly discouraged from forming attachments to the children in their care.

Here's a fairly recent paper that I think gives a good summary: Link

Here, they describe the responses to the Strange Situation test (which tests a child's attachment to their caregiver).

We found that 100% of the community sample received a score of “5,” indicating fully formed attachments, whereas only 3% of the infants living in institutions demonstrated fully formed attachments. The remaining 97% showed absent, incomplete, or odd and abnormal attachment behaviors.

Bowlby and Ainsworth, who did the initial study, thought that children would always attach to their caregivers, regardless of neglect or abuse. But some infants don't attach (discussed along with RAD in Part 2).

Here's a really good review paper on attachment disorders in currently or formerly institutionalized children : Link

Core features of RAD in young children include the absence of focused attachment behaviors directed towards a preferred caregiver, failure to seek and respond to comforting when distressed, reduced social and emotional reciprocity, and disturbances of emotion regulation, including reduced positive affect and unexplained fearfulness or irritability.

Which all sounds a lot like Tom in this scene. The paper also discusses neurological effects, like atypical EEG power distribution (aka brain waves), which can correlate with 'indiscriminate' behavior and poor inhibitory control; which makes sense for a kid who, oh, I don't know, hung another kid's rabbit because they were angry.

Furthermore...

...those children with more prolonged institutional rearing showed reduced amygdala discrimination and more indiscriminate behavior.

This again, makes a ton of sense for Tom's psychological profile, because the amygdala (which is part of the limbic system, which regulates emotions) plays a major role in fear, anger, anxiety, and aggression, especially with respect to learning, motivation and memory.

So, I agree completely that Tom needed a lot of help, especially given the fact that he spent eleven years in an orphanage (longer than the Bucharest study I was referring to), and Dumbledore wasn't exactly understanding of his situation, and probably didn't realise what a dramatic effect the orphanage had on Tom, and given the way he talks to Tom, probably treated him as if he were a kid who grew up in a healthy environment.

In case you are still unconvinced that hugging is that important, there's a famous 1944 study conducted on 40 newborn human infants to see what would happen if their physical needs (fed, bathed, diapers changed) were provided for with no affection. The study had to be stopped because half the babies died after four months. Affection leads to the production of hormones and boosts the immune system, which increases survival, and that is why we hug children and babies should not be in orphanages. They are supposed to be hugged, all the time. I can't find the citation right now, I'll add it later if I find it.

But I think it's vastly unrealistic to say that Dumbledore, who grew up during the Victorian Era, would have any grasp of this and I don't think he was actively malicious towards Tom.

Was Tom Riddle failed by institutional childcare? Absolutely.

Were the adults in his life oblivious to his situation? Probably.

Do the shitty things that happened to Tom excuse the murders he committed, and are they anyone's fault but his own? No. At the end of the day, Tom made all the wrong choices.

And, for what it's worth, I think (film) Dumbledore (although he expresses the same sentiment in more words in the books) wishes he could go back in time and have helped Tom.

"Draco. Years ago, I knew a boy, who made all the wrong choices. Please, let me help you."

[dana-chan-the-control-brain]

Happy new year everyone 🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉

I know 2020 has been hard for everyone.

And I want everyone to know, suffering isn't a contest and we all suffer in different ways. But I feel I should give my year in Review. Just some things that happened to me personally.

This was an intense, and long and spiritual and emotional journey for me...

I really discovered what it meant to have community, family and what my life means to me.

But I feel I need to get this in writing cause I can remember the year with vivid detail and I will probably forget if I don't get it down.

Do I have to share this publically online to my tumblr account for a bunch of strangers to see? not really.

Do I want to?

Yes. I think so. Just from how so many people on tumblr and real life have touched me.

This is kinda long and no one needs to read this.

(idk how to do a readmore on mobile. But this is where I would add it later. No one needs to read if they don't want to.)

January/February: (and some background on the last five years of my life cause.....well. it's important.)

As people knew, I got way into Invader Zim last summer. I spent most of my waking life working a dead end job at a grocery store. I lived a sad lonely life, going straight home to a single dark studio apartment. With not many material possessions outside of games, my laptop and my tablet to my name. Half of my material loves, such as home furnishings and books were still in boxes from when I moved in. In case I ever had to move again, or get some "big screenshot or copywriter" job in the city.

....

I lived in that city in the same dead end job and apartment for five years.

No friends. No social life. I often refused to make doctor appointments or attempt to establish myself in that city. I didn't even talk to anyone in my workplace.

Work. Go online. Go to sleep.

I lived like that for five years.

I thought it was good.

Even my therapist thought I was doing well.

When I really wasn't. My main character flaw I struggle with is motivation.

I can talk to someone about very detailed plans I have to fix a problem... But I tend to never follow through.

Just because I can describe in detail how to fix my personal problems, it doesn't mean I will do it.

(I have gotten better at this but it's a major struggle)

I might have been a Zombie during the day...

But by night I was pouring my soul into my AU and my analysis.

After being so thoughly ignored or overlooked by the Naruto fandom and the Undertale fandom, I felt like I had finally found my home and was settling into a community there.

I just loved that people loved what I had to say.

Especially my AU.

It's no secret that a lot of themes in my au revolve around found family, grief, and loss.......

Fatherhood, in particular.

What it means to be a father, how much do you need to try when you mess up, how willing should a child forgive their parent, especially those that have wronged you and how much of it is factually accurate and simply a self projection of what children want their parents to be and visa versa... What amount of forgiveness and change is nessasary...is it needed?

....

It's no secret that a lot of my AU is a giant coping mechanism for my Dad's death. Espessially the falling out and growing closer with a lot of my family members throughout the years following his death. (Most of the time I keep it ambiguous to how it relates to my personal life unless I include a readmore that states so outright. I feel my au can be enjoyed by a variety of people in the fandom who don't need to know me as a person or my life story.)

My Dad passed away in 2016 in February and my family still feels the aftershocks to this day.

It's part of the reason I moved to the city, alienated myself from my family and people that loved me and refused to experience life for five years.

My entire world was Zim, and I was okay.

March: When America finally realized and started to feel the effects of the pandemic....

A lot of people got scared.

Me included.

I didn't have any streaming services or access to the news. So I only heard accounts from my mom.

I didn't understand why the store was so dead quiet and empty for a few days, then it went into mass chaos and panic in the span of two days.

It felt like Retail black friday in the worst way. Everyone was packed like sardines. Everyone was yelling. The lines at the registers bled into the clothing department.

I was witness to customers shoving others for toilet paper, being rude to cashier's and just overall unpleasantness.

At the time, I didn't even fully grasp what the pandemic was, and I feel a lot of people at the time didn't either.

I ended up absentmindedly scratching my eyebrow in front of a customer and she screamed and villanised me for it. That they didn't want groceries touched by my "unclean hands"

I ended up breaking down into tears.

The customer behind me gave me a hug and told me I was doing a great job.

But the damage was done. It was the final straw, I couldn't stop crying and I was breaking apart.

Thankfully my Boss (the one who likes me) pulled me aside and asked what's wrong.

It was then that I quit. No notice. Same day. I had to get out of there.

I was planning to move to an apartment with my sister in the summer, but my Mom offered for me to move back in with her temperarily just so I can get out of the city and away from the pandemic.

So I did.

I got scared, broke my lease a month early and quit my job of five years that gave me nothing back.

He told me, "take care of yourself and your family, I won't keep you here, do what you need to do."

So I did.

April-June:

A very eventful few months.

My mom offered for me to live at her place, but for some reason she was acting like I would live there forever. That this wasn't a temporary arrangement, and that I didn't have an apartment set up already.

This was in large part to my sister, who had lived with my mom taking advantage of her for years.

Even though my sister and I were going to move in together, I was just never sure about it cause of how she never packed her stuff or made any effort to find a job.

My mom often acted like I was lazy and not searching and was treating me like... Well, an unruly teenager instead of a woman of 29 years. She acted like I was a failure for returning home when it was her idea in the first place.

I would have just been petrified in the city.

Like usual, I retreated to my au again.... And in the spring, something eventful happened.

In may, 8th 2020:

I was invited by @rissynicole to join an invader zim discord.

Now, I've never really used discord before. I always thought it's interface is too confusing.. and I'm a member of a few other iz discords and I usually don't follow them that closely.

Rissy assured me it was different cause some friends of thiers made it and it was smaller.

Before I knew it, I was sharing memes and getting to know everyone there.

It wasn't long after I invited my partner in IZ crimes, @paketdimensioncomic who was genuinely wary of iz servers due to a bad experience with the last one they were a part of.

But soon they were sharing memes and laughing with everyone else.

My eyes were starting to open and I was able to connect to fans of my work in an interpersonal way. And I was able to discover new artists and aus I never knew about.

I was also able to meet so many others of the community and invite them to the server myself.

The moo-ping 10 server kept me sane while I was living with my judgmental mother.

Not only that, the summer was very productive for my au.

Drawing was all I did, and it was a huge break from the job as a cashier I had.

Not only that, June came, and with it, me and Ceph's first collab fic:

A result of us just going back and forth in our DMs constantly about Professor Membrane and how he changed in ETF for the better and how much we adamantly stan "trying-to-be-a-good-dad-brane" and how much of his ETF development has to be implied off screen in order for the emotional resolution in the movie to matter.

The only reason I never professed my love for Membrane as a character in the fandom before the fic dropped was.... Well....

Membrane can be a decisive character in the fandom and I was so worried people would hate me if I did an analysis on him, simply because he's not the best parent in the world. (As an understatement)

Ceph and I really encouraged each other to scream our love for the science himbo loud and proud more frequently and so often.... I actually start to see less Membrane hate posts and breakdowns then their used to be.... I like to think it's a combination of Me and Ceph's influence, along with ETF and the Quarterly's painting Membrane in a slightly more nuanced light then he was previously.

I never wrote a collab fic before and it's such a rewarding and fun and unique experience that I don't think I'll ever have again. And I love working with Ceph on our fics so much.

So much so we did it again...

July-August:

I never thought I would be one of those people who writes NSFW IZ fic... But here I am.

The Brainbrane au started.... An au of my au where Membrane and the Computer fall in love and Membrane makes him a body.

This ship was based around the idea where we joked that Membrane and Zim's Computer would have funny interactions if they ever met, under the pretense Membrane thinks Computer is Zim's parent.

Our headcanons morphed and shifted until we just full blown started shipping them.

Just because Membrane and Zim's Computer have overall REALLY entertaining chemistry.

It's a character dynamic never seen in the show or comics (yet) and I imagine thier interactions to be nothing but entertaining banter.

The fic was also born from spite... Making fun of the troupes and cliches that we found personally destestible in some questionable zadr fics.

So an angry ace and a demi-bisexual collab on a porn and end up blessing the fandom with

Compapa headcanons,

Computer being recognized as a more common used fanon character,

The ship of Brainbrane.

The fandom having a crisis of "oh God, not only are we xenophiles we're technophiles too!!!" Or "why you gotta give Zim's Computer an ass"

More android Computer designs

It was an eventful summer.

In the midst of all this, I moved into my new place, got a new job, and I was able to see my friend (who is def my platonic straight soul mate) who lives in Indiana.

She came to visit, showed me how to decorate and how to take care of my body better! Things were looking up! It was great.

September-November:

My job was at a boat store. If was approaching the fall and my hours were being severely cut.

I was getting into a rut of depression again.

I thought things were changing but the same routine I was trying to escape from was the same thing coming back.

But instead of letting it take hold, I decided I was going to do something about it... I was gonna visit a museum and go with my sister. Just... variety stimulation.

Well that didn't happen.

I talked about this shortly in my au itself...but..

My sister had a complete mental breakdown.

She stopped taking her meds, went off the deep end and was in the hospital a total of five times throughout November.

A lot of it was acting out and the perfect storm of environmental factors that made her scream and act out so she would keep going back to the hospital.

It was traumatizing for me.

I just can't explain what it's like. For her and for me to be in that position.

I'm not telling the full story and a lot of bullshit things happened I won't share here.

She got diagnosed with bipolar one and my mom expected me to be a caretaker for her.

I threatened to disown my family and move away out of state.

It was just too much for me to handle.

So much I was a nervous wreck.

I tried to pick up a second job... Cause my sister was in the mental ward so frequently and couldn't pay the bills.

But I was fired within a week cause I was so stressed I couldn't retain the basic information they were training me for.

It was an office job.

My dream.

It could have been.

I was fired from something I really wanted.

I was only there for three days.

I could not retain any information.

I was a mess.

My sister was a trigger, my mom wanted me to live with her. I couldn't live like this.... I had to get out.

I had to get out.

December:

Remember my Indiana friend?

Well the first week of December is my birthday.

My 30th to be exact.

While I did pick up a seasonal position at Target (not my first pick)

I took the first week of December off so I could spend time with her. Cause she agreed, I needed a break from this crap.

Surviving 30 years is cause to celebrate and if I had to celebrate with my sister I would have cried.

I know there was a risk traveling out of state during a pandemic...

But I needed out, I needed a friend..

And I kinda wanted to look at the place since I was considering moving there.

My friend's mom was sick so she avoided me and her daughter and got us a hotel room.

It was fun! I got to swim in a salt water pool, we talked about Naruto, I showed her the iz and su art books I brought, also Computer and Membrane tea.

I also got to meet her other friends and get crunk. And her bf who is super nice and funny!

I had a super fun birthday....

Until her mom told my friend that her grandparents had covid and that was what she had. And my friend got sick within that same day.... As did I.

I owe so much to her family.

I was an entire state away...about a ten hour drive from home.... She let me stay at her house. "The covid house" we called it.

Cause everyone (except the father. He avoided everyone and booked a hotel immediately cus he was an ER doctor) had covid within a day.

I called in, the test results were positive and I had to stay with her family for ten days quarantine before I could work again.

Which would have been fine....

If my tumblr didn't log me out perminately of my old account. @dana-chan325 .... Which really sucked cause I had a constant headache and was too sick to engage with tumblr or much of the fandom. I didn't want to make a new account when my head was in a bad fog and I could barely breathe or smell.

It's not like I saw much of my friend either.... We all slept at different hours and she had more symptoms then I did.

It was just netflix, danganronpa v3 and cry.

I was miserable, but at the same time.... Not?

I really feel like God himself was the one who pulled me off from tumblr, and my living situation.

Maybe a whole extra week feeling like a bobblehead was what I needed.

It gave me some much needed clarity on my relationships with my mom and sis and friend.

Running away to Indiana was not the solution here.

Once I was better within ten days and no longer had a leave of absence, I drove home.

I am glad I fully recovered (but from how I understand it, my dear friend is still ill. I'm praying for her)

I might have gone to work a bit too soon, cause I had an asthma attack after trying to unload a single cart in the span of six hours.

My boss lectured that my speed was unacceptable, and even though I explained the covid situation and breathing problems many times, she threatened that I'd be fired if I'm that slow again.

Que the next few days of work where they put me on register.

Instantly I was sent into a panic remembering the last time I was on the register and how that panic attack caused me to quit.

I even asked if I could go back to stocking, since my breathing had improved. My boss assured me that I was put on the register cause they needed help and nothing to do with my covid thing.

Then as December concluded and the new year began, my boss said that this was the last shift for me cause my position was seasonal and they were letting a lot of people go.

I then asked why I was on the schedule for Sunday, and he told me to ignore it and I'm free to reapply for full-time.

I mean.... They can act smart about it...

But putting your general merchandise stocker onto register after she had an asthma attack and missed working the first two weeks of December due to covid.....

Not a good look.

So once again, I'm jobless once more.

Will probably continue to live with my sister for awhile.

But I do not feel as if it's a bad thing....

I met so many good people this year....

My friend's family even gave me 500 usd to cover my rent since I couldn't work for a majority of December.

I've seen evil and good from humanity this year. I've seen acts of god, good friends and what my real family means to me as well as friends I consider family.

This year really made me look back at the person in the mirror and say,

"I deserve better."

And actually worked for it this time.

Oh and after Christmas I got a horrible yeast infection that burns over most of my body currently.

Very accurate doodle to the pain I'm in right now.

(seriously my body is a fungus.)

But hey, good news, I respected myself enough to go to the doctor about it!!

So that's progress.

I really hope 2021 holds good things for me.

Thank you to the mooping 10 server for always being there and keeping me sane,

Thank you tumblr for liking my au and everything.

AND A SUPER SPECIAL THANK YOU TO @evartandadam and her family for housing me and my dumb diseased ass. Everyone, she is an angel and I can't express how much she means to me. Please check out her art and buy her stuff on redbubble.

Anyways... Byebye 2020.

I look forward to what I can accomplish for myself this year.

[tarlos-spain]

Flufftober Day 19 - Flowers

Fandom: 9-1-1 Lone Star

Pairing: Carlos Reyes/TK Strand

Characters. Carlos Reyes, TK Strand

The earth laughs in flowers

Carlos decides to surprise TK with flowers. Neither of them knows that they will end up in the emergency room because of an allergy that TK doesn't know he has.

TK was not sure if it had been the best date of his life or if it had been a disaster. Carlos felt terrible and there was nothing TK could do about it.

"It wasn't your fault. You didn't know. Neither did I for that matter."

The nurse's call to one of the patients made them pay attention in case it was TK.

Luckily his wasn't urgent and they would have to wait a little longer in the hospital waiting room.

TK rested his head on Carlos' chest and let himself go into a fit of sneezing that left him breathless for a moment. His chest ached from the exertion but otherwise he was fine.

Carlos gave him a kiss on the head and stroked his back to help him feel calmer.

"Giving you flowers was silly." "What do you say? You're the first one to give me flowers and I assure you it's one of the most romantic things anyone has ever done for me." "IF we forget that I've given you a terrible allergy that almost..." "Don't be over the top, babe. I'm fine, congested and couldn't do a marathon. But otherwise I'm fine and as soon as they give me a few antihistamines, I'll be good as new."

TK closed his eyes for a moment. He wasn't exactly feeling well, but everything was better and easier when he was with Carlos.

It was worth it, of that he had no doubt. Carlos had organized an afternoon together, away from the police station or the firehouse, an afternoon just for them.

A picnic lunch in the park.

"Can you believe this is the first time I've ever been on a picnic?" "Come on. You're a New Yorker, everyone knows you guys have picnics in Central Park all the time." "You've seen a lot of movies babe. Maybe there are people who do, but I'm the type to show up afterwards when the picnic goes wrong to help them out."

That alone had made it worthwhile, a romantic picnic, lying on the grass, in the sunshine and talking about them, about the future, about the future they both wanted to share. Carlos had brought music, a cooler with TK's favorite ice cream and finally the flowers arrived.

TK was in the middle of a fairy tale and he was sure the day would end with Carlos proposing to him and he was excited about the idea, looking forward to it every time a new surprise arrived. And when the flowers arrived, TK smelled them strongly, taking advantage of the moment to look to see if there was a ring in them.

What he found, however, was a strong allergic reaction to the flowers.

He started sneezing as if he was never going to stop. He soon found it hard to breathe because between sneezes he had no time to catch his breath.

Even though he didn't want to spoil the day Carlos had prepared, he had no choice but to let Carlos take him to the hospital. He was worried about him, especially since TK had no idea what was happening to him.

"I need to ask you something." TK said in a congested voice. "Anything you want, tiger. I owe you after I sent you to the hospital." "You didn't do it yourself, it would have happened anytime and better when it's just you and me than in the middle of a call." "I don't know, I guess you're right and I'd rather not think about it again, what is it you want to ask me?"

TK sat up and taking advantage of the fact that the sneezing seemed to have stopped, he took a deep breath and smiled. He took Carlos' hands between his own and decided to take a chance at last.

"Were you going to propose to me in the park?"

Carlos blushed, opened his mouth but said nothing.

"Oh shit, you weren't going to." TK continued. "You hadn't even thought about it yet and now I'm forcing you to propose to me." "Tiger." "No, no, it's okay. It was silly and I already have a trauma from a stupid marriage proposal that I should have never said out loud. I think I have some kind of curse with marriage proposals or maybe my problem is with marriage itself." "Ty, stop."

Carlos took him hands between his and squeezed them to get TK's attention and make him be quiet. He looked into his eyes, they were red and the nerves from what he had just said had made him blush.

"Forget it, I didn't say anything. Maybe when I take the antihistamines I'll forget even me." "Then it'll be a shame because you're not going to hear the nice statement with which I wanted to ask you to marry me, in the park." "Were you going to? Why did you make that face like I threw a glass of water in your face?" "Because I've been wanting to ask you to marry me since the first time I met you, then things got hard and this year I've thought so many times that I was losing you that I was afraid to take that step like I was attracting bad luck or something. "And you still want to do it?" "Well now I'm afraid to ask you and the roof will fall in on us." "At least we'll be in the hospital by now. Doesn't sound like a bad place to try to break the curse."

Carlos looked around, it didn't seem like a bad idea.

He saw a nurse approaching, just now they were going to call TK, so better to throw the question now lest TK's wasn't just an allergy to flowers and they kept him longer.

So he knelt down on the ground and took TK's hand, pulled out of his pocket, where it already burned, the ring he had been holding all day and popped the question, hoping the world wouldn't end.

"TK, will you marry me?" "Of course I want to marry you, I really don't understand why it took you so long to ask me."

A woman came up to them and put some flowers in front of TK to congratulate them and a second later TK started sneezing and choking. She helped him to his feet and took him to where the nurse indicated to do some tests.

At least Carlos had had time to ask him the question.

[rjalker]

Hey, so, what would you consider unhealthy levels of shipping? I don't mean like paedophilia, I know that stuff, but what else would you consider unhealthy or problematic? Because I personally really enjoy shipping characters but don't want to end up going too far or coming off as creepy.

It's not that there's anything inherentlu wrong with shipping, it's when people refuse to think about the content except to ship characters from it.

Think of The Hunger Games. It's a story about trauma and War and poverty and taking down corrupt governments and refusing to let new people with different names but doing the same thing take over just because they're splashing a new coat of paint on the old atrocities.

But the media, in Universe, which was on purpose, and in the real fucking world which is just so fucking terrible and such motherfuking irony always always always focused on the shipping of Peeta and Katniss.

In Universe, the people of the capital only gave a shit about Katniss because they were shipping her with pita. In the real fucking world everybody was trying to fucking pull the same shit that they did with Twilight with Team Peeta and Team Gale or whatever the fuck his name is. People look at the Hunger Games, and they're take away is oooooh!!!! Love triangle!!!!

They ignore every other aspect to the story, and all they want to focus on or talk about is the ship.

Or even miraculous ladybug.

People ship Adrien and Marinette, and that requires that they ignore literally every single second of Adrian's behavior in Canton. So they do. Not only do they ignore it, they make excuses for it and justify it, because the only thing that matters to them is their ship. Or if they're the racist misogynist tape, they don't even care about the ship, all they care about is Adrien, and they want Marinette to die ( after cat Blanc came out, do you know how many fix and fanart there was of Chat Blanc beating Marinette to death while she smiles at him and says she forgives him with her last breath? And that's not even the worst thing that these people were writing. I think you can imagine. That is a separate, but related issue.

Shipping is not inherently a problem. It's only when you refuse to interact with anything except through the lens of shipping.

I have not watched the movie parasite yet, but I want to, and I have seen people complaining about it that it was boring because there wasn't anyone they could ship. Their entire take away of the movie was that they didn't like it because they didn't feel like shipping any of the characters together.

Media does not exist for nothing but romance. Shipping becomes a problem when there is an entire book series about trauma and War and poverty and systemic racism and everyone's take away is oooh look!!! a love triangle!!!!

Shipping also becomes a problem when it's used to be racist, everyone watching the new Star Wars movies was so fucking desperate to ship Rey with someone, but also too fucking racist to ship her with Finn or Poe, that they instead ended up having no choice but to ship her with the fucking space Nazi who tortured her and invaded her mind and murdered dozens of children and has committed genocide.

There's nothing wrong with shipping characters. It's only when you refuse to think or interact with a media in any way except for searching for the next characters to ship together. It becomes a problem when you refuse to think except about shipping.

People like okay Supernatural. Everybody knows about supernatural at this point. People are so desperate for something to ship that they either ship Sam and Cass, or Dean and Cass, or worst fucking yet, Sam and Dean themselves. The fandom literally ships the actors. They write real person fanfiction about the actors and they ship the actors together and write fanfiction about it. Not the characters, the actors. And then they get so fucking obsessed that they send literally I am not joking I wish I was joking oh my God I wish I was lying, they sent death threats to the actors as wives because they were getting in the way of their goddamn Ship by existing. I'm not joking, I really really fucking wish I was. The people in this fandom are so desperate for something to ship that they ship the actors and sent their wives death threats over it. I am not joking. I am not exaggerating.

Shipping things is not a problem in and of itself. It becomes a problem when you refused to ship healthily and refuse to interact with the media or any media through any other lens or think about it for five seconds for any reason except for shipping. It becomes a problem when other people are trying to have a conversation about the other aspects of the media, and you get pissed off and try to spin it be all about shipping.

I'm probably not explaining this very well.

Other people can probably explain it better, so feel free to add on.

Everything else aside, it's deeply completely rooted in amatonormativity.

[blissfulsaturn]

Story time:

I don't know if anyone cares or wants to read this, but I'm gonna tell y'all when and why did i start believing in Charmie. So buckle up, who ever is reading this.

I've been a part of a lot of fandoms and they were usually about movies/TV shows/actors/actresses. I've always been a shipper of characters and not actors, I'd search their pictures by their character's names, read and write fanfics about the characters, i did everything that involved just their characters. Example : i used to ship Stiles and Derek from Teen Wolf, just them, not Dylan O'Brien or Tyler Hoechlin, same thing with the Maze runner, i shipped Newt and Thomas, and now Thomas Brodie Sanger and Dylan O' Brien (oh Dylan...lol) etc.

And then i saw Call me by your name, and i was shipping (still do) Elio and Oliver, but there was something more to it, i couldn't wrap my finger around it, something was missing, like it wasn't enough that it was just them. So i went online and watched all the interviews with Timothée and Armie.

Honestly, something you need to know about me, i was never involved in a private life of a celebrity or knew all this PR, Hollywood, fake relationships shit until i came here on Tumblr. So when i watched the interviews i was like "Aww they're such good friends, they're really close if they talk like that and touch each other like that, if they compliment each other like that etc", because i was like "You can't ship two actors, are you insane?? Armie's happily married with two kids, his wife looks good (on photoshopped pics, i never zoomed in her eyes and jaw), and Timmy's definitely straight and all that bs."

So time goes by, and I'm still shipping just Elio and Oliver, and Armie and Timothée like bros and good friends (that rolled around naked on bed, and made out for 10+ minutes).

And then TIFF happened and that was a breaking point for me. Even before TIFF when Timmy showed up after being a ghost for 6 months, and he showed up for Armie Hammer. That kind of spiked in my book, that was the first time i gave myself a permission to believe there's more to it than just friends. And then the TIFF hug and everything that happened at TIFF.

So i joined Tumblr and realized i wasn't the only one with that opinion, it was good but still wasn't enough for me. Now, I've seen Charmie being spread around and never really took it seriously, like i saw them as nothing but friends. But that hug, that hug was...everything to me. I'd think of Armie being married and then the hug, I'd think Timmy's probably straight, and then the hug. The TIFF hug undid all the doubts i had of them being just friends.

Then SSIFF happened and the rumor about Tim going to dinner with LRD and then his eyes, those sad eyes, he wasn't sick, we've seen him being sick, it wasn't the same. No, those eyes were pure sadness and anxiety, and i remember seeing him like that and all I wanted to do is fly over to Spain to hug him for whatever reason.

Fast forward to the first Central Park picture of Tim and Lily.

That's when i got very suspicious. Okay, they were at TIFF and SSIFF, there was no interaction, that rumor of them going to the same dinner was just a rumor until the black and white picture came out months later (where Timmy looked like he was holding some sort of guard), how come this relationship just sparked out of nowhere? (Lily was on the set for 2 weeks, no time to fall in love) Then Mud happened, then those pictures from the rain, then those from Central Park, and all the gossips and rumors and made up stories...everything was so suspicious to me. So i log onto Tumblr again and saw all the theories and i tried to develop my very own.

If Charmie was just a fantasy, and it was made up by couple of people on the internet, then it shouldn't bother anybody, because it was just a fantasy, and this relationship began so close to the TIFF hug that got me thinking "What if it's not just a fantasy but something real, and they're covering something up?". Because, let's face it, not in a millions of years would I ever put Timmy and Lily together in a relationship. He was Tim, and she was very problematic (from family to drugs, lbr). It got me to question either Timmy and his choice of women, or his PR team (I learned that here). But Timmy went on being his perky self and this relationship just stunk to the core.

And from that point on, everything was smooth sailing.

Maybe I've gotten far into something I shouldn't have, but the point is, the reason why i started to believe in Charmie is because of the fake relationship. It was too close to them being publicly affectionate and too far from thinking Tim would really fall for a woman like that. I'm sure Lily's okay in a closed room alone, but in public, i don't like her very much and it has nothing to do with Tim, or me being a jealous person that wants Tim all for myself (he's not my type), i wouldn't follow someone like her and her insights in the world. Simple as that.

After that, i turned the film around and realized that they've probably been "together" since CMBYN promo or so. The fact that "friendship" like Tim's and Armie's had to be covered by a fake girlfriend and a wife that was rather a control freak, then i got my thoughts straight.

Now i know what we say about Tim and Lily, and Armie and Liz, they could all be legit and really in love and happy, but...i just don't see it. And i know what we say about Tim and Armie could be false, or it could be true, we're just speculating, but my God, when all the pieces are put together, when all the videos of them gawking at each other, their body language, their eyes and compliments, just them being them...it's hard to see them as just friends and co-stars. They went through something when they were filming CMBYN, and I seriously doubt they stopped at that. I think this movie awoke something in both of them and they deepened the bond and it got them where they are now.

So, thank you PR teams for making me believe in Charmie, you did a shitty job and each time you screw up a bit, I believe in them even more, because the more you try to cover something up, the more real it gets for me. And it's not just them, it's the entire picture, this is very simple and people with logical thinking can see it also.

Conclusion : I am a Charmie, i love and support both Armie and Timmy separately and together, i don't like Lily and i think Liz is very...something. No hate, this is just my opinion on all this.

Have a great day, sorry for the long post, here's some Charmie love.❤️

[thecanadianowl]

Justice league Snydercut review

Wow talk about a long movie. Remember Mass Effect's 3 shit endings that were later improved (sorta) with DLCs. Well that is kinda how this movie is.

Before we start this, I just wanna say that I was very impartial throughout the whole snydercut movement. I wasn't part of it but I do see the good that they did in regards to some of their charities and with how the fandom itself has been painted in a negative light. So its good that they got what they have been demanding for quite some time. Snyder as director for me, I really am not the biggest fan of. His movies have some great cinematic moments that look amazing but the context around it is what muddles it for me.

Is it better than Whedon's JL? YES. To start I'll look at some of the things that I do like.

I do like how it was split into parts.  Gives it that miniseries/Comic book feel

Thank god they removed that stupid cringy flash landing on top of Diana's chest scene.

Darkseid looks good. I know some people have issues with it but I liked it. I mean looking at it first glance has me convinced its Darkseid. His voice isn't too bad either. Reminds me a bit of Injustice 2.

As much as I have issues with Darkseid being introduced so early I do like that he had a brief confrontation/glaredown with the League, foreshadowing a possible in person encounter and that the League needs to expand if they are going to fight against Darkseid.  

Steppenwolf's design has greatly improved and looks better than before.

Loved the scenes between Alfred and Diana.  Wish there was more of that.

I loved how the movie added Cyborg, Aquaman and Flash attempting to stop Superman from getting to Batman. I also liked how in this version,  Batman pleading to Clark's humanity telling him that world needs him and he needs to snap out of it.  Also bonus for taking out that scene of Batman on the ground groaning about how old he is getting.

Okay seeing Clark get the black suit and having the voiceovers of both his father's merge together works in terms of Clark's arc into becoming the person he was meant to be. Also like the use of Zimmerman's Ideal of Hope score wished they let it play out a little longer.  Probably my favourite moment in the film is where Superman just takes Steppenwolf's Axe like its nothing and freezes it.

Now to go into some of the more critical stuff that bugged me when watching.

For a movie that is 4 hours long, pacing issues were bound to happen. I think the first example of this can be found in the opening with the Superman scream wave (which started to get a bit hilarious when his screams could be heard every now and then) hitting all three mother boxes. they are shown individually reacting to it and it takes time, where it could have just showed them together or an compilation of each of the motherboxes waking up. I know it Snyder's thing but tone down on the slow mo. Like some instances its fine (like with bullet time or Flash's scenes) but other instances I'm just like alright I get it.

The scene involving Cyborg transferring money into that single mother's bank account. Is he gonna do this for all the people suffering just like her? or just for that one person? I mean if you can hack into the world monetary system, you can solve a lot of financial issues affecting  the majoirty and not just one person. Did I miss the scene but why did Cyborg go from helping one poor person, suggesting the potential good he can do to change the world for the better  to "Fuck the world". Seems a bit inconsistent in character. Especially since he knows who Diana is (from what he says)  and that Parademons are after the motherbox. Maybe her offering help, you should take it? idk Vic. Also the whole Auto defense system malfunction, would it not be better if this was established beforehand where we see Vic struggling to maintain his body's autonomy leading up to the Superman confrontation? Prior to that it seemed he had it under control and his biggest conflict throughout the movie seemed more to be with him coming to terms with his new body. With that being said, Cyborg's character here is much more interesting and better than it was originally. I can see why Ray Fisher is so pissed (well that and the abuse he faced).  I am glad this was improved and gave the character a lot more to do.

The movie still has the same issue as before in regards to the whole motherbox plot and how convenient it was that all three are located on earth. You would think that with the involvement of Darkseid/Steppenwolf that separating them to distinct locations across space would make it more difficult to collect them. I mean we know that the Green Lanterns exist (we saw one get chomped), you'd think that they or the guardians would take one and secure it on Oa. The pushback to this would be "well there was only one green lantern and he died, so how could they retrieve the box?" which begs my question, why send only one? I mean it has been established that Darkseid is a known conqueror of worlds, you'd think the Guardians would be smart enough to send more than one Lantern to aid Earth in their fight.  Did they not think it would be a good idea to have the corps be more involved/keep an eye on earth since it is the only planet that was able to repel Darkseid's forces?

Why is it that the best idea of security when it comes to humans is to bury it? Would it not be better in optics to look over it and know its location instead of dropping it somewhere on the off chance that someone might find it due to being  curious or the land changing/altering  making the box more easy to attain? A situation as dire/serious as this, you would think that the Amazons/Atlanteans would have been better prepped with armor/weapons for such an event. I mean you have the arrow of Artemis that shoots quite a distance to give Diana a message but not some kind of weapon that hurts/cripples Steppenwolf? Or better yet, how about the moment that the boxes started acting up after Superman's death, that Atlantis/Themiscarya would put aside any differences they had with one another and to the outside world to come together to secure the boxes?  How could Darkseid forget the name of the only planet that was able to force him to retreat? nor does he know that it harbors the anti life?

Did this movie break Aquaman's continuity? because from the dialogue between Mera and Arthur, its implied that Atlanna abandoned/left Arthur at Tom's doorsteps whereas in the movie,  we see Atlanna spend a couple of years with Tom and raising baby Arthur before she was forced to come back. You'd think Zack being a producer for the Aquaman  movie would have edited that line or made it more clear. Well that or James Wan F'ed up when making the movie.

"I've never seen a being as strong as Steppenwolf" Did Diana just forget Ares aka the god of war who killed the Greek Pantheon/Old gods and orchestrated the first World War? Hell from the looks of the flashback it seemed Ares (I'm assuming its Ares, if its Hades, my bad) was getting some good hits in on Darkseid, who is superior to Steppenwolf.  While we are on the topic of Diana, it's a bit odd that Snyder who  was a producer on WW84 where one of the biggest focuses on the movie that Patty Jenkins talked about was how Diana doesn't solve her problems with violence (even though her primary weapons in this movie are a sword and shield but okay. Then again New 52 hasn't done a good job in disproving that), yet in this movie we see her using her gauntlet smash to fucking kill the one remaining terorrist. Like sure you can argue that they were terrorists and deserve to die, but given how easy and quick it was for her to take out the previous guys, why do something that runs the risks of destroying the very building that you are in (with hostages). I mean from the look of the blast and how much debris fell from the building outside, and it was a miracle no one (but the terrorist) got hurt/killed.

Why did Steppenwolf  kidnap  them in the first place? Just use that mind extracting device you used on the Atlantean soldier to see if they know. Seems like a waste of time to collect them in one location only to interrogate them later.

Okay, I'm sorry but even in this cut I still don't like Miller's Barry Allen. He isn't as bad as he was in the theatrical cut but man does it stick out. When he is helping to escort the kidnapped civilians out, why doesn't he just grab them and transfer them to a safe distance? He even makes a comment about how slow they are going. Can I also just say how weird it is for Barry to take time saving Iris to caress her hair and look at her more creepily in slow mo? Like yeah its in slow mo but still I think your priority should be to get everyone to safety as quick as possible and check if anyone else could get hurt.  I will admit that Barry's speech as he is running so fast to reverse time at the end was really good. Tho the more I think about all the slow mo Flash scenes are good.

They still kept the "Let's use the mother box to bring back Superman plot". Why? This is a piece of tech that you don't fully understand how it works and you are going on the whims of someone you just met. Especially if they come back as a different person/mindset all together.  If Superman 's death was the reason that allowed for the Mother box to call to Steppenwolf/Darkseid, what the hell were they doing prior to Superman's arrival on earth? I mean we've seen how easy it was for Steppenwolf to attain the two boxes even if they were guarded, so why the wait ?. I get that Batman is going through an arc and trying to change from the person he was but how does go from "1% chance of absolute certainty" to "let's go on a whim and have faith" when it comes to resurrecting Superman? 

Its gonna be awkward as to how Clark will explain his sudden return from the grave around the same time Superman came back.

I was wondering when the Knightmare scene will play out. Jared leto's Joker isn't over with me, it seems way too try-hard to be edgy. Other than that yeah, not much I can say about it. Tho do we seriously need another iteration where Superman (or someone with Superman like powers) is evil?

I also love how nonchalant Bruce is about J'onn appearing in front him. However the revelation that J'onn was that army general all the time breaks so much of continuity (and just why now did you decide to show up and help and not idk the time Zod invaded and nearly  terraformed earth, HELL WHY TF DIDN'T SHOW UP TO HELP THE LEAGUE IF YOU KNEW ABOUT DARKSEID, I'M SORRY TO RAG ON BUT REALLY THIS CAMEO JUST OPENS UP SO MANY QUESTIONS, IT JUST SEEMS LIKE AN "PALPATINE WAS BEHIND THIS ALL ALONG" KIND OF THING ).

In terms of getting a sequel, I am not sure if WB is going to go through with it given that their current vision seems to be a different route than the one Snyder intended so who knows. Despite my criticisms I do believe this is Snyder's best DCEU film to date and probably one of his better films. You could tell that he put in a lot to make this. The movie itself does have issues mostly due to the plot surrounding the motherbox as well as pacing. I would say it's worth the watch at least once, though I think its best to watch it in doses rather than one sitting. Ultimately this is the version that we should have gotten and I can see why so many people who were supportive of Zack wanted or vouched for him to finish it. Regardless, I think the very least I am happy for Snyder. If you like Snyder's previous stuff, you will like this one, if you don't, your perception of the film won't change significantly other than some cool bits here and there.  

[awesome-bamon]

This whole Reylo/Anti solidarity thing is a joke. Esp. since they're only saying this because they didn't get what they wanted. If homeboy would have survived they would have been on their high horse and continue to ignore Finn/John and other characters of color and ignoring how Rey fell for a Nazi. Finn wasn't even the one to see him change! Rey had all of the access to that boy's "change" but Finn the actual victim of his selfishness in joining a Nazi org. or Poe who's been 1/3

fighting in this war for years don’t get to make their own decisions about whether to forgive him or not. No offense to Rey but why would I care about her opinion of Ren when other people who are comparatively more effected by his past (and who are considered her friends🙄) don’t even get to say how they feel about him? The writing makes it seem like Love is the big answer to everything as long as it isolates you from the people you care about, ignores a person’s past no matter how harmful 2/3

3/3 and (let’s be real) puts the power of carte blance forgiveness in the hands of a white girl for her dark, brooding white boy at the cost of her poc friends (co-workers at this point) stories and experiences. This story makes change seem magical and instant, like it takes one person to forgive all your shit to be okay. We know Ren doesn’t care about anyone else but Rey and he doesn’t actively want to be good. He just wants her. And that’s not romantic. It’s creepy.

Yeah, I’m not going to pretend to be all a sudden buddy-buddy with the Reylo fandom just because we’re pissed off with how the movie went for different reasons.  They have been demonizing and attempting to vilify Finn every since The Force Awakens came out and have been looking for any reason to attack and tear down John.

Just in the last couple of  weeks they have went after John 3 different times. First falsely accusing him of not defending KMT  at all when he did.   Then they criticized and bashed him because he dared called their lord and savior’s Rian Johnson’s the Last Jedi  “Iffy.”  And were all about acting like actors are supposed to blindly love and support the writing that their character gets no matter with, when they believed that their white ship and white character are being pandered and catered to.

But, are now talking about how Adam Driver didn’t like or support how The Rise of Skywalker ended, so he decided not to attend some Star Wars events.  Even though they would have bashed and criticized John at the thought of him not attending events because he didn’t like the writing for Finn. Which is what they would have done if John even thought about not attending any of The Last Jedi’s Star Wars events, since all they care about is the fact that Rian Johnson fan serviced Reylos and propped up Kylo, therefore their entitlement has them believing that The Last Jedi isn’t allowed to be criticized.

But, after all of the time convincing us that Finn fans are supposed to embrace and love everything Rian Johnson wrote for Finn, they can’t embrace and love everything JJ Abrams gave to Kylo Ren.

And Rey as a character is tainted and ruined for me.  I just can’t accept her kissing and crying over the man who put Finn into a coma, tortured her other friends, and killed Han in front of her.  As well as attempt to kill or harm her several times. 

It’s like she is slapping Finn in his face by embracing and accepting Kylo. He does one decent thing and all is forgiven in her eyes.  And  Finn risking his life for her doesn’t matter and nothing else matters because the man who abused her died doing one decent thing.

JJ Abrams ruined Rey and derailed the potential in Finn being the main character of this trilogy with an arc focused on his back story and how he rose up to defeat Kylo and the first order.

And did it all for no reason. Because Disney may make money off of this, but if they thought that completely catering to  the Reylo fandom was going to get the movie the praise and accolades then they are in for a rude awakening.  They fell for believing  the Reylo fandom being the majority of the Star Wars fandom and went with having Rey’s arc be all about redeeming Kylo, because they thought that it was what the majority of the audience would want.

Yet, they just get a bunch of pissed off people, Reylos still not happy and content since Kylo died and  The Rise of Skywalker being the lowest rated movie out of the trilogy. 

[writings-from-the-hart]

Writebr Intro

Writeblr Intro Time!

Hiya! This is so overdue and I apologize for that lol. I’ve been meaning to write this but school seems to always be getting in the way of just that. Writing. But here I am finally writing this! And yes my username is a pun of my own last name but I just couldn’t resist.

So basically, I really want to surround myself with other writers and have stumbled across tons of writeblr’s (I think that’s what they’re called lol). Instantly I was in love and wanted more of what the community had to offer. I’ve been a self-proclaimed “author” or writer since my early years of grade school. I was that child in the back of the class with ADHD that couldn’t sit still (the cliche bouncing leg and always chewed down nails) and had what my mother called an “overactive imagination”. My notebooks in high school were often filled with wild stories about “galaxies far far away” or dystopias with cruel governments ruled by dictators. Now I’m in my second year of college swamped with classes about the Psychology of criminals (or I like to call the science of murder), and trying to find time to write a novel. So the struggle is real my dudes.

A little about Me:

Hana

20

She/Her

Pisces

Asexual

Forensic Psychology Major and English with a concentration in Writing Minor

Book hoarder

Dog Mom

Vintage AF

Low Key Emo Punk because I’m no average white girl!

History nerd (Love learning about the old wars and cultures)

Movie nerd (There’s an endless stack of DVDs in my house)

Fandoms:

The Mandolorian (or the ManDADolorian)

Star Trek

Star Wars

Hannibal

X-Files

King Falls Am

Welcome to Nightvale

Transformers (Obviously not the bad movies lol. Bumblebee is baby and must be protected always.)

Good Omens

Sherlock

Lord of the Rings

Marvel (There are so many shows and movies in this category we would be here all day if I tried to list them.)

Timeless (Not sure if the fandom is still alive after what the writers did to one of our ships lol)

DC (I’m a huge Batman geek and adore Wonderwoman, but I take the good with the bad when it comes to this fandom. Especially movie-wise anymore.)

And there’s probably more but my memory isn’t working currently.

Goals?. . . maybe:

Get my novel finished (This has literally been on my To-Do List for who knows how long.)

Meet more writers/new writers.

Improve my poetry (I suck at poetry so I bad I never let it see the light of day, so I need to work on it.)

Start my bullet journal.

Wips:

Okay by now you all know I have at least 1 Wip because I mentioned getting a freaking novel done, but just as a precaution as to what I mean by Wip or Wips. I get distracted quite easily, for some odd reason my brain absolutely loves to jump from one idea to another for no absolute reason. Like WTF dude we already have an idea we’re working on why do you keep bringing all these new ones to me like stray dogs. And like any good dog Mom or distracted writer, I want to keep all the ideas/stray dogs. So, when I say Wip I mean “Look at this cool idea I came up with” and I’ll make sure to specify which one is hogging most of my time.

Renegade: Dystopian, Thriller, Post-Apocalypse, and Science Fiction.

This is my baby. Most of my free time is dedicated to adjusting plotlines, character arc’s, fixing freaking plot holes, and other important stuff other than just plain writing. I’m hoping to finish this also monster of a story by 2020 and get it published. So big stuff!  

“So tell me little wolf do you want to punish those who have wronged you?” An assassin known as the Crimson Ghost makes their way through the corrupt city-state of Ashton completing a job given to them by the Black Rose. What is a seemingly normal job though turns into something far more complicated when they stumble upon the fractions of an abandoned notebook from the past. A past the Republic is trying to desperately hide and bury no matter what. On the other side of the world in the Republic’s capital Eshar, plainly referred to as “The Prodigy” or “machine” by his superiors,  Eric Coalwood has built a life upon the ashes of his family, striving to meet the high expectations set before him by his mentor General Wolfheart. However, his life falls out of its normal day to day routine when the unexpected is asked of him. Command a task force made up of the Republic’s most wanted or his life is over. Eric doesn’t need reasons for why he must do what he has to, all he needs are orders and the Republic is more than happy to give them. Either way the clock is ticking for both the Crimson Ghost and the Republic’s prodigy and with time running out they both have two options. Either get over their different beliefs concerning the Republic or allow the world to once again succumb to war but this time nobody is going to survive it. “Legends are slippery things. For the glory that coats them hides the pain, suffering and death that created them.”

The Trouville Files: Dystopian, Thriller, Post-Apocalypse, and Science Fiction.

Not my biggest priority but definitely one of them considering the plot of this story. I mainly use this wip as a reference for Renegade because it’s actually the prequel to it. Also, it’s great to use as writing practice when I’m plagued with writer’s block for Renegade or frustrated with a plot hole. So this is my double-edged sword that does a lot of good.

“Death in these black days is neither kind nor quick.” The year is 2153, the world we know is nothing more than a wasteland strewn with the dead and a sky being choked by their ashes, not glorious and thriving but desolate and starving. The Red Death, a pandemic with a steady progression and a gruesome countdown to the demise of those infected. No one outruns it or survives it. “United we stand, divided we fall.” The Allied Nations, a totalitarian superpower, promised a united people but all they gave this world was more death and destruction. The Red Death isn’t the only thing slowly killing humanity anymore, we are in the form of the War of Broken Pacts. The spark of revolution is lit, but if it will remain so is a question asked by everyone. Does it stand a chance against the iron-fisted government holding the people in shackles? “Rebel with a cause.” Genius Medical Officer for The People’s Republic, Cyprus Ramiro works day and night in search of a cure for the Red Death exterminating hundreds, at least before this war kills him first. But he is also a man on the run and the rebellion can only shelter him for so long. “Duty over pain.” Cunning Spy and Soldier, Orion Ultor is ordered by the Allied Nations to infiltrate and gather information on the ever-growing People’s Republic. In bold letters is Search and Destroy; make a ruin of the rebellion and ensure the Allied Nations remains as it should -- unquestionably in power. No matter the cost unless he wants to suffer the consequences again. “If we fall we shall rise from the ashes like a phoenix.” They should have never met, battlefields don't make good friends. It wasn't fate, it wasn't destiny, only war throwing people together.  The Allied Nations is trying to stamp out something they fear, but can they before the Red Plague? Or will humanity find itself extinct.

Beyond his point is where I house my stray dogs/ideas

Hiraeth: Paranormal, Horror, Mystery, and Thriller.

Scooby-doo who?

Hiraeth means a homesickness for a home which you cannot return. That is how Arcane feels like she’ll never be home no matter how hard she tries to connect with her family. The closest she feels to being home is with her friends and in the worn leather seats of the van they all pitched in to buy. It all started out as a way to pass time and for all of them to escape their families because to be honest parents never understand, but it all turned sideways when a simple “ghost hunting trip” stirred something that was meant to remain buried. The truth never remains buried though, not really, somehow it will always creep back in ugly and twisted. Arcane has never felt “at home” but she’ll do whatever it takes to keep what she considers her family safe.

Sweet Dreams: Historical Fiction, Thriller, and Romance.

A literal dream turned into story plot and no I’m not kidding.

The Red String of Fate, The Lovers, and War. These are the three elements intertwined within the plot of Sweet Dreams but before anyone makes any assumptions this isn’t some chummy rom-com. There will be tears and heart strings may get yanked clean out because the angst is real. War and love never mix well, it leaves a sour taste in ones mouth and makes the mind question things it shouldn’t. Like is the woman in his dreams the same woman he sees in all his dreams? Constantly he somehow ends up spotting that same ruby red lipstick, honey golden eyes, and brunette hair laying in perfect curls. She’s everywhere except in his actual life. They say you and your soulmate share dreams, living proof of how intertwined souls are. She doesn’t believe in love or the idea of souls, not with the monsters roaming around the countryside and battlefield carrying assault rifles. Society tells her where her place is, but she disagrees and rather create her own destiny.

The Prophet: Paranormal, Thriller, Post-Apocalypse, and Science Fiction.  

A short story I can’t seem to let go or it doesn’t want to let me go, but either way, this story has the makings for something great. It also at times seems strikingly similar to Good Omens, so don’t be surprised.

There’s no anti-christ in this story, he already has a book about himself so let’s not make another one besides there are other stories that need to be told. Such as, have you ever heard of modern day prophets and I’m not talking about those people with cardboard signs saying “the end is near!” or giant churches with people preaching about the end times. No, I’m talking about a kid with messy hair and dark circles under their eyes because sleep is no longer a choice due to migraines that plague them every night. Migraines that bring weird cryptic messages that make one question their own sanity. And what happens when strange people start asking about said migraines and messages?

Virago: Fantasy, Thriller, Historical Fiction, and Romance.

I’m not a huge fantasy reader, for some reason I can’t stay invested in them, but here I am with a fantasy story in my wips. It has mages, knights, assasination plots, and one super badass general who takes zero shit from her king. That’s right women empowerment, my dudes! I don’t really have much of a synopsis inline or a plot because this is only of those wips I let rattle around in my brain from time to time. But I will say it does give me that LOTR vibe but also Game of Thrones.  

Don’t be surprised if you see my stray doggos from time to time because I will admit I love to play around with storyboards. Even if I don’t have a fully planned out plot put together for it.

And that concludes this what was supposed to be short Writeblr Intro. I hope I have peaked some of your guys’ interests because the community definitely got a hold of minee. Feel free to send me a message about anything I mentioned (even if it’s just fandom shit I don’t care) and don’t be shy. I’m a huge introvert but somehow love talking, so don’t worry it won’t be awkward and odds are I’m equally nervous about conversation lol. Also, feel free to add me to any taglist and reblog/like if you’re active and would like more Writeblr mutuals!

Happy Writing,

Writings-from-the-Hart