#alba writes nonsense

[sibillascribbles08]

Doing art is so hard as of late but I am determined to draw some more VHHB nonsense

Starting with this joke based on this post that I’ve been sitting on for weeks now

Varii hopes he gets the death sentence by the end of all this

[capoteera]

Exactly!! I’m so mad that these people get away with this nonsense //

1. 100% sure none of these losers have been to any part of Portugal, and they're eating their hearts out about it.

2. This is when you know the depression has made them hit rock bottom. They're at zero. Alba has shown up for an opportunity they will never have, looking better than they ever will, and is loved by a gorgeous, rich man who gushes when he talks about her. Who looks giddy in love when he's with her.

They'll never have any of that. Not just Chris. They know damn well they'll never know love like this. No one out there will adore them like this.

The sum total if Alba's life? That joyful, loved up freedom? The choice to either continue her career or stay home and have some gorgeous babies for Christopher Robert Evans? Or anything in between? The freedom to do whatever she wants with the rest of her life, knowing that she'll always be fine and her husband has her back? They'll never have it.

Alba is literally just going about her business, and yet... To have the power to do nothing and still lay waste to the psyche of people whose existence she's blissfully unaware of...that's power few of us will ever see.

It's making them sick. They're screaming, crying and throwing up. And so they come online and post vile shit, because that is the sum total of THEIR lives. That's the pinnacle of their achievements...writing nasty comments and anons to each other to agree with themselves. That's their biggest accomplishment.

So now they're shitting on the entire country of a woman they would trade lives with in a heartbeat.

Loser energy.

But what else can you expect from them? They literally have nothing else to give. They have no choice but to come online and vomit their jealousy all over their own blogs.

If they had anything else to live for, anything at all, this wouldn't affect them like this. But this, this loser shit that they do, day after day...that's all they have. This is what they have to do to cope with the dead end that is their lives.

They look at this couple and they're forced to take stock of their own barren lives, and it’s turned them all into the most grotesque version of themselves. It's ugly, but ugly is all they have. Ugly is all they are.

I don't even think they can even help it anymore. Like is said, it's that loser energy. They’re typing through their tears.

[maximumwobblerbanditdonut]

I am patient with stupidity but not with those who are proud of it.

Edith Sitwell

I understand that this fan may have missed my previous response, but I'd like to clarify that there have been some surreal moments from SH’s fans and their comments. This moment doesn't change the essence of who they are. This is their way of talking with all emotions flying high, right? Although claims that this word was created by Diana Gabaldon and given to SH to use on his merchandise, this is not the case. The word Sassunach/Sassanach is not a made-up word and it is not the property of any one person. It has been in use for centuries and has roots in Gaelic and Scottish culture.

Sassunach/Sassanach simply means English person. Similarly, Albanach means Scottish person. Alba in Gaelic means Scotland, which was a language that the English referred to in ancient times due to the language they spoke. SH appropriated this word because he is an opportunistic man who will take advantage of what he can find to reach some end.

Lowland Scots and non-Gaelic speakers were also called sassunach. But in the 18th century, the Scots used the word due to their occupation of Scotland for hundreds of years. No matter what you think, no one in Outlander SH or DG has a legally legitimate title to the word Sassenach. Gaelic is not inherent to DG or SH. The Gaelic language and culture are an integral part of the nation's identity, and more than half of Scotland's Gaelic speakers live in the Highlands and Islands, connecting people for centuries SH used it word as a cultural appropriation he ignored the history and struggles of the culture from which he was taken. He is a lowland Scot and he doesn't speak the language. But, Don’t be surprised, after all, everything about him is made up.

Don’t forget, Gabaldon from New Mexico picked 18th century Scotland as a setting for her novel by accident after seeing an old episode of Doctor Who featuring the companion character Jamie Robert McCrimmon, (played by Frazer Hines) fictional character also known as Jamie, who fought in the Battle of Culloden fighting for Bonnie Prince Charles on 16th April 1746.

The earliest known use of the word Sassenach is in the mid-1700s. The earliest evidence for Sassenach is in the writing of Tobias Smollett, a Scottish novelist.

Tobias Smollett wrote in the novel, Humphrey Clinker (1771), ‘The Highlanders have no other name for the people of the Low Country, but Sassenagh or Saxons’. In modern Scotland, however, the Gaelic term has been adopted into general usage as sassenach, denoting something or someone English.

In DG’s original book, there’s the problematic use of the Scots word “Sassenach,” derived from the Gaelic word “Sasannach,” which does not mean “outlander” or “foreigner” — it only means an Englishman. In Gaelic the word is neutral, but in Scots, the word has a pejorative sense which can be offensive to English people. (I’m sorry but you can’t go into the issue without greater detail here, and post about this word with nonsense comments ) You must read about Scottish Gaelic history and culture. The word is only applied to the English, "Sassenach" not refers to any traveller not born in Scotland... in other words, has nothing to do with "outlander."

It is worth noting that Gaelic is not magical and, despite being Scottish, SH did not grow up speaking the language in the Highlands as many Scots do. Instead, he took the word and applied it to his brand, taking advantage of the fact that his fans see themselves as a ‘Sassenach’ (a fictional television character, that's idiotic). This tactic plays on women's emotions and allows SH to benefit quickly without making concessions. It might be a smart move of him, but some may see it as really questionable. Nice way for a 44-year-old man to shine and live supported by adult women 😳

It’s considered inappropriate for a man to rely on the support and attention of adult women. It's concerning to see SH's female customers blindly following buying expensive merchandise for decoration and praising him all year round. These individuals are often referred to as 'useful idiots' who mindlessly parrot comments without questioning or thinking critically.

I believe if someone chooses to take advantage of their fans, it's because their fans enjoy looking ridiculous and don't mind being laughed at. Unfortunately, there's not much that can be done about this. As the saying goes, 'Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.' I find it hard to believe that some of SH's female fans who don't have any Scottish ancestry, no Scottish blood running through their veins would want to pretend to be Scots 🙄

They are female clients who pay for SH’s services at private events, but it doesn't seem to have any positive impact on their lives. His only impact was leaving a scar on his forehead that he'll never forget while increasing his bank statement. These women, and rarely men, buy his expensive products just to flaunt them on social media in hopes of getting attention from the person they idolise. This behaviour is mostly seen in women interested in a middle-aged man. It's worth noting that SH doesn't even know his clients' names or even that they exist.

It sounds like you're not familiar with SH’s books. He hired Charlotte, 👻 a ghostwriter, to write Clanlands books and another ghostwriter to write Waypoints. It doesn't matter if other people have used ghostwriters, we are not arguing about them, this is specifically about SH.

By the way, the spy who dumped me? It was a fun comedy film but Brian Glazer had the idea of ​​working with female roles and decided to choose Mila Kunis and Kate McKinnon, he did not choose SH (who was chosen by Lionsgate/Sony), as a spy who left no one behind, Well, Gillian Anderson and Justin Theroux were more important than him.

SH is not a bartender. He doesn't prepare his own recipes. Instead, he presents cocktails from real bartenders and fails to mention their creators, thereby taking credit for them. In this scenario, you are not offering any thoughtful reflection. If you don't want to be mistaken as an obsessive fan, you shouldn't behave like one. It's tiring to see such behaviour in adult women.

On the other hand, conventional alcohol brands do not need or use awards or medals as a distinctive feature, nor do they even use praise as a reason for being. Perhaps, the messages, brand attributes and market positioning are enough to win over the consumer. Very different from SH alcohol, which relies on women who have no idea how to tell whisky or gin apart to elevate and praise their idol in the marketplace.

So, It seems that you have not studied Scots Gaelic properly and have no idea about the history of Scotland. But if you've started learning Scots Gaelic, you can continue, but you should try harder. If you are a learner, it is always good practice to make this clear.

Never try to use jealousy as an excuse to open up the conversation… BAD IDEA. (Look at what happened to Leia… she kissed her brother!) By the way, no one likes mediocrity and settles for it.

Cheers :)

Posted 11th April 2024

[luminary-lady]

Debunking “The Yoga Certificate” Conspiracy

I can’t believe I’m spending my Sunday evening discussing this, but misinformation is my pet peeve, and this subject happens to overlap with passions of mine, specifically photography and photo-editing. So, allow me to use my expertise in those areas to refute the post that is going around the fandom claiming Alba photoshopped her yoga course certificate. Even if you’re fully onboard with the whole “they’re just PR” argument, I’d recommend hearing me out, so that you don’t look silly and undermine your own credibility by repeating an easily disproven claim.

Debunking the first argument: “The instructor’s name is edited off the certificate.”

This is based off of a misinterpretation of flash photography and how that impacts the color of an image. Here is the photo that Alba uploaded:

The blog who started this conspiracy (which I can’t tag, as they blocked me after I reblogged their earlier post) cropped the photo of the certificate and circled an area like so:

Yes, there is a slight color difference in that part of the photo. The only problem is, there are color differences throughout the photo, because of a phenomenon called illuminant metamerism. This is just a fancy a way of saying that the color throughout image will appear differently depending on the type and amount of light shining on it. When taking a close-up photo of an object with flash, the light from the flash affects how the lens captures the color. This is because of how the light bounces off the photographed object. The effect varies, depending on the focal length, angle, and texture of the object. It many cases, this kind of metamerism can create subtle splotches of different coloring throughout the image, like so:

So, no, the deceptively cropped photo is not proof of editing. It is proof of flash photography. Next...

Debunking the second argument: “Her name is layered over the white line meaning [it’s] placed over it using editing. It aint [sic] written directly on it.”

Again, sorry, incorrect. First of all, this user (with assistance from @nancydrewwouldnever​) claims to have “delayered” the image to prove it was edited. That’s an immediate giveaway that photo editing is not their area of expertise. (No offense.) You cannot “delayer” a JPG or PNG file. If layers were indeed added to the image, you could only discern those layers if you have one of two files: 1) the original .PSD, .IND, or. .AI file that can be opened and manipulated in Adobe Creative Suite or another editing software; or 2) an original PDF file that you’re manipulating in Adobe Acrobat. Instagram stories do not allow for PDF or raw file uploads, so there is no way to “delayer” them, even if they had been edited. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s take a look at the name:

You can see by looking at the “B” and the stems of the “a’s” in Alba’s name that there is some ink bleed from the letters, i.e. the Sharpie or writing implement smudged a bit, creating a blue halo effect from the black ink. And of course the letter “p” crosses over the white line. That’s not proof of editing - that’s how writing works.

We also know that the black letters/numbers were not edited onto the certificate because the blur and pixelation of that lettering is similar to that found on the serif-type white lettering. Using the other blog’s example for a moment, see how their edited-on black lettering has comparatively sharp, crisp edges (for the record, they chose that name, I did not):

It follows then that Alba couldn’t have taken a photo of someone else’s certificate and edited in her information, as the levels of pixelation across the lettering wouldn’t match in that case.

Finally, there are other points that make this conspiracy nonsensical, and they don’t even require knowledge of photo editing:

As the blog acknowledges themselves, the other instructors in the course referred to Alba as a teacher in their Instagram comments. What reason would they have to lie? Do you genuinely think, using all your common sense has to offer, that random normies from Atlanta are “in” on this conspiracy? Genuinely?

People stalked the Yonder website and discovered that Alba taught a “new teacher” class on November 20. Ironically, they tried to use that to prove their previous, now debunked conspiracy that she wasn’t invited to Walt Disney World. Now they’re claiming the yoga studio must’ve received a payoff for her to teach there without a course. As the lingo goes, bffr.

I know some people in this fandom are desperate to believe that Alba is not staying in Atlanta with Chris, that she is just a calculating succubus who pops in for photo ops then spends the rest of her time baiting the fandom. If they believe that, they can justify their nastiness to themselves. They can console themselves that Chris will eventually see her machinations, dump her, and prove them right. I get it - they’ve been proven wrong so many times; and that’s not fun. And here I go, proving them wrong again, though I’m sure they won’t see it that way. They’ll say “hey, Justin!” or “hey, Alba!” or call me a “cleaner.” But they won’t be able to come with facts, because they simply don’t have any.

P.S. Don’t waste time arguing with me on anon. I’ll just delete. If you can’t stand behind your arguments, I’ve got no time for you.

[sidewayspeace444]

You say he's "not your type" and still you write nasty things about him and his wife, you seem really upset it's not you who's wearing the diamond ring, let it go, he's a married man now and it doesn't matter how many times you read tarot cards for him or them trying to convince yourself and others that "he's not in love" "it's transactional" "they're not happy" it's not a legal marriage" or whatever nonsense your telling yourself, that's not going to change reality and before you attack me, no I don't like Alba or her friends but I live in reality, I'm not in denial, I don't spread hate and I'm tyred of this unnecessary hatred.

Hi! It seems like you’re really butt hurt that I have a brain and can express, and form my own thoughts. Thankfully I was raised by a wonderful grandmother who told me to never look up and praise a man because of a character he portrays.

The diamond ring is/was a loan. I don’t think anyone is upset by that and more like laughing. If you live in reality then you would know this man ain’t shit and you need to face that.

By the way it’s tired* have a wonderful new year. Sorry you feel the need to stand up for a man who would shove you in front of a bus to save himself.

[texasjen13]

Why did you delete the ask you just posted? I wanted to finish reading what that person had to say and what your reply was to them. I think the person who wrote that ask is Alba. It's just weird that they've time to stalk tarot blogs. You would think because they're celebrities they got better things to do.

Sorry I just didn’t want to have there nonsense on my Threads I didn’t want to give them the time of day or the attention. I think it was Alba too so

All I told her or that person was that I didn’t write that article, and that her reading was full of shit because she was so far from the truth. Or they were so far from the truth.😂 plus a fact the person who wrote it is named Elijah, and my name is not Elijah.

And plus if I would’ve wrote that article, I have some mad writing skills😂😂😂 kind of made me wish I took up journalism instead of dentistry😂😂😂.

And plus, if it was Alba, her tarot reading, suck! Because it was really far from the truth, and really far stretched😂😂😂

[majaloveschris]

Do you think maybe these videos and pap walks look so terrible because Chris wants nothing to do with it and he wants us to know it’s PR? ://

Nope, I do think this. I think he’s done everything on purpose. People will assume he’s inept with technology, so they’ll write it off.

We can all agree the pap walk, WDW, and now this scare video was all fake, contrived, and manufactured. I don’t think it’s so hard to believe that a man who knows exactly how his fandom is uses it to his advantage.

Personally, I do think he did it on purpose, I think the knew the video would be torn apart as would everything else.

I think it's quite easy to see that he isn't happy around her, that he doesn't look like someone who is in love, and that the whole scare video is fake.

This is not the first time something similar has occurred. Let's just take the whole "We saw Selena's reflection in his piano." That was before Alba, and it was complete nonsense. So I suppose they could have expected the same thing to happen here: that people would analyze the videos and photos.

[happiestplacehq]

ALICE LITTLE is twenty-threee years old. They are a Creative Writing Major. They are the incarnation of Alice from the Disney film Alice in Wonderland.

+ Creative, Curious, Friendly - Over-Imaginative, Impulsive, Careless

ABOUT ALICE

It would be a lie to say that Alice isn’t a little bit odd. They were always incredibly curious as a child, and would stick their nose into just about anything. There was an eagerness to learn and ask questions, even if those questions lead to trouble. Their curiosity quickly gave way to a burning desire to make up fantastical stories, much to the dismay of their parents and sister who were far too practical for the nonsense. Alice was often dubbed a liar for the stories they would spin to explain a broken glass or where they had disappeared to last night. It seemed an overactive imagination lead to just as much trouble as asking questions, and Alice often explores where they aren’t supposed to. It was a natural choice to study Creative Writing, against the wishes of their father who thinks it’s a useless career. Alice is extremely curious and inquisitive, often to their detriment. They are friendly, finding it easy to talk to just about anyone. Unfortunately, thanks to their brain working overtime on the imagination front, they tend to be careless and scatterbrained. One fateful Halloween, curiosity finally caught up to Alice. After the town's annual Halloween Party, Alice vanished, seemingly into thin air. They were found in the woods in the middle of December, returning with confusion and memory issues that they are still recovering from. Alice hasn’t been “right” since they returned but is desperately trying to ignore it and return to normal again. Alice said they don’t feel like themself anymore, and they are certain they have the memories of “another Alice”.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Alice is non-binary and uses they/them pronouns.

CONNECTIONS

Alba Laplan - Alice’s best friend. Alice likes to tell Alba their stories and is glad to have someone listen to their ideas and rambling. Lorelai Hart - An old friend of their parent’s, Alice finds Lorelai to be bad-tempered and rude. Since returning, Alice has had a growing paranoia about Lorelai, not helped by the fact that they poisoned her at the request of a mysterious package. Rita Jacobs - Someone Alice thought was a friend, but who apparently has other motives for talking to her. Apparently they're related. Alice doesn't know what to think.

Alice is currently unavailable. Their faceclaim is Amandla Stenberg.

[littlemissidontcare]

Yes. Yes, dudes like Chris Evans get married to women like Alba, and no they don't care what Alba or friends of hers have posted in the past, it won't stop them. The writing is on the wall, stop believing what the pr blogs in the Evans fandom are saying, they are hanging onto their last thread. I have no doubt that official confirmation will hit the internet real soon./// Not to be rude but do you see the writing on the wall? Cause he hasn’t been seen with her in literal months. She’s been in Portugal as of just a couple weeks ago. Even the theory that they were all in Bermuda together was debunked yesterday by one of his friends. His team is pushing article after article about nonsense just to get her name out of his search history on Google. Fans are keeping this thing going.

[chelsea-katz]

.

"Alba Laplan, I'm Chelsea Katz. Pleasure," she said, reaching with the hand that was still holding the cigarette. "Oh, shit, sorry. I forgot about it there for a minute."

She gave Laplan another glance. "I mean, I'm a reporter. It's going on record, but I won't write your name if you don't want me to." She put her cigarette away and scoffed a little. "Trust me, Lory doesn't mind. She knows I respect her too much to post lies and slander about her." It was better for her, and for everyone, for well-researched news to be spread rather than baseless gossip anyways.

Chelsea sighed at Alba's question. She had sent a message to Lorelai (several, in fact, and most of them photos of her cats in various absolutely adorable angles and situations) about five days earlier. No reply, not even an annoyed warning not to bother her with such nonsense, as Lorelai usually did. No worries, at least not yet. Then Chelsea had visited her at the office on Friday. She wasn't there either. She began to worry. And then she wasn't even at home, and Chelsea started to really panic. First there had been Alice's sudden and very concerning disappearance; then Rita's illness (which she had assumed was a severing of ties when she didn't reply to her messages, until she learned the truth –or at least as much of the truth as she could gather); and now, who knew what had happened to Lory?

"I've been looking for her for quite a while now, and I can't locate her anywhere. Not on the phone, not at the office, not at home... And I got a hunch she didn't just decide to go on an unannounced trip to the Bahamas for the winter holidays."

Alba's eyes went wide and she quickly shook her head. Energy drinks to keep themself working late into the night was about as far as she was willing to go. "No, I don't smoke, thanks. I'm Alba. Alba Laplan." They glanced at Chelsea's cigarette. "Um, I don't think you should do that inside, by the way."

Alba scrutinised the journalist, trying to remember exactly what purpose she was usually at the firm for. The way she was talking wasn't adding up. "What do you mean, confidential? Is this going on record? I'm only an intern, but I don't think Ms. Hart would take too kindly to being written about while she's away, even if it was by a friend." Alba frowned to herself. "Especially if it was by a friend."

The feeling in the pit of their stomach was getting worse, and she wasn't sure that it could be written off as anxiety anymore. Was Chelsea ever make social calls to the office? Or was she only ever there on business. Alba couldn't recall, their own head usually too buried in work to notice much else. "Please forgive me if I'm being rude, but why are you asking me? I'm sure it would be easier for you to find out from Ms. Hart herself?"

[tempobrucera]

This belongs here, and I want to treasure it in my asks like a prices possession 🥰🥺 And I want to see it in case there's some nonsense in there again.

Thank you so much Alba! @maneskings It means a lot 💕

"Nobody writes for Thomas as you do" is my favourite compliment I got on my writing. And heard from like 5 different people by now, but you were the first one who ever said that and everytime someone says, I think "Yes, Alba told me so" <3 And thank you, I'm glad you enjoy my silly writing so much!

💕.

[nat111love]

I woke up this morning feeling disgusted by the writers unfair treatment of carlos cifuentes .l feel like they collectively agreed that  carlos must be hated by the whole fandom , that’s why they are now doing the how to fuck and ruin carlos’ character challenge, and in order to do so they have to use whatever nonsense they can to make people hate carlos so they can win that challenge.

carlos was one hardcore feminist and a firm believer in equity and social justice them trying to tell us otherwise doesn’t sit well with me, he was never about money, if that were the case he would’ve done everything he could to be in his father’s good graces so that he would’ve gotten his father’s money once he was dead ( but he didn’t give a flying fuck and did whatever he felt like doing and was  expecting to be written out of his father’s will ).

 He knew how evil his mother was that’s why he called her out on her evilness more than once and also cut her out of his life,A MONEY HUNGRY PERSON WOULDN’T ACT THE WAY CARLOS DID so when l see the the fascits had money so l sided with them bullshit and a line like “why l’m not surprised your mother would be proud” l just want to throw hands .

SEASON 1 AND 2 WERE CHEF KISS but after that the writing went downhill.

Season 4 and 5 felt like a vendetta against carlos… the writers tried to make him look like an obsessive boyfriend when we all know that carlos was never that type of person  he left lidia when he learned that she was alba and that she had been lying to him for months, he doubted her love and didn’t want her back even when she told him that she had never loved anyone the way she loved him he still pushed her away, he also broke up with her after he discovered that she was behind carmen’s attempted murder so why on earth would he lie about franciso in season 4 why would he at the expense of his pride , self esteem and principle want to stay with a woman he believed wasn’t in love with him?! carlos always tried to do what was right, he was a supportive Partner, he was there with carlota fighting for equity, he also was there for angeles during her darkest days…he was a good person who also had  flaws but obsessive, selfish?! were never one of them!! He was never an  uncaring or greedy person so l don’t know where the fuck did the he didn’t care about his child/was a bad father  or loved money crap came from .

The writers used every characters they could use to shit on him, his father, lidia, Francisco, marga, carlota even elisa his own sister and the only character they left on his side was the evil one his mother…they assassinated his character deprived him of a father daughter’s relationship. They took everything that was his and gave it to francisco a man who had been threatening to kill him since season two… as if it weren’t enough they decided to make him a fascist / spy, he lost everything but the worst part of that story is that  it still wasn’t enough for them so they decided to punish him by killing him…he didn’t get the chance to see his daughter…HE DIDN’T GET THE CHANCE TO SEE HIS DAUGHTER OR TALK TO HER…

[imonlyhereformyclass]

Sin City Bombshells

For this post, I am going to be analyzing the following female characters: Nancy, Wendy, Gail, Miho, and Shellie. I am going to be going in depth about Lucille in another post, when I discuss lesbians. I know it’s a lot, but each of these characters represent a different spectrum of female sexuality, and to a certain extent, objectification. Most of the significant female characters are in the sex industry, as prostitutes or strippers, respectively. 

First, we have Nancy Callahan, played by Jessica Alba. Her story is brought by Bruce Willis’ character, John Hartigan, saving her when she was a child from a child predator. They part for several years and meet again in the future when Hartigan gets out of jail. He sees her as a 19 year old working as a stripper. She tells him that she never stopped thinking about him and has fallen in love with him. It is implied that they start dating afterwards. I don’t mind an age gap in relationships but this one rubbed me the wrong way. Hartigan met her as an 11 year old and he was grown. Now that she is older, she is viewed as a sexual object. I think that this represents the barely legal fetish that a lot of men carry. Along with this, Nancy is the perfect example of the stereotypical image of a stripper. She is a young woman (college age, fresh out of high school) with a heavy baggage of childhood trauma mixed with potential daddy issues. I think she fell in love with Hartigan because he saved her as her lowest. A savior, of sorts. I expected her to have a bigger role in the story because she is a huge name and is even on the cover. She only appears for a small bit and was only accompanied by Hartigan. She is constantly sexualized by her now stripper job and her kidnapping. I think it would have been a cool idea if Hartigan and her teamed up, like a Batman and Robin situation. Her role as a film noir trope is the “The good-bad girl stands in between the girl-next-door and the femme fatale, which highlights her moral ambiguity” (Barroso). Nancy has an innocent image (as we remember her from the beginning of the movie as a child), however, is now grown and had a darker moral code. Her becoming a sex worker also ruptures her moral ambiguity. Some still believe that being involved in the sex industry is immoral and evil. 

Next is Wendy. She is played by Jamie King. Wendy is the twin sister of Goldie, Marv’s prostitute lover. The reason she is given that name is the striking image of her soft golden billowing hair. Goldie was killed, hence Marv (Mickey Rourke) going on the hunt to find her killer. He blames himself for her murder and goes on a revenge spree to avenge her as he couldn’t save her previously. Since the beginning, she is framed in a sexual lens. She is described as an angel sent from heaven. She is naked the second the audience sees her in a passionate lovemaking scene. She is enveloped in light. Dana Leventhal observes, “The men idealize, romanticize, pine for the women by placing them on impossible pedestals (circumscribed by sexuality and desire) as cherished imaginings and visions, and through this possession make it their duty to guard and safekeeping them, especially since the women are jeopardized or victimized by brutal crime and injustice” (Leventhal). He finds out that Goldie has a twin, Wendy. Wendy is hardened and dead set on revenge, as she should be. She is a no nonsense type of woman. Wendy is tough and willing to bring the murderers to justice. She is still sexualized, nonetheless, as Marv always compared her to her sister, and viewed her the same way. Donaldson writes, “The women of classic noir are often alluring, moral ambiguous, and two steps ahead of the men in the story” (Donaldson). Wendy is alluring, as she starkly resembles her prostitute twin sister. She is morally ambiguous as she is dark and calculating, yet she joins Marv (the anti-hero) on avenging the wrongful murder of her sister. Wendy is one of my favorite characters as I liked how merciless she was. 

Gail, played by Rosario Dawson, serves as one of two women of color characters. That is a discussion for another day, as I am going to be analyzing her character. She is the femme fatale. Barroso defines the trope as, “The femme fatale...is mysterious and seductive, known for using her charms to ensnare men and get them into dangerous, and most often, deadly situations. Her main characteristic is using her feminine sexual traits as a way to achieve hidden purposes” (Barroso). She is tough and isn’t going down without a fight. She is the epitome of female empowerment in the eyes of men: tough and battle ready, and looks good doing it. From the picture alone, she is scantily clad. She looks great and I like her outfit but I know the reason why she is dressed like this. She is cunning and commanding. She resembles and reminds me of a dominatrix. Sexually dangerous and isn’t afraid to beat down men. She has masculine traits like being the leader of the gang and she is gritty and domineering. She kills men in a severely violent manner and is strong and self sufficient. 

I freaking love Miho. She is, by far, my favorite character in the film. The movies that Devon Aoki appears in, her characters always reign supreme. There is a reason Suki from 2 Fast 2 Furious is still so popular and raved about. However, there is something I hated about her character. She didn't say a word. Her character is the epitome of age old Asian stereotypes: the silent ninja. Miho would strike her sword on her opponents in the same “badass” manner as a ninja would. Her character had so much potential and I feel like it was a waste to have her be silent the entire time. Both her and Gail are the tough girls in the film. Leventhal writes, “The women are not helpless, powerless, or weak; rather, they are cunning and battle-ready. Not only do they refrain from asking for help from the male protagonists, but they either resist or fight to save themselves from their enemies” (Leventhal). Miho is presented differently from the other girls of the film. Her, along with Gail, are not the average damsel in distress, which I like. Laura Woodhouse rants, “Miho...initially appears to be the only truly powerful woman in Sin City. She is not possessed by a man, she is not a victim, she is certainly not physically passive as she goes on to kill many more men and can easily win a fight with any man...It is almost as though Miho is a different creature, a member of a race of silent killers that exist only to perform acts of violence. Quite simply, she cannot be presented as a ‘normal’ female because she has superior killing skills to a man and this threatens the patriarchal nature of Sin City. The creators of Sin City rob Miho of a voice in order to justify her power” (”The F Word”). 

Last, but not least, there is Shellie. Played by the late Brittany Murphy, she is a prostitute. Her costume in her major story arc is a black underwear set with a white oversized button down shirt. Given that she was in her own home and she is allowed to wear what she wants, but it rectifies the stereotype that women walk around their home scantily clad, sexually available for overnight guests. Along with that, it fits her day job of being eyed on by the voyeuristic audience. Shellie is conceived as the victim character; she needs the help of her boyfriend to save her from her deranged pimp of a boss. Leventhal notes, “the traditional formulations or projections of femininity as sexuality are retained, as are the concomitant age-old misogynistic conceits of male domination/paternalism in the guise of safety and defense of women, i.e., the cliche that women are weak and need rescuing by men from other men” (Leventhal). Shellie mirrors the poor princess locked up in a tower, needing her Prince Charming to come and save her. 

Barroso, Malu, et al. “The Representation of Women in Film Noir.” High On Films, 10 Oct. 2019, www.highonfilms.com/women-in-film-noir/.

Donaldson, Kayleigh. “Problematic Faves: Sin City.” SYFY WIRE, SYFY WIRE, 24 Apr. 2020, www.syfy.com/syfywire/problematic-faves-sin-city.

Leventhal, Dana. “Superwomen? The Bad-Ass Babes of Sin City – or Are They?” Bright Lights Film Journal, 28 Apr. 2019, brightlightsfilm.com/superwomen-bad-ass-babes-sin-city/.

Woodhouse, Laura, et al. “Sin City.” Word, 18 June 2005, thefword.org.uk/2005/06/sin_city/.

[mcustorm]

Thoughts on Jamie Johnson 5x08

I actually don’t even know what to think. You guys don’t understand. Do you know how serious this episode was? It was so serious, that my afternoon nap was delayed so I could write this post. And only important things stop my head from hitting the pillow.

Last week was Dillon’s glorious coming out, a beautiful moment to put an apex to all the tension between Dillon and Elliot. This week, Dillon’s coming out continues, for better or for worse.

I love how *all* of this episode centered around Dillon coming to terms with being out/being outed. It underlined the significance and severity of the moment. Somebody check up on Patrick Ward’s back because he was carrying this episode, and I know we’re all here for Dillon but he truly is the most fascinating character on the show.

Delliot getting ready to see each other after the previous day’s shocking events was such a cute scene. We all know that the characters on this show tend not to feel any way about anybody romantically, so just seeing those two try to look/smell nice for somebody they may feel some-kind-of-way about...ah, there goes those memories of mine again, haha.

And of course, I for the most part like Elliot’s role as someone who’s a little bit more experienced and can help out a baby gay like Dillon. Elliot being so different from everybody else we’ve met thus far on the show not only makes him fascinating to us, but to Dillon as well. On the other hand, I did not like that 1) Elliot almost immediately went and told Ruby and 2) after helping out Dillon with his gay journey, he mayhaps yeeted off into the sunset.

Ya know, if Hansard and Harry and Indira and Molly and Savage and Wozza and Jethro and Jack’s awesome dad and the different-somehwat-prominent-black-male-extras-on-the-team-each-season didn’t exist, I would have more faith that Elliot might have more of a role in the story moving forward. But this show has proven time and time again that if the character’s name isn’t Jack, then once the story is done with you it’s done. At this point in his journey, it maybe isn’t the best idea that Dillon get involved in a relationship. That makes sense. But to maaaaaybe reduce Elliot to a m*****l n***o? I don’ like det. 

It *seems* from what the show has presented thus far, that the only narrative purpose for Elliot to tell Ruby about Dillon is so that [both in-story and in the writer’s room] Dillon can have a reliable shoulder to lean on who is [and this is the important part] not Elliot. With him out of the picture, now Dillon’s go-to is Ruby if he needs a sounding board. And I have no idea why that’s the story-angle they’re going for. Perhaps Elliot threatens the status quo, which is “all of our characters are hopelessly, eternally single.”

But who knows, maybe I’m completely wrong and these last couple of paragraphs are irrelevant. Maybe not.

SN: Seriously, this show’s ships is definitely an interesting writing decision. Thinking about all the ship inequality thinkpieces that came out of the Andi Mack era, let’s talk about how the only canon het ship on this show that may give you feelings like Delliot is Jack and that rich guy whose name I’ve already forgotten. 

Do you wanna know what? Today was the most sympathetic I’ve ever been for Liam, and yet in this episode he did the most despicable thing he’s ever done. Well, maybe I’m not sympathetic per se, but at least I realize that he’s just another victim of his father’s emotional abuse. You know, Joseph’s brothers felt neglected too, and I never said “well maybe their father could’ve treated them better” when they sold their brother into freakin’ slavery. There has to be a line between seeing Liam as a victim and seeing him as just plain evil. Or maybe it’s a Venn Diagram. Either way, I’m still not a fan. I wonder what redemption for this character looks like.

I just like that this show was so unafraid to go there. It is completely unprecedented in any TV show intended for children/young teens...at least to my knowledge. I’m gonna make it very clear that I’m not trying to downplay other shows’ accomplishments, but coming out really is an internal and external journey. One is how you feel about yourself, and the other is how others react. This is my opinion, but some shows have really got the internal part down (DOAFP was GOAT-tier with this one); however, when the time comes to do the external part, the show either doesn’t go there or kinda just limps over the finish line. Does that make sense? Am I just rambling?

I think of all the programs that I’ve watched, this show has already done the best job of reconciling those two aspects of coming out. Besides The Fosters, perchance. Some people will be right by your side, others may need time. Despite all of the blatant and frankly disgusting homophobia that we saw on the program, the show made it clear that this is just what I said: a journey. There may be hope yet.

Also in this episode: Eric feels bad, because he did wrong and also because his “friends” are being generally dickish to him, and Jamie is also here to tell Dillon he did phenomenally at the cup (which, just a portion of that energy would’ve been great yesterday for the entire team, but go awf Mr. Johnson). I guess I should take away that Jamie and Dillon are in a way better place than they’ve been before. Great.

So there ya go. I must say, that was probably a Top 3 episode of this TV show. Which is why that preview for next week made me say, “Okaaaaay…” So wait, are Boggy and Jamie just like BFF’s again? Are we gonna address the nonsense that Jamie was spewing last week? Are Kat and Zoe just friends like that now? Are we gonna address the nonsense that Zoe was up to last week? WAIT, Freddie wants to spend time with just Alba and Eric? ARE WE GOING TO ADDRESS THE NONSENSE Y’ALL WERE ON LAST WEEK?

I will keep going to bat for Eric, idc idc.

See ya next week. Off to take my nap.

[fuckyeahcarlosandlidia]

The Nonsense Fest

I feel like saying a few things more about the mess the showrunners deliberately decided to do to trasform their show in a joke. Francisco’s fans may like it as much as they want, because Carlos is dead, because Lidia has a family with Francisco now, but certainly that’s not the way you make a real and valid choice. It’s not a choice at all.  Seriously, she doesn’t even say a word about Francisco.   He's not in her thoughts.  She doesn't make a comment to any of the girls about the life they have together. Anything about him.  It's all about Sofia, Eva, and then Carlos. If this was their way to fix the things between them, at least they could have let her be more active and clear about her feelings. Being silent is not an equivalent of being clear. “A silence means yes” doesn't work on television.  On television you show things.

Sure, we got the worst of the worst. The writers killed Carlos’s personality and then they killed him physically for the triangle.  We lost our favorite man - without him, we lost everything - in order to change direction in the triangle. For fan service.  Because Blanca Suarez and Yon Gonzalez are destined - poor them! - to end up together whatever they do, because El Internado made them destined. Dear Lord, what a migraine!  But really, here the amount of disrespect for the story, for the characters, for the fans can’t even be described because they had the chance to keep everything good, to give respect to everyone and they decided not to because they went too far with Carlos and Lidia and they had absolutely no other way than turning him into a despicable person, not worthy of Lidia and their own daughter. Fail! BIG FAIL! That’s not how you do it! And guess what? I love him even more!

They started their nonsense in season 4 with the whole coma storyline, making Lidia a mute woman who can’t even talk anymore, she just plays the nurse 24/7 at the hospital, except when she plays “Agent Carter” with the girls, completely forgetting she has a daughter to take care of and a “husband” who adores her and would do anything for her. Including getting crazy.  And that’s what they do to Carlos. They turn him into an insecure man because he’s not able to understand anymore who his “wife” is in love with, completely alone with his fears and insecurities. He goes insane at the idea Francisco doesn’t remember anyone but Alba. But excuse me, why is remembering Alba a threat? Wouldn’t it be the same if he remembered everything? What difference does it make if he remembers Alba and only Alba? Something that didn’t really have anything to do with Francisco, but only with Carlos. Francisco got amnesia, then in season 5 -voilà!- memories are back. It wasn’t even for his character, it was just for Carlos’s downfall. Yes, congratulations!! 

Now, I would like to remember that Lidia breaks up with Carlos because he didn’t tell her about Francisco being awake. And then she leaves to protect Eva from Carmen.  These are the reasons why Lidia leaves, not because she realizes that she’s sooo in lurve with Francisco.  We know this from Blanca’s pov, too. It’s canon, it’s confirmed. Lidia had NO intention of leaving Carlos and the family they had. But my question is this: if they wanted to change the direction of the triangle, why didn’t they do it properly?  They could have killed Carlos at the end of season 3 for example, heroically and in a beautiful way to save his only love and his precious little one, and then in season 4 they could have started re-building Lidia and Francisco the way a relationship is supposed to be written and built-up in order to be valid and believable. There was no proper build up at all.  Francisco spent 5 episodes out of 8 in a bed, asleep. In the first part of season 1, they have 2 scenes together, but they have no substance at all. Lidia and Carlos still did the show like no others.  And everything they did since season 4, about Lidia and Francisco, and the triangle stuff, is nothing but FORCED.

If there's something I'm kinda happy about is that in that necklace there was no picture of Francisco. The ones close to Lidia’s heart are Eva and Sofia.  And that's it.  That was satisfying because I already thought he was in there, too.  So the only people she kept close to her heart are Eva,Sofia and Carlos.  By the ring.  

Also, if Eva asked about her REAL father all the time, it means that Lidia talked a lot about him to her, it means he was there in that house like an elephant in the room. And she looked for him, she wrote to him many letters, she wanted to keep in touch with him. Wether it was for Eva or other stuff, that was supposed to be said, because it's respectful towards the characters.  They told us all about this, nothing about Francisco and Lidia as a couple, but then they completely wasted it. They didn’t use this material.  And it was meant to be used because it’s what make the characters real. In character.

In season 2, when Lidia broke up with Carlos she never for once looked for Francisco. She kept keeping that ring close to her heart, pining for Carlos and the life she wanted with him. In season 5, despite her life in New York with Francisco, Lidia keeps asking for Carlos, keeps writing to him in order to get a word from him. For how long? She talked to Eva about him many times, so tell us more about this.  You just can't drop it. It's a good premise. You can't just use it for Carlos’s pov and not for hers. For God's sake, she's the one that matters. She constantly talks about wounds, what wounds are you talking about, Lidia?  Tell us, because it’s important to know. If she’s so happy with her “perfect” life in New York, what kind of wounds may she have about a man who broke her heart a long time ago, a man who doesn’t even know what love is, uh? Why are you so curious, Lidia?  Why do you care, Lidia?  Enough not to jump on that van and leave him there for your own salvation?  Tell us!!

Anyway, to me all of this points out to Albisco NOT being endgame. It’s not that I really care about part 2, I just want to see Lidia’s reaction to Carlos’s death and I want Lidia to avenge Carlos and the person he was, because she saw once again the person he was. Not a “franquista”, not a despicable man.  But a man who loved too much. However, Lidia has her daughters now.  They are her endgame.  Along with her friends. Eva has Carlos' genes. No matter what, he’ll live through her. The more she grows up, the more she'll look like him. And Lidia will always have her from him. The greatest gift he could give to her.  And the other one, well, Carlos is the one who helped Lidia to get Sofia back, so he gave her that one, too. Metaphorically.  Francisco may have helped her raise them for awhile, but not seen, not happened. And that’s the big difference between Lidia and Carlos and Alba (I refuse to call her Lidia) and Francisco. Lidia and Carlos made a story and showed it before our eyes, since the very beginning. We saw how they fell in love with each other, how they made each other feel when they were together, we saw them fighting in every way, for each other, for their future, even for being crazy fools in love with each other. We saw them creating a life together, fighting for their family, and breathing each day of their family. Step by step.  We saw Lidia choosing Carlos again and again with Francisco there, we saw them at the aisle promising eternal love to each other. A team in every way. ‘Till the very end.  Because even in his last hours, Carlos was Lidia’s strength, ‘cause she wouldn’t have been able to do anything without him. And she was his light, the only light he has ever known in his entire life.  And you can’t find any of this between Francisco and Alba. 7 years together, in the same house, with two daughters, all of this off screen, and they’re not even married?  Please! What are we talking about?

[masked-disciple]

19 through 25? :0

19. Is there something you always find yourself repeating in your writing? (favourite verb, something you describe ‘too often’, trope you can’t get enough of?)

Hmmmm.... Honestly, not that I can think of? I mean characters in my head sometimes walk up and inform me they’ve committed incest again, but that doesn’t usually make it to AO3. (Shoutout to Rhada for informing me of a whole lot of shit he did with Sisyphus, who is related to him in Mirrorverse on a fucking technicality, jfc. But also Rhada’s been committing incest by way of sleeping with Gordon, aka Minos’ son, since the bronze age so.) 

I mean, I probably overuse Toby quotes, but tbh I actually can’t think of something I overuse too much. Huh.

20. Tell us the meta about your writing that you really want to ramble to people about (symbolism you’ve included, character or relationship development that you love, hidden references, callbacks or clues for future scenes?)

I’ve already done this a lot (I’m actually answering this last because I’m trying to think of my favourite here), and. Hmmm. Honestly, I’m gonna go with IKM Minos, because while I have rambled about him before, only in DMs, and I haven’t talked about IKM much yet.

The thing is, I know as much about him as y’all who follow the series do. He’s very quiet in my headspace, and only ever comes out when I sit down and write him. But he’s four things. Four things, completely at odds with each other, and yet completely in harmony. He’s a griffon, he’s a Spectre, he’s noble, he’s feral. And everything he is can be summed up in those four traits.

He’s a griffon, to start. Half cat, half bird. All the casual arrogance of cats, all the flock behaviour of a bird, all the loyalty, all the insistence to guard. That’s what griffons do. They guard. And that’s his fundamental beginning: he’s a griffon, once you strip everything else away from him.

On top of that, he’s a Spectre. He’s casually cruel and vicious, very traumatized (how, I don’t know, he won’t tell me), he’s a strategist, he prioritizes his own survival but looks out for the others in his division, and he’s very very choosy about who he trusts to not hurt him, who he trusts he won’t hurt on purpose.

Then, his demon star, Nobility. This comes from the Age of Myth. He’s at ease with humans, can interact well with them, can slip around their social etiquette with grace, despite being nothing like them. He’s a little bit chivalrous, has honour enough, tries not to get too messy, actually does have a moral compass of sorts.

Lastly, he’s feral. Wild. Untethered and unforgiving and free. This is the opposite of his demon star, yes. But it is what he is, and he has no issues stripping free of his fancy clothes and running naked through the mud with nothing but fur to cover him and howling at the moon as he rips through prey with his teeth. 

Seems contrary, and indeed, he’s a very contrary person. The real joy in how those go together.

A griffon Spectre means he’ll guard his division. He doesn’t need to love them to have no option but to guard and protect them. He’s the leader of the flock, and he’ll do what needs doing. He’s cruel, he’s responsible, and he does what he needs to. This ties in well with Nobility, his star, because he has enough of a moral compass to know when he has to sacrifice someone, and how to feel bad about it, while his Spectreness allows him to not feel as bad about it as he could.

Naturally, most of the time, he’s noble, a bit fussy and imperious, likes his poetry as a way of speaking. But the more he’s hurt, the angrier he is, the more upset he is, that stripes away into his feral nature. His nobility is a mask and a shield for his true nature: simply a wild griffon, untethered by any rules and unforgiving to any that meet him. I’ll explore this part a bit further later on as this is the part of him that Alba really falls in love with, but this is where his personality begins to really shine. That duality between his noble, imperious nature and his honest, wild self.

He’s a hard as fuck character to write. But oh, I love the results. 

21. What other medium do you think your story would work well as? (film, webcomic, animated series?)

As answered previously, I Have No Fucking Idea But Probably Anime.

22. Do you reread your old works? How do you feel about them?

As also answered previously, yes, because I have no other choice if I want to see my damn rarepairs most of the time, and I enjoy doing so because I like most of my fics. 

23. What’s the story idea you’ve had in your head for the longest?

I answered last time as Rose’s story, but I checked my spreadsheet for what I’d forgotten and gold star me, I forgot about one I really do want to talk about: the TLC version of Seanan McGuire’s Every Heart a Doorway as a long fic! Harry Potter AUs are out. Wayward Children AUs are in as fuck.

What I know is that Aiolos and Aiolia run a school like Eleanor does. It may be located not far from Sagiverse’s Saint Shion’s University, probably Academia Terrestria. Most of the cast is TLC, Golds and Spectres mostly. It follows the adventures of one young Sasha, kicked out of her world by Hades himself after going mostly all the way through the plot of TLC itself, as she deals with coming back without her brother - a possibility she’d already made peace with - but with him still in Sanctum Greece, out and committing mass murder - the part she isn’t cool with.

She walks in during the first few chapters to meet Aiolia just as Minos - from a high Nonsense, high Wicked world where everything is the theatre and the rules make you think it’s Logic and it’s not - bolts across the room, swings a grappling hook around the chandelier, and scales the wall in the nick of time before Pandora throws her trident at him. They’re roommates. Pandora’s from Prism, Kade’s world, as the Goblin Princess so she is understandably wanting Minos dead here.

Sasha blinks, immediately goes on the defensive because hello, two Spectres, but neither know who the hell she is. Lia takes her with him as he negotiates getting Minos into the tower room with Albafica, from the Moors where he and his dad fend off vampires with a strain of woody rose poison they put into their blood, and then puts Sasha in with Pandora, who helps her figure out that just because she knows all of these faces and names doesn’t make them the same people. (This is after watching her freak out over Minos and Alba sharing a room, because she watched them kill each other.)

And then like two weeks later Alone shows up, immediately throws himself at the Dragon Prince Rhadamanthys, who is sixteen and doesn’t know how to handle a small child without a tail and shares the attic with Aiacos, who lived in a world of fire and brimstone and light and wind, moderate Virtue, moderate Logic. Sasha freaks out, Pandora sits on her, and it is discovered not that long later that Alone brought Hades with him.

I have no idea what the plot is past that point. I figure I’ll be asking Zander or another system how I should best write Alone and Hades, which is a standard possession that I want to be thinly-veiled multiplicity, because really those two things are the damn same from where I’m standing and that would be cool.

I’ll write it when I’ve got a plot. Gah.

24. Would you say your writing has changed over time?

Oh abso-goddamn-lutely. I finally figured out how to show and not tell so much, and how to vaguely fix my biggest problem that I had forever: expanding individual threads so I didn’t rush everything. Now that I’ve figured out how to do that, I’m pretty sure I could redline for another writer struggling with the same thing. One of the bits of advice someone said that really fixed my writing was the idea of one, ‘always name at least two sensory details in every paragraph’, and two, ‘for the next six months never write ‘they saw that’ ‘they felt like’ ‘they wanted to’ etc etc, and find a way to say that without saying that, take no shortcuts and never say it outright’. Once you understand why they’re telling you to do that, you can go do it again and avoid the purple prose, but it teaches you how to expand things.

Instead of just going ‘he was sad’, if you can’t say that, then what ends up happening is that you quietly restate he was sad by referencing it in his every action. Body language. Tone of voice. Show don’t tell is advice that works great with examples. Take out every ‘they were’ ‘they saw’ ‘they felt’ and you have no choice but to show it without telling it. And it makes your writing so much stronger.

Another thing I learned was that a Mary Sue isn’t a level one character, they’re a level twenty in a level-three-recommended story. Their backstory is their plotline. This one I learned from Betsy Lee, with No Evil versus Brother Swan- specifically, Ozma Angeline. Look at her child form. Now look at her adult. Her adult is the perfect idea of an edgy Mary Sue. But it’s clear the moment you see her child form, that her every adornment was gained after she first appeared. She wasn’t born that way. Every mark she has is a part of her story. I first met Angel in NE, and I got to know her. Then I saw her in BS and I was like “is that fucking Angel???” and suddenly everything made sense. That’s a well-written character. Sure, we see fuckall of her arc, but that’s when I finally understood how to write a powerful character without making them a Mary Sue. Because nothing stands in the way of a Mary Sue, they never struggle. You set the Mary Sue as their endgame, twenty years after the series ends, and you’re golden.

The last thing I really learned that helped me so much owes itself to Seanan McGuire, of course the Toby books. Specifically: Luna Torquill. This is where I learned that allies become enemies offscreen if they want to, and how to give your side characters a true arc without ever giving them the spotlight. Toby characters don’t feel like they’re just waiting for Toby herself to check in with them. They go do their own stuff when she’s not there, and actively get more development offscreen without ever feeling out of character. Luna is the most obvious example, but Sylvester, Antigone, Tybalt, and Cass all do it too. Actually, the only one who didn’t was Connor and he died and I didn’t like him anyway. Luna really showed me how to bring my side characters to life, and in that understanding helped me really get how to write a character arc.

25. What part of writing is the most fun?

Sneaking in metaphors and foreshadowing and recurring motifs and parallels, and doing so accidentally because I’m just that good. /lh No really, I love having parallels and shit in my writing that make me look smarter than I am, because most all of them are accidental and I only notice after someone points it out. I look like a genius. I’m bullshitting it the entire way. But when I do actively do it, and it works out, I like it even more. I love hiding little things that reinforce the storyline and atmosphere and add a deeper meaning to my work.

Like, for example. In Aeternum, specifically As We Watch The Hourglass, Tsuko pointed out that the state of the boiler room perfectly represents Minos’ mental state. She’s fine, she’s fixing things, and then outside circumstances causes her to fall apart and Alba just attempts to patch it up enough that it’s vaguely safe enough to work with, but still very very fragile and prone to collapsing at any second. Add in that she’s an engineer and this is her specialty and biggest talent, and it seems like a super cool parallel to do, especially since I really like reflecting my characters in the world around them.

It was completely accidental. I wanted to show that her sadism that canon Minos has is in there, that she isn’t totally OOC and just hasn’t yet become more like her canon form (he’s more traumatized and has gone down a path she’s only inching onto at the moment), but I also wanted them to get a damn bath so Alba could bitch about his hair, while showing that Minos is actually surprisingly useful. In order to do that, I needed the boiler room, I needed to show her fragility, and then I needed to show what was underneath that. And then I needed the threat gone so they could do other shit. In order to make that realistic, I forced her to not panic about it even though she really wanted to, and Alba did a shoddy job because we gave him like an hour and he’s running on little food and less sleep. That was it, that was my entire thought process. And on the page, there’s symbolism that makes me look smart.

When I go to rewrite Aeternum, I’ll be showing more of their early relationship, so she actually is useless onscreen for a bit, so the scene has more oomph when surprise, she has talents after all. (Later those talents will prove very important, but I haven’t written that part yet and won’t for a while.)

So yeah. Accidental symbolism. I love doing that shit.