#also agree with you we are here for fiction & fun- i really hope this doesn't come across as like pretentious or anything like that i swear | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

littleoddwriter · 3 months ago

Text

Character Analysis: Cooper Abbott (Trap, 2024)

Hello there and welcome to me being painfully autistic (this is meant as a lighthearted joke; but also... yeah)! In order to get it out of my system, I wrote an in-depth character analysis on Cooper Abbott (played by Josh Hartnett) in the movie Trap (written, produced and directed by M. Night Shyamalan). The analysis only focuses on specific points, because otherwise it'd be even longer and more convoluted than it already is. I will make separate posts about the other points I didn't have a chance to mention/analyse (like the relation of Lady Raven's songs to Cooper's emotional journey, technical aspects, acting choices, and pretty much entire scene analyses) eventually, though. This is by no means an "official" analysis, just something I wrote for fun because that's how my brain works and I really needed to get those thoughts out there. But if they spark a conversation, that'd make me very happy, too! Anyone who finds themselves reading this: I hope you enjoy my interpretations, and I'd love to hear your own thoughts if you wanted to share them! But always remember to be kind and respectful!

The points I covered in this analysis:

Surface level traits and facts about Cooper Abbott

Relationship with Riley (and Logan, by extent) In contrast: his wife Rachel

Motivations during the movie (escape, not getting caught, keeping his two lives separate and balanced) Also: motivations for killing (trauma)

Key Conflict + Epiphany: his love for his children and thus, the fear of getting caught

What does all this mean for Cooper as a character, and by extension, us, the viewer?

Disclaimer: In the section for his motivations for killing, I will be taking a look at the claim that he has OCD. I, myself, have OCD and am talking from personal experience and knowledge I gathered through subsequent research and therapy; but that doesn't mean I'm an expert or that you have to agree with my takes, just because I'm looking at it through a more personal lens. Speaking of, when I mention his trauma and abnormal psychology as cause for his murders, I by no means want to say that everyone like this is automatically prone to being a violent or dangerous person. That's not true whatsoever, please remember that. (Once again, I'm talking from experience here, as well.) This is merely an interpretation of a fictional character, who was written to be this way. Also, of course, take what I say with a grain of salt. This is just for fun and not meant to be on an academic level (hence the lack of sources because I was mostly talking from what I just know, and obviously the movie itself, such as interviews with Josh Hartnett and M. Night).

Anyway:

To start off, I want to talk about the most basic, certain facts about Cooper Abbott that we get throughout the movie. Who is he on the surface? How does he appear to others? What do we know about “the Butcher”?

On the surface, Cooper Abbott is a cisgender, white, middle-aged (estimated to be in his early forties) male of the middle class, who lives in the Philadelphian suburbs with his family, consisting of his wife Rachel, his young teenage daughter Riley, and his younger son Logan. Cooper is a firefighter, and most likely has been one for up to twenty years at that point, depending on when he started his training and if he went to college beforehand. He managed to create the ideal family life. He’s a very involved and good father, who deeply cares about his children’s wellbeing and happiness, and does anything he can to achieve that, like buying concert tickets to Lady Raven for Riley as a reward for her good grades, and coming along with her.

To others, he appears like the ideal husband and father, and regular citizen. He seems like a completely normal and functioning member of society with good values, a great family, and who works as a first responder in the fire department, which is a noble career to pursue. He generally presents as the perfect example of what the modern man of his status 'should' be. On top of that, he’s incredibly charming and easily makes people open up to him, want to keep him around, and reveal information to him that they wouldn’t (and shouldn’t) give up to other strangers like him. He appears like a friend; even when he’s just met the other person. He’s non-threatening and trustworthy, and also humble. He can be pushy, but backtracks enough with believable excuses and commonly used phrases to make the other person feel at ease and like he’s only a well-meaning person, clumsily and charmingly asking for help or information.

For example, when he asks Jamie about all the extra security at the venue, and later asks to come back to the storage room with him, where he swipes his keycard, all the while making friendly conversation and getting information he needs from Jamie that he shouldn’t even be able to get otherwise. But by letting Jamie witness his “good values” as a family by allowing the other girl to get the shirt first, so as to not start a fight, and telling him he works in the fire department, and helping him with the heavy box, he creates a bond of trust with the other man. In turn, Jamie willingly tells Cooper about the police and FBI presence, due to evidence that led them to believe a serial killer, the Butcher (Cooper), would be at the concert; and later, in the storage room, even going so far as to tell him his secret passcode for security, because Cooper is “on [their] side” by being a firefighter and evidently great father. Another example of that is how Cooper got Riley to be chosen to be the girl for “Dreamer Girl” to get on stage with Lady Raven and backstage later. To achieve that, Cooper talks to one of the spotter’s he sees around, humbly and a little clumsily telling him how grateful he and Riley are to be there, while revealing in a lie that she had just recovered from leukemia, and that all he wanted is for the Spotter to thank Lady Raven for them to put on such a great show and make Riley happy, after having felt “cursed” due to her sickness. All of that is an effective manipulation and a lie, which only Cooper knows, but clearly strikes a chord in the other man that leads to Riley being chosen without her ever finding out how or why.

Then, there is this side of Cooper that nobody knows is his. “The Butcher”, as the media refers to Cooper Abbott’s serial killing. According to the media, the Butcher had been actively pursued by the police and FBI for seven years at the time of the movie, and twelve victims had been found and linked to him, based on evidence. His victims, as far as we know, consist of people of various ages, genders, and ethnicities. The thing they apparently had in common was that they were all good, selfless people. A young father of a two-year old boy, taking care of his parents, while working as a teacher, and even being awarded as “most liked teacher”; and another young man, who is into sustainable agriculture. We are also told about a woman without further details, leading to the thought that his victims come from all backgrounds. The bodies were normally found out in the open, chopped into pieces with a meat cleaver, hence dubbing him “the Butcher”. In the psychological profile of the Butcher, it was determined that he possibly had maternal issues and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), which is supported by Cooper hallucinating his mother, and evidently having been punished and severely traumatised by her growing up, such as his extreme need for control in every way. His abnormal psychology becomes more and more evident throughout the movie and will be discussed further down.

Now that the more basic facts are out of the way, I’d like to focus on the two key relationships we witness in the film. His relationship with his daughter Riley, and by extension his son Logan. And in contrast, his relationship with his wife Rachel.

The film starts with showing the audience what a great and secure relationship Cooper and Riley have as father and daughter. He lets her happily, and loudly, play her music in the car while singing along, albeit off-key, and encourages her. He calms her down when she’s stressed about being late to the concert, explains to her to not trust random sellers in front of the venue, and continuously tries to cheer her up and get her excited when she starts getting into her own head about things, and succeeds. We are also shown that he cares about her wellbeing beyond the present moment and that they have a trusting bond where they can talk about anything with each other, which is made evident when Riley opens up about her being left out and possibly picked on by girls at school. Cooper shows her compassion and understanding for her situation and feelings about it, and follows that up by making her laugh again and distracting her from it. As well as being emotionally close, Cooper is also physically affectionate toward Riley by often keeping a hand on her upper back or shoulder, and around her head, such as embracing her, and kissing the top of her head on several occasions, all of which she’s happy to receive and reciprocate, and sometimes even initiates herself, making it a mutually close and loving bond they share.

Throughout the movie, we often witness him showing interest in anything that concerns Riley, be that the slang words she uses, her wanting a tour shirt, and most importantly, her hoping to be picked for “Dreamer Girl”. And, of course, while the latter is merely a way for Cooper to find an escape when he feels cornered, by having been shown all of the previous interactions between them, it’s safe to say that he’d at least shown interest and hope for her to be chosen, regardless of his own predicament. Something that’s also mentioned a lot is Riley’s good grades and the concert being a reward for them, which shows that it’s important in their family to work for what they receive, and that said work will always be appreciated and celebrated, which is also later shown with the whole family eating a pie Rachel baked for the occasion. Generally, Cooper is constantly shown to be incredibly involved in his children’s lives and to care deeply about them and their entire being, such as raising them to be confident and independent people with good values.

In addition to how he is with Logan, it can be interpreted that it’s not much different from how he is with Riley, except maybe appropriate for his younger age. Around the house, we can see drawings done by the kids and family photos that underline this. And when they all sit together around the coffee table to eat the pie, Logan is seated at Cooper’s side with his dad’s arm around him, signifying an emotionally and physically close relationship between them, as well. In the end, when Cooper confronts Rachel and confesses how enraged he is, directing those feelings toward her, it amazes him that he’s only angry because he won’t get to see his children again, once more conveying to the audience how important the kids are to Cooper, and how close their relationship actually is. Even if that, to him, is a huge revelation, which will be explored further down.

In contrast, Cooper’s relationship with his wife Rachel looks a little different. While on the photos around the house, they look happy and close to one another; especially on a photo that was taken at their wedding, there is a clear shift away from that when we see them interact once Cooper and Riley arrive at home, along with Lady Raven. Rachel seems reserved and keeps her distance from Cooper. As we later find out, that might have very well been because her suspicions that he’s the Butcher were more or less confirmed when he returned home with Lady Raven, and had Riley tell her that ��dad’s acting strange”. Lady Raven does, indeed, confirm it a few minutes later and tells her that “Cooper is the Butcher”.

The movie’s finale takes place at their home again, after Cooper managed to flee from the police and FBI multiple times, having to let go of Lady Raven for that. There, he sits down with Rachel and discusses with her that he figured out how the authorities even got wind of him being at the concert because he knew it couldn’t have been his own mistake, as he’s too meticulous about that, in order to keep his two lives separate. Rachel admits to following Cooper to one of his safe houses, planting a torn piece of the receipt for the concert ticket, and then leaving an anonymous tip for the police that the house might belong to the Butcher. She says she did it to either get them closer to Cooper or prove her wrong of her suspicions, as it dawned on her over time that perhaps he was this wanted serial killer she kept seeing on the news, because he was often away at night, brought home jewellery that he made up lies about where he got the items from, and smelled of cleaning fluid used at hospitals, rather than the one he would use at the fire department.

Throughout the entire conversation, it is evident that Rachel, while terrified, is also grieving. She just lost her husband and the picture perfect family life she had built with him over the years, and is now confronted with the thought that it had all been nothing but a lie for him. Cooper, on the other hand, doesn’t display such feelings at all. He doesn’t appear remorseful of using her this way, nor does he seem to grief what they had now that he knows it’s all gone because he’d been caught. Instead, he is angry, feeling betrayed, and perhaps even hating her for ruining everything for them all. After all, if it hadn’t been for her, nobody would have ever known about his presence at the concert, and none of the things that transpired would have happened at all. But as mentioned above, his anger is directed toward her for the fact that he’ll never see Riley and Logan again, not because he’d been caught or lost his wife along with his children. In fact, he planned on committing murder-suicide with her as revenge and to keep himself out of prison. All of these things point toward Rachel having never been more than a tool to Cooper to keep appearances as a normal citizen without a sinister side to him. He seemed to have never loved her at all; although, perhaps that was true at the beginning of their relationship for a little while. Even so, his love would have been different to what other people would feel, and it is also revealed that he seems to have never felt strongly before, which further supports that he was never actually in love with Rachel.

Since Cooper is the protagonist of the film, we follow him throughout, only ever experiencing anything from his perspective. And that brings me to my next point: his motivations.

The first aspect of this is pretty straightforward. The entire movie is about Cooper Abbott trying not to get caught by the authorities, thus escaping the concert without being detected, and also without ruining it for his daughter. He becomes increasingly desperate to achieve his goals and keep the balanced life he had worked so hard to build, but finds a dead end at every turn he makes, until the second half of the movie. He’s motivated by his need to keep Riley happy and in the dark, while wanting to stay completely undetected and get out of the venue. He can’t let the authorities even see him as a potential suspect, which is exactly why, after several failed attempts to escape, and managing to get backstage, but being faced with the threat of a police inspection, Cooper asks Lady Raven for a private talk, once more playing the card of Riley’s made-up leukemia recovery. Once he’s alone with Lady Raven, he works himself up to revealing his identity as the Butcher to her, showing her his current victim - Spencer, who is captured in a basement - and explaining to her that he can easily kill Spencer with carbon monoxide poisoning by releasing it from a small box in the basement with one push of a button on his phone. Thus, he effectively pressures Lady Raven into helping him and Riley out of the entire venue without going through the police inspections first, as they’ll ride with her in the limousine.

His motivation, after having been outed as the Butcher, is not to escape, necessarily, but to kill Lady Raven, his wife, and himself, putting an end to everything, now that he has no leverage anymore with Lady Raven having managed to have Spencer rescued, and the police and FBI knowing who he is, there’s no escape for him.

This brings me to his motivation for killing. We know, on a surface level, that he’d been actively searched for his murders for seven years, and that twelve victims have been linked back to him, due to similar modus operandi and location (presumably, since we don’t know about other evidence linking the murders to one killer). We also learn how he chooses his victims when he tells Lady Raven that he felt “the urge” once he saw her behind the curtain at the concert, and explains to her that it’s almost an odd experience for him to feel that way, but that he thinks it’s when he “see[s] someone who thinks they’re whole”, which “can never be true” because “everyone’s in pieces”. This also explains what his victims had in common by being people too good to be true, so to speak. They were seemingly selfless, genuinely good and caring people that might have felt fulfilled with their role in life.

Later, we also find that Cooper is described as “profoundly different” by the FBI profiler, Dr. Grant, and that he’s never felt any deep emotions before or could build real connections to people, according to what Cooper implied about himself, at least. Thus, supporting the thought that when Cooper says, “everyone’s in pieces”, he’s mostly talking about himself and expecting everyone else to be the same way, because all his life he’d been taught that he’s missing something by not being like the majority of people. That leads to the connection to his mother in his motivation for killing.

Throughout the movie, we’re shown that Cooper hallucinates his mother as an elderly woman, implying that her memory is haunting him. With her being shown as an old lady, it could also be interpreted that she died of old age and that the image in Cooper’s mind is what she looked like when Cooper last saw her before her passing. This conclusion is mostly reached by the fact that, as far as we know, the murders only began seven years prior to the movie’s events, and it is often said that there are specific moments in somebody’s life that could trigger such things as killing. Supporting this is the fact that we’re told that Cooper had often been punished in his youth, presumably by his mother, whose love and approval he always longed for, which might have kept him somewhat grounded for most of his life. And thus, her death could have possibly triggered him to give into his urges because there’s no more love and approval to anticipate from his mother. We get a glimpse of that when Lady Raven attempts to deter Cooper from hurting her inside the car, as she pretends to talk to him in a way that his mother might have by speaking in a harsher tone and threatening punishment if he didn’t stop; but then she turns it around and attempts a level of empathy by calling him a “good boy” and saying that “[he] can choose to be good”. He doesn’t fall for it, knowing that she’s trying to get under his skin with things that the FBI had told her about him; but there is some truth in it.

This is especially implied when, at the end of the movie, Cooper is drugged with his own tranquillising powder and hallucinates his mother talking to him; although, as we find out, it’s actually Dr. Grant posing as his mother. She gets through to him by telling him that she’s proud of him for finally feeling such anger, and “not all of [him] is a monster”, and that “it’s good [he’s] stopping the monster”. This scene is also when he reveals that he “thought [he] was pretending, but [he] wasn’t” about his love for his children. So, his motivation for killing would be the trauma of having been constantly punished by his mother for being different and perhaps unruly, when all he ever wanted was her love and approval, only to never receive any; thus, resenting anyone that seemed to have it all together and needing to take it away from them by killing them. This is also represented in his crime scenes, where his victims are found chopped into pieces and scattered all over the location they’re found in, relating back to his comment that “everyone’s in pieces”.

Something that should be mentioned here is that it is mentioned in the movie that the Butcher might suffer from obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) by Lady Raven as she more or less parrots information she gathered from the FBI to subtly alert Cooper’s family to his true being, while pushing Cooper into revealing himself with those pointed remarks.

Throughout the movie, there are small moments that indicate that Cooper, indeed, suffers from OCD, which mostly presents as an extreme need for control. For example, we see him neatly fold his napkins at the stadium, fixing the towels at home, despite more pressing issues at hand, such as checking on his captive victim via camera, while he's at the concert, and often repeating that “[he’s] in control”, and only revealing his true feelings about his situation when he feels said control slip through his fingers. Only in such moments does his mask break, showing parts of his true self, until he doesn’t hide it anymore once it is out in the open anyway. His OCD is not a motivation for his killings, but it is evidently a component of his abnormal psychology that might have played into his mother’s abuse and his subsequent trauma and response; although he could have also developed his OCD as a result of his traumatic childhood.

In addition, the possibility that he has OCD at all is pretty likely due to aforementioned examples, but also how he finds comfort in planning the captivities and murders, just as much as the killing itself, as he confessed to Rachel. The obsessions and resulting compulsions in people with OCD are often linked back to a need for control and comfort, no matter the nature of the thoughts and urges. Obsessing over particular things is normally the distressing part and the compulsion is then something to soothe oneself and momentarily get rid of the obsessive thoughts and fears, thus finding comfort in them; even if the compulsions end up harmful to oneself or others in some way. On top of that, when Cooper feels himself losing the control he had over the situation with Lady Raven and his family, he can’t hold back his immediate reaction of distress and anger by banging on the closed bathroom door and not letting up; eventually going so far as yelling, “open the goddamn door”, uncaring of his children witnessing him in a state such as this, which should be extremely unusual for him. Everything is lost to him in that moment, and he’s caught up in the desperate need to gain back control, that his reaction is disproportionately intense, in comparison to his usual lack of emotional participation in what is happening around him or to him. When a person’s compulsive need for something cannot be fulfilled once triggered, it can lead to such great distress as was displayed with Cooper when Lady Raven was hiding in the bathroom with his phone, therefore creating more credibility to the claim that the Butcher/Cooper Abbott has OCD.

I’ve mentioned Cooper’s relationship with his children and his realisation that he’s capable of deeper feelings and connections a few times already, and now I’d like to take a closer look at that revelation and the conflict it created for Cooper throughout the entire film.

As stated above, Cooper’s youth consisted of being punished by his mother, not receiving the love, care and approval he needed and longed for, which later translated to a trauma response that led him to commit murders. Among all of that, there’s also that he never got a chance to develop normally as a child, which could very well be the reason for his lack of deep emotions and empathy, none of which he ever received or learned to have.

It can also be thought that because of how Cooper’s mother saw him and clearly conveyed this image to him, he had a distorted sense of who he was, fitting himself into the box he was forced into by his mother as a child and never finding a way out of it. Technically, once he grew up and made a life for himself, he could have realised that she wasn’t right about him; but instead, he was stuck in this specific image that he was convinced of and now believed to be entirely true about himself. This image that he was a monster, that he was incapable of love and real, deep connections to other people, and genuine feelings in general. All of it went so far that he had convinced himself that his fatherhood was nothing but a performance to keep cover. This entire time, he believed that when he showed love, care, and interest in his children and their lives, it was only pretense. It’s only during the movie’s events, when he’s confronted with the threat of losing his children to being found out as the Butcher, that he realises just how important they truly are to him, that it’s not all about having a cover, and that he genuinely feels affection for his kids.

This revelation, as amazing as it is for him at the end when everything is lost for him anyway, is also what creates the biggest conflict for him throughout the movie. Instead of just finding a way to escape undetected, no matter what or how, he constantly has to look out for Riley as well, make sure he doesn’t ruin the concert for her and drag her into this. And he has to stay close to her, which means that he can’t leave for long periods of time to figure a way out; even though he tries and eventually runs out of excuses and opportunities as Riley grows more concerned and therefore aware of his strange behaviour. In the end, he does manage to combine both interests by getting Riley to be chosen for “Dreamer Girl”, but it comes with unforeseen consequences when Lady Raven joins them at their home, and the movie’s finale takes place with Cooper being found out and having to escape custody several times.

To Rachel, he admits that his rage is “unfamiliar” to him, as he “never felt this before” and it makes him “feel out of control”; but the reason for it is “amazing” to him because it’s caused by the knowledge that he won’t see Riley and Logan grow up. And when Dr. Grant later poses as Cooper’s mother and tells him that she’s proud of him for feeling such anger, he also says, with pleasant surprise in his voice, “I thought I was pretending, but I wasn’t”, which implies that his lack of emotional involvement has been part of his conflict with his mother all his life, and that it’s reason for him to have believed that he was incapable of such; even when he clearly cared about his children. It never registered to him, until that specific night, that maybe his mother, and by extension Cooper himself, was wrong about him.

What does all of this mean for Cooper Abbott as a character, though?

For one, he’s incredibly complex. There are many different layers to him that can be explored at length, and I still have only scratched the surface here. There’s this side of him that only he knows about, the Butcher, but also his childhood, which he probably never revealed to anyone before. At the same time, he’s a picture perfect family man, a firefighter, an unassuming citizen, and deep down, a hurt child that never had a chance to heal. And with that comes the fact that his complexity is merely part of being human; especially a grown adult with forty-plus years of experience. His character is an interesting one to take a closer look at because he poses questions that humans are naturally curious about and want answers to, but are also afraid of truly exploring those darker corners in depth. Cooper allows us to go there because he’s fictional and there’s no real harm done when looking into his murders, for example.

Cooper, at his core, is like an amalgamation of those serial killers whose names we all know, and who are usually described in ways that we witnessed Cooper to be in the movie; and that presents a challenge to the audience. We’re faced with a protagonist, who is a murderer, and a good father, and a traumatised child at heart; and we want him to get away, until we catch ourselves wanting that and remembering who he truly is. But is that all true? Is he truly only a monster? I think that, specifically, is what makes Cooper Abbott as a character so intriguing. He challenges our perception of murderers being those monsters, through and through; especially when we witness him being a great father. It forces us to look into that and wonder how that might relate back to our reality.

To wrap this up, what I think it means for Cooper as a character is that he’s human just like everyone else, uncomfortably so. He’s an exploration of the darkest shades a human has, but also shows the brightest lights we have to offer when it comes to human interaction; especially family. And it’s uncomfortable to witness how the dark and the light can go hand-in-hand like this, possibly without anyone else ever knowing.

#cooper abbott #cooper adams #trap 2024 #character analysis #whew this got... long. and maybe a little convoluted lol i tried so hard to be concise; and only focus on specific things #this is also very much an invitation to talk to me about Cooper pretty please hfdkjshfkdjfh #been writing this for a few days lmfao and i still have sooo much i wanna talk about...#i could do an analysis of every single scene of his + the music and technical aspects as mentioned above #and i might do some of that at least

12 notes · View notes

rawliverandgoronspice · 1 year ago

Note

Actually, sorry, I still don't see why TOTK is imperialistic. The imperialistic one does seem to be Ganon in his greed to conquer. I'm not saying I doubt your argumentsz just... Could you help me understand that?

Hey, yes! No problem at all. If that's okay with you, I'll compile my arguments in a series of links where I reply to previous asks.

Again, I want to reiterate that I don't think what we see in-game is secretely an imperialistic story about Rauru being a bad guy. We can speculate all we want, but there is no evidence in-world for Ganondorf to be anything other than a horrible baddie. My point is not that Ganondorf is secretely misunderstood in TotK, but that I believe Nintendo should have constructed its storytelling in a way that avoided falling into very loaded narrative patterns with real-life imperialistic echoes, and I am criticizing that they didn't try to deliver a version of Hyrule that gracefully accepted its own history, its influence over the world and its inherent moral grayness, instead of nervously scrubbing itself of substance out of fear of its own legacy.

This is the big one, that addresses the game's framing and why I think TotK's version of Hyrule parallels imperialist narrative movements.

This one talks about my problem with Rauru's character writing and what doesn't land for me.

This one is about why I don't think Nintendo is cackling about that good imperialist story they did, that it was probably accidental but still worth mentioning.

And this one, which I assume is the previous ask you sent me, adresses why I think saying that the zonais (and Sonia) are also PoC-coded kind of misses the point in my opinion.

Hope this clarifies my argument! I feel like, as the conversation matures in the fandom, this specific position (not talking for anyone else but me here) is getting kind of warped into something that it's not, or being conflated with the way people are creatively invested in the characters, which, while I certainly won't deny one obviously feeds off the other as far as I'm concerned*, are two separate things.

Again, it's completely fine to disagree! Or to agree and not be put off (everyone stop feeling guilty over the rare joy we manage to catch mid-flight --we can critique media without demanding people to Feel Bad as a result of the conclusions): it's a really fun game and I did play over a hundred hours! But I think the conversation is at least worth considering in a way that isn't caricatured as its weaker arguements.

*(to be very transparent so my own position is crystal clear, and it helps people making up their own mind: Ganondorf touches me as a character because of the way he inherently tries to fight against the limitations Hyrule/The Goddesses/the fiction itself try to force upon him --to devastating and unproductive results-- so the more his own canon tries to flatten him and the more poignant his character becomes to me. Won't deny that! It's this exact realization that made me spiral into hyperfocus to begin with --I am deeply touched by themes of tragic ambition and the impossibility of meaningful rebellion while STILL willingly burning everything down for the sake of refusing your place in the universe, even when the only thing accomplished by the end was the unflinching expression of your agency as well as General Suffering. So of course he would just catch me by the throat like that, that bastard. That being said, I don't think TotK Ganondorf (or any Ganondorf tbh) is a poor little meow meow, especially not in this game's canon where he is *obviously* nothing more than a threat to be stumped and doesn't ever meaningfully oppose you ideologically, which is kind of my problem. Even OoT Ganondorf, simplistic as he may be, questions Hyrule's inherent stability, inevitability and glory in many, many ways. Here's another, final post about why I liked the gerudos better in OoT despite All of The Problems, that partially addresses this exact point!)

#asks #thoughts #totk #totk critical #totk spoilers #ganondorf #rauru #when will my brain return from the imprisoning war....#thanks for the ask!#it actually allowed me to rassemble my points in a more digestible way so it's pretty neat #I feel like I forgot a couple of posts so maybe I'll add stuff back later #again while I think I'm right because I mean... I wouldn't invest that much typewriting in the whole thing otherwise #I'm completely fine with counterpoints and cordial disagreements #(as long as the counterpoints are not like huge mischaracterizations or understand that... I'm talking about the narrative framing)#(not the reality of Hyrule itself)#(I don't care about Hyrule itself it's not real!!!)#((I mean I care deeply but you understand me))

98 notes · View notes

suzannahnatters · 2 years ago

Text

Trope Talk #1: Enemies to Lovers: A Deeper Dive

Reports of my death have been exaggerated, but not greatly. While I was in bed for a week lately, roleplaying a Victorian invalid, I watched a YouTube doing a deep dive on the enemies to lovers trope. While it was really fun seeing her break down subtropes (hate to love, rivals to lovers, reluctant allies, villain romance, and more - all of which I adore), I found myself somewhat disappointed by her attempt to discuss the deeper issues surrounding the trope. Like, yes: a lot of people enjoy things in fiction that they would not enjoy IRL and mature readers CAN distinguish between fantasy and reality...but also the media we consume DOES shape us, not all readers ARE as mature as we'd like to think, and while this trope can be executed in a way that's not problematic, it can also be executed in a way that is. Even if we wouldn't all personally draw the line between toxic and healthy in precisely the same place, I think that line does objectively exist. So, here are some of the ways I've subjectively drawn that line in my personal writing and reading when it comes to this trope...

SOME WAYS OF DOING ETL RIGHT

1. Not everyone is going to agree as to what's healthy and what's not, and it's important to listen to others.

Some are going to be mad at me for loving this trope at all, and some are going to be mad at me for thinking that one still needs to exercise judgement and that not everything goes, but hear me out. As a writer, the harder you go with this trope, the more divided your audience will be. Given that we all tend to draw the lines in different places, I think that listening to each other and discussing the reasons behind our own preferences and choices is going to help all of us understand the stakes, avoid hurting or triggering readers who have trauma from toxic relationships, and extend grace to storytellers who don't make the same decisions we would. And we shouldn't be defensive that this is necessary. ETL is actually a fairly new and under-explored trope, which I think is part of why it can be so divisive, especially in a post-#MeToo landscape where a lot of us are starting to rethink the controlling men and helpless women in pairings we've been conditioned to see as romantic. Meanwhile, as an author with a deep love for this trope, I hope that posts like this will help more cautious readers to understand that writing about dark and spiky relationships doesn't necessarily mean romanticising abusive behaviour. Either way, I've benefited from listening in humility and I truly think my stories are better for it.

2. Remember that evil is not misunderstood.

If you'll be writing ETL, then you need to decide early on if the love interest is evil or just misunderstood, and be careful to write him accordingly and be honest about it. If the love interest literally goes around killing innocent people, deal with that. That's evil, that's not (just) a traumatic childhood. On the other hand, if the love interest is antagonistic because of a misunderstanding, but is a fundamentally decent person deep down, he probably wouldn't casually slap the heroine around or otherwise act like a jerk. One mistake I used to see a lot of writers making (less often these days) is trying to convince me that some loathsome jerk is just misunderstood. No, if he's been doing bad things, don't try to explain his guilt away. Confront it head on.

THE LAST JEDI was my gateway drug to ETL precisely because I'd never seen this trope done so beautifully and so uncompromisingly: when Rey is forced to face the fact that the boy she likes is unrepentantly evil, she refuses to join him, explodes him and gets out of there. Ben isn't ready to seek repentance yet; he's a proud, if wavering, villain. Because the movie was absolutely honest about the evil within Ben, I was able to genuinely hope Rey might confront that evil and exorcise it, instead of being gaslit into thinking it was all right.

By contrast, in the very Bluebeard-vibes kdrama MASK, the love interest believes he's responsible for the death of his late fiancee and is being manipulated by the villain into thinking he's criminally insane. As a result, he believes that he's going to kill the heroine, his new wife. Physical touch and dirt are both triggers for him, too, and what the audience sees as a trauma response comes across to the heroine as strong hostility. He tells the heroine he is going to kill her, and she believes him, but the truth is that he dreads it as much as she does. This is a really beautifully done form of misunderstanding. Just remember that to be believable, misunderstandings need to be resolved fairly quickly.

3. Enemies doesn't need to mean hatred or toxicity.

While hate to love is a valid subtrope - especially in contexts where the characters aren't literally trying to kill each other, like in a contemporary romcom - ETL does NOT need to involve toxicity. There's a difference between ordering the assassination of an enemy, versus strangling your wife to terrorise her into obedience; both are bad, but only the latter is classic domestic violence, which casts doubt on any "HEA". Enemies need not hate or even abuse each other to be at odds; they may feel deep personal respect for a worthy opponent, who just happens to be ideologically committed to an opposing cause and therefore duty bound to antagonise the other. Personally, these characters may like, respect, or even passionately love each other - but thanks to duty, they're obliged to thwart each other.

A favourite example of this is Nikita and Michael from the spy show NIKITA. The pair started out as master and pupil before becoming coworkers for a rogue government agency, Division. Now Nikita has gone rogue herself and is working to bring down Division. She knows that Michael is still hanging in there for several reasons - he still believes Division serves his country, he's been skilfully manipulated by the head of the agency, and above all he feels the need to protect Division's young agents who are increasingly exploited by them. Nikita still has respect for Michael because of all these things and because he's the man who trained her to be as awesome as she is - and because she's his best student, Michael returns the sentiment and still goes out of his way to protect her, even as he's trying to hunt her down. Midway through the season, Nikita tries to protect Michael by preventing him from taking out the man who once killed his family - at which point Michael's view of Nikita sours. But she never stops respecting him and he's still willing to work with her when necessary to protect his agents. Throw in some mad chemistry and you've got the ingredients for a perfect ETL situation - although it has some hostility from Michael's side, it's never without that solid core of care and respect for each other. This is what makes the romance work, of course; all romances need a good reason for the character to care about each other.

4. Remember that ETL is a fundamentally transformative relationship.

This builds on my first point. In ETL, unless there's a valid misunderstanding at play, there are probably moral/ethical differences between the characters. Thus, a huge part of your romance needs to be about resolving those differences, usually for the better. In other words (unless you're really into a corruption arc for the protagonist), the villainous/antagonistic character needs to genuinely repent and change, and we need that change to be demonstrated convincingly in story. At this stage, then, a good ETL story becomes about character growth, which means that it cannot be rushed. If the love interest has genuinely been evil, then he needs to change and prove it.

LOVE BETWEEN FAIRY AND DEVIL is a great example of a transformative ETL story. At the beginning of the drama, Dongfang Qingcang is a terrifying evil overlord who has frozen his emotions, killed his own father to rise to power, mastered hellfire magic and terrorised the three realms. As the story unfolds we do learn that there are some misunderstandings: Dongfang's father is the one who destroyed his emotions and forced him as a child to kill him, as well as instilling in him the fear that his people will be destroyed unless he conquers their enemies. But, this doesn't make Dongfang's villainy okay. Even after his emotions have been reawoken by our adorable heroine he still needs to realise that invading her homeland is not the right way to say thank you. By the end of the story we see that Dongfang is indeed a changed overlord. It takes a while, but it is believable.

5. Related, the characters should be a match for each other, especially when it comes to power and to morals.

I think a lot of the objections to ETL and villain romance pairings come from a perceived mismatch between the two characters: a weak person with a stronger person, or a pure and good person with a despicable manipulative blackguard. I think that it's always a good idea to balance this out. If your story begins with the love interest kidnapping your heroine to be his queen, why not let your heroine run a coup and replace him on the throne - right when he least expects it? The fact that your heroine is willing to get her hands dirty when it comes to this antagonist is not just delicious drama - it's also evidence that the two of them have more in common than they might think, and that in a longterm relationship she won't have any problems standing up to him. Alternately, if your heroine is going to remain pure and good throughout, she should probably be a match for the villain in terms of power, however that is measured in your story (and it can be a totally different sort of power than the villain wields). One of the most delicious things when watching any villain fall in love is finding the one woman whom he's absolutely helpless before.

I think Holly Black did this really well in the FOLK OF THE AIR trilogy. At first, Jude is a powerless mortal in the deadly fae court, and Cardan is the fae prince who delights in tormenting her. Jude proves herself far more cunning and ruthless than Cardan as she maneuvers the two of them into power as reluctant allies. It's clear that what Jude lacks in magic she makes up for in sharp intelligence and will to survive, and her ability to find a happy ending hinges on her ability to let down her guard and be vulnerable to Cardan. On the other end of the scale, Beauty and the Beast in most of its incarnations is about two kind people who want different things for sympathetic reasons, so that even though Beauty is held captive by the Beast we can understand the Beast's desperation to break his curse (and the Disney animated classic makes his motivations even more sympathetic by imposing a rapidly narrowing window of opportunity in which to do so). The Beast is truly gentle, and Belle is just spirited enough to snap back at him when he snaps at her. Both these stories work because the lovers are fundamentally a match.

6. Be creative.

There are all sorts of ways to create that delicious see-saw between "I adore you" and "I am going to kill you". The kdrama THE MASK, as mentioned above, uses the hero's mental health in an incredibly respectful way to create a sense of antagonism. The kdrama FLOWER OF EVIL does something similar. In Megan Spooner's absolutely incendiary SHERWOOD, there's a scene where the love interest goes from nearly killing the protagonist to tenderly embracing and caring for her within the very same chapter. Normally this would be the red flag to end all red flags, but it doesn't work that way here. How did Spooner manage it? Simple. The love interest doesn't know that the outlaw Robin Hood, whom he's trying to capture, is actually the same person as Maid Marian, the fair lady he's in love with - and when a quick costume change takes our heroine from one persona to another, the love interest's behaviour changes too. The emotional rollercoaster is real - but only for her.

7. There doesn't need to be a HEA.

I know, a lot of you are going to be up in arms about this, but it's true. Sometimes, especially in a straight up villain romance, the villain shouldn't get the girl. Maybe that's because she wants someone else, maybe it's because he's too manipulative and evil to be convincing as a long term relationship. But, let me frame it like this: why limit yourself just to writing the viable romances? There's a lot of good fun that can be got out of unviable romances too. You may not feel comfortable settling down with the villain, but that doesn't mean he can't be kissed :3

For example, in THE RINGS OF POWER the showrunners did something I never expected and gave Sauron himself a little crush on his greatest nemesis, Galadriel. The final episode, as he revealed his true identity and did his level best to manipulate her into joining him to rule Middle Earth, put joy into the souls of fangirls everywhere. It also caused a whole lot of people to clutch their pearls for some reason which remains opaque to me. After all, Tolkien was the man who wrote Eol, Maeglin, Wormtongue, and that moment when Morgoth himself was perving on Luthien Tinuviel. That aside, this is never going to be a viable match. Galadriel is married and hates Sauron's guts and Sauron is still a manipulative snake whose plans for healing Middle Earth involve him ruling as its lord and master, hopefully with Galadriel at his side. Galadriel doesn't fall for it for a second, which is one of the very things that makes this kind of story so incredibly satisfying to me. The fact that she won't succumb to his manipulation and temptation is incredibly empowering. As in THE LAST JEDI, the ball is in Sauron's court as to whether he changes to deserve her. And of course he won't - not just because he goes on to become the Lord of the Rings of Barad-dûr but more importantly because he never loved Galadriel for who she is but because of the way she made him feel, powerful and purposeful.

Not all villain romances need to end this way, of course, because some villains are capable of change. I think this is what makes Reylo viable where Haladriel is not. While Sauron and Galadriel each appeal to the EVIL in each other, Rey appeals to the good in Ben; he meanwhile desires the Light in her. This is why her refusal does ultimately prompt him to change, although of course the story's resolution was massively bungled in THE RISE OF SKYWALKER.

8. Love should be what the villain needs - but not what he wants.

It's hard to make absolute rules when it comes to any artistic choice, but this is probably the closest I come when dealing with this trope: because there should be consequences for the love interest's misdeeds, especially when it comes to the heroine. I call this the POTO rule: if the love interest wants the heroine romantically or sexually abuses her, he should not be rewarded by getting her. Enemies to lovers may fight over anything by any means, but not over romantic or sexual possession of each other. If the villain becomes a villain in order to possess the heroine, then a HEA for them involves giving him exactly what he wanted and thereby justifying his bad behaviour. Mind you, this doesn't mean the love interest can never want the heroine on some level; if he did not then this would not be a romance. We're talking about his most fundamental motivation and his most important story goal. She should not be either of them; she should be a distraction, an impediment to them.

This is simply good writing sense. Enemies to lovers normally implies a positive change arc for the love interest. Every good positive change arc involves a character who Wants one thing, say, to rule the world; but Needs something totally different - the capacity to make peace through compassion, say. Such characters may or may not get what they Want, depending on how good it is for them and the people around them, but they'll always get what they Need. This is why I think ETL works best when the heroine herself is the thing the antagonist doesn't know he Needs. As an enemy, and even more so if he's a villain, he's likely to be unscrupulous in getting what he Wants, and he shouldn't get her for the same reasons that characters often don't get what they Want. Think about it: the villain probably needs some hard consequences for what he's done. He can get them, *and also get the girl*, but only as long as the girl isn't the motivation for his crimes.

{How does this fit with the "stolen bride" genre of story, usually a fairytale? Do I disapprove of those on principle? Mm, no. If the bride was stolen primarily because the kidnapper claimed to have a romantic or sexual attraction to her, I might object. But there's usually some other motivation. He wants to break a curse; he wants to annex her kingdom; he wants to keep her out of his enemies' hands; he might have been ordered to marry her by someone he dares not cross, or bound by an ancient custom; in any case he ought not to be personally motivated to control or possess her. This is one of those grey areas where lines blur and it's wise to listen and be careful because so many real women have been trapped in marriages to real live villains; but the thing is very doable under the right circumstances.}

I call this the POTO rule because it was inspired by THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA. In this story, Erik is obsessed with Christine to the point where romantic and sexual possession of her drives everything he does. He kills, manipulates, and gaslights everyone at the Paris Opera in an attempt to win Christine's heart, and ultimately he's willing to threaten to kill the man Christine truly loves in order to get the thing he Wants: Christine's hand in marriage. Now, I know a lot of you ship this pairing and I'm not going to scold you for it; maybe you ship them the way I ship Haladriel, loving the relationship without thinking it should end in a HEA, or perhaps you think Christine can fix Erik through some genuinely transformative plotline, or maybe you just want Erik to get what he wants even though it's messed up, and whatever it is I hope you have fun with it. But personally, from the perspective of a published author with a sense of responsibility to my readers, I really think the story ended in the best possible way. Erik doesn't get what he Wants (Christine) but he does get what he Needs (a transformative moment of transcendent compassion that enables him to act in a truly loving manner, by letting Christine go).

So, most of the time, I think it's wisest if the heroine is what the love interest doesn't know he Needs. Again, LOVE BETWEEN FAIRY AND DEVIL does this SO well. Dongfang Qingcang doesn't have time for love - emotionless and too busy Evil Overlording, he's never been in love before. So, when he's saddled with an adorable, dimwitted flower fairy, he can't wait to break the spell that links them together so that he can kill her and get on with his villainous plans. When her emotions begin to infect him, he can't help falling in love with her, even though he fights it every single step of the way. She's absolutely not what he Wants, but she is everything he Needs to thaw his frozen heart and teach him to act with compassion and empathy. Even though he spends much of the series planning to kill her, the HEA doesn't strike me as being Problematique the way that an Erik/Christine HEA would be - because a HEA with Orchid represents the moral growth that Dongfang needs, rather than the selfish desire he wants.

9. Maybe the villain's HEA is with someone else.

This doesn't mean a villain is irredeemable or shouldn't get a HEA. It just might mean that his HEA is with someone else. (Unless he's actually a rapist. Then just light the man on fire.) Erik shouldn't get Christine because he's done so much evil in order to possess her. But, once she's broken through to him to show him compassion, he might be ready to learn to love and to make amends for his past crimes...perhaps with someone else.

This was a huge part of the inspiration for the character of Vasily in my Bête Epoque stories. He does something which traumatises the heroine so much, there's no realistic HEA for them. Like Christine, she forgives him anyway, even in the midst of betrayal. And like Erik, he finds he's unable to go through with his villainous plans. She gets her HEA with somebody else, but I found myself with this incredibly compelling character whom a lot of people were pulling for. Vasily has already learned a huge lesson through having loved and lost my first heroine - so when he meets my second heroine, even though in a lot of ways he's still a treacherous monster, he's able to start afresh, and do better, with someone far more resilient who holds far greater power over him.

10. Individual characters will need individual things.

Finally, I think it's necessary to use judgement based on the individual characters and what they need. This is another reason why it's so difficult to make hard and fast rules here. For instance, I said that if the enemy sexually assaults the heroine he should forgo any hope of a HEA with her. But I think we've all seen romances that involve, say, some dubiously consensual kissing, which we can understand the kissee forgiving. By the same token, the act which disqualifies my character Vasily from his first HEA is not sexual assault but something which is coded that way within the story world, and experienced that way by the heroine (vampire bite). The fact that it's not literally sexual assault is what makes it possible for Vasily to get a romantic second chance, but the fact that it is figurative sexual assault is one of the main things that decided me against a HEA the first time. So, I think that whether you're a writer or reader, it's important to exercise judgement based not just on the things that are obvious, but also on less obvious things like the characters' specific needs, the thematic symbolism of the story world, and more.

So those are my best ETL writing guidelines - and again, this is only what works for me! I think it's really hard to make hard and fast rules for any artistic work, but from thinking about what works for me and what doesn't, these are some of the lines I've drawn for myself. If you're reading this, I hope it provokes some helpful thoughts :-)

162 notes · View notes

skepticbeliever-bookclub · 7 months ago

Text

Hiya there, shippers & readers

After our usual game/watch-along round was profoundly derailed by some recent fandom events, we really feel like our response and the time we spent spilling our hearts in our fandom-vent channel made us that much closer. We got some new members and we've had a lot of new fun times. It feels like we're ready to embark on a new chapter of reading fic and discussing it together. It also brought about another sentiment; a special desire to interact with something in our beloved fanspace that doesn't always get a lot of love. That is, the steven fic.

And there is a lot of it, surprisingly. Ranging from the early years in the background of shyan or featuring in his own peculiar way in pairings and threesomes, either way, we decided that it was really time for us to show some love for fiction!Steven in hopes to inspire more. Due to that, we voted in 9 nominations and decided that the top 3 would stand as milestones in our Steven season journey. Among those three, the top of the vote was a very particular favourite of this mod's

under thy tongue by makemadej (santamonicayachtclub)

The book club as a whole seemed to agree that this fic is holistically a beautiful piece, that it reads like what it must feel like to observe the iconography of classic artists painting god and the angels in all their mythos as Steven navigates an ephemeral opportunity to be intimate with Ryan.

Rating: E

Summary: Ryan sprains his ankle because basketball and ends up staying at Steven's place. Guess how many beds there are.

Book Club Thoughts

First off, I'm a shyan shipper but…. this fic really sold me on this pairing we don't get enough opportunities to talk about steven/ryan as a pair esp since ryan is such an open book but he's the kind of guy who feels a lot of guilt about purchasing big things for himself and mean while Steven is more reserved but there has always been something so wonderfully hedonistic about him the setting of it feels very liminal, and it adds to the tone The nature behind Steven almost feeling like this is something he may not be allowed to have as the thought of Shane lingers over his head even though the dude is on the other side of the world, yet Steven is still there to take care of Ryan in all the terms. It's just how beautiful Steven's character and personality is written in this fic. i love stevens religion being used as a tool of indulgence rather than restriction. he is fully worshipping ryan. a man so beautiful you gotta experience him in a biblical sort of way And all of this being from Steven's pov just really fits his love of the nicer things and his appetite so well his saying "there's nothing wrong with wanting" feels so poignant to how he operates here to the end of the fic. He has always had desires but he doesn't steal and he didn't want to feel like he was stealing Ryan so when Ryan starts to ask him to do things that he--Steven-wants to do, it's surprising to him. it's about the devotion to god and Ryan's godlike physique that can't be anything other but the manifestation of god's love on earth i adore the dream-like quality of this fic. the liminal energy of the timeline and that they know they wont be staying together, yet it's still so intimate and loving There is such beauty in the way he is written; a kind, quiet, methodical individual. His language of love being acts of service is so fantastically written. It’s true service… and yet there’s the quiet self satisfaction Steven indulges in as he’s…. servicing Ryan….. This fic is a quiet, calming, dare I say meditative read. It’s comfort, somewhat bittersweet in the way their entanglement is temporary.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO JOIN US FOR OUR NEXT DISCUSSION? CHECK OUT THE FAQ, AND SEND US AN ASK! IF YOU’RE LOOKING FOR FIC RECS, PLEASE CHECK OUT OUR READS, NOMINEES AND BOOK CLUB REC LISTS!

#shyan #stryan #limgara #limgara fic #pre-watcher era #bed sharing #hurt comfort #biblical themes #somewhat unrequited #read of the week #sbbookclub #steven season

17 notes · View notes

starmeadowsystem · 1 year ago

Text

Like my drawings? GET ONE HERE

Hi, we're the Starmeadow System! We're an autistic transfem system who kinda just exists and also draws things sometimes.

About us (individually)

Stella (she/they/kit): Kittygirl host. Shows up the most often. Loud and outspoken about a lot of things. Makes up the most things and kisses the most girls. Wants to do more things for her headmates.

Apple (she/her): The red panda gremlin who manages to be a bigger lesbian than Stella (when adjusting for the resource gap). She also has a sister in our partner system.

Pizza (they/them): Fictive from Chicory: A Colorful Tale. They are very silly and cute. Very pettable as well.

Cupcake (she/her): Really cute dog. Also one of Stella's several exes.

Ezekiel (he/they/ze): Green bird who lurks and says "computer" sometimes. Has the voice of a 90s text to speech program.

Volo (he/him): Fictive from Pokemon Legends: Arceus. Memelord who announces his presence with his theme. Approves his source's Near MB post we think.

Artemis (she/her): Fictive from Deltafauna, a series we tried to develop once. Acts and speaks in a very deadpan fashion.

Crystal (she/ice): Pretty glaceon with a southern accent. One of Stella's kids somehow.

Amethyst (she/her): Fictive from Steven Universe. Lurks. Says things sometimes.

Technoblade (he/him): A mix between his "real life" and "dream SMP (my behated)" self. Also kind of a memelord. Claims to get along with Volo well.

Rich (he/him): Factive of a guy we worked for once until we got laid off. Hasn't shown up in a while. Don't know what he was about tbh.

Nomi (she/her): Fictive from Dogs in Space. Just as chaotic as her source, and is also probably very very gay. Pettable.

V1 (he/him): Fictive from Ultrakill. Very violent. Claims he's a gopro. Even more enthusiastic about killing transphobes and cops than most of the system.

Sox (he/him): Fictive from Lightyear. Acts as a therapist who remains unaffiliated with the psychiactric system. Very pettable.

Doris (she/her): System member who briefly showed up based on the person-sized dinosuar plushie we have. Kissable.

Bluey (she/they): Fictive from Bluey. Small, adorable dog child. I (stella) would kill for her. And do the dishes for her too.

Rocket Raccoon (he/him): Fictive from Guardians of the Galaxy. I'm a little gremlin who likes shooting shit. Hope you understand.

Fandoms

Listed in alphabetical order. Non-exhaustive.

Animal Crossing

Beastieball

Bluey

Breaking Bad

Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling

Celeste

Chicory: A Colorful Tale

Deltarune

Dogworld (2021)

Grapple Dog

Hollow Knight

The Hunger Games

Kirby

The Legend of Zelda

Pix and Bit

Pokemon

Preeny Has To Repeat 6th Grade

Rain World

Sonic the Hedgehog

Super Cat Tales

Super Mario Bros.

Squid Game

If you notice there's a pattern: yes, we're furry gamers lmao especially Stella

Shit we do

We post things, reblog furry women and Very Fun Political Things Going On, and sometimes maybe work on some projects.

Stella's the main person who manages things about "Pure of Heart" characters on tumblr, and posts about it when she feels like it. She has also made a 100(DEC36)-point moral scale for evaluating fictional characters. Discussion around this is encouraged.

Independently of that, kit's also planning Souls of the Broken Warrens, an adult interactive comment-driven dark fantasy quest about genocide, cute rabbits, and love and companionship in the darkest of times.

Pix and Bit Save the Galaxy is a fanfic I sometimes write for on AO3. It's about a couple trans lesbians fighting one of their dads and his army for the fate of the Galaxy. You know, normal shenanigans n shit.

These plans are about as liquid and malleable as life itself, of course, so uh. Yeah.

Cool people you should also follow

@rougewitchfox - Very very pretty and cute and kissable. Minors aren't allowed on her account. She's also agreed to proofread for Souls of the Broken Warrens so that Stella doesn't accidentally end up harming marginalized people, given the sensitive nature of the game's subject matter.

@autisticsupervillain - cool guy who happens to often talk about Magnificent Bastards, Complete Monsters, and pitting fictional characters in fights to the death and seeing who wins with better logic than Death Battle. We consider him a good friend of ours.

@imsobadatnicknames2 - Interesting fella who runs Brave Little Mouse, a cyoa with Mausritter rules. Has a Ko-Fi. I cant buy him one rn though :(

Anyway that's it we think, have fun dealing with us lol

#pinned post #starmeadowsystem

17 notes · View notes

island-ofthelost · 4 months ago

Note

okay.. so this is going to be long because it's something that has been hurting people I know on here a lot lately.

I saw a reblog you did to a post someone did on here today about Five, and originally when I read this particular post this morning, it made me feel bad. I know it was just their opinion and they have every right to it, but the way they wrote it was just so, "Everyone else who doesn't see it this way is wrong."

Your reply in your re-blog was what I think we all need to hear.

I'm being a wuss-bag by saying this anon, but I don't want to get into it with people on here.

I would make this comment on the post, non-anon, but I have already had so many shitty bullying anon asks sent to me about my posts that I do for anon replies, and on many of my other posts where I am just trying to have fun and be creative. People have also come after me non-anon about me writing stories with Five in romantic situations or because they think my other posts suck. I am just trying to avoid more of that mean stuff and the back talk from these guys that they do in their other posts that they may or may not think don't get send around to all of us.

Message to them-we do see them. It's a relatively small community within the TUA fandom.

Mostly, I just want less hate and judgement going on, and your reply was a great way of explaining another way to look at this that includes everyone, and I really really appreciate that.

I just wanted you to know, that there are so many people out there that feel bad about this stuff, and that they and I agree with you. I support you and I think that you made very good sense without being mean to anyone.

I also just wanted to say how brave you are for speaking up to make the very good point that, yes, Five Hargreeves as a fictional character may be aroace, or maybe not so much, or maybe somewhere in-between on all that, just like so many real people are. But he also very much could have had real romantic feelings of intimacy with Dolores and he could have those same things with someone else if given the opportunity and time to get there.

Five may be into girls, or guys, or both, or no one. He may like blondes or pink haired people or banging aliens with two heads for all I know. He could be autistic. Fuck it, he could be anything because he's a fictional character we can all bend anyway we want and project our own beliefs and feelings on. That's the point of fanfiction. The show and comics lay out stuff pretty clear about Five on emotional stuff and all that relationship stuff, be it with Dolores or chicks he is hitting on, or his family, but still all of that is up to interpretation by the many viewers out there and it's all good. That's the big picture.

People need to stop putting down others on here. It's all good guys!

I see posts on here all the time by people saying cruel things about different ships they don't agree with, or about other users tastes, either intentionally or maybe not intentionally, and they do it because when the people they don't agree with dive into the fictional world of Five, they see him as someone capable of anything, and often times this includes a romantic relationship with someone real.

And yes, I see Five's interactions with Dolores romantically, and I might be wrong on that, but I do. Even well after Five was out of the apocalypse and he came to her, he missed so badly. He feels things for her whether she is real or not. It's real to him. It's heartbreaking but real. Five kisses her and says mega romantic things to her in Italian in season 3 when Jamie spits on him. That was in his head. His thoughts. His desires. His feelings coming out in that scene. She didn't make him do or see that. I thought it was sad and beautiful and only made me love the character more. I think Five has more heart than any of them-capable of so much love if he's only given the chance to give and receive it. Like you said, maybe somewhere down the line, Five could have that. I hope he does, but even if it's not romantic or physical love, that's perfectly fine to. I can bend my brain to see anything.

I have seen it called disgusting to think Five capable of physical forms of love and intimacy that are romantic or sexual in nature. I have seen posts bashing the writers and the people that read anything with him in these situations. There's many on here making posts for the soul purpose of calling other people on here disgusting for envisioning Five as someone with infinite love of all kinds. They say they are sickened by all the Five X reader insert pairings tags, and they are horrified by people out there who want to envision a part of themselves in these stories with Five. All sorts of tags have been called disgusting and really, if they feel that way and don't want to see it, then you can filter tags you don't like so you never see them. Why not do that instead of bashing people who have done nothing to you.

I often wonder how they would feel if they saw posts saying what they thought or wanted to read or buzz excitedly about was disgusting?

I think they'd feel judged and pissed and sad. And they wouldn't be wrong.

I think it is sad to tell anyone else that what they feel is wrong. I don't think that is exactly what the post I am referring to today was doing or trying to say. I think that person who wrote that is a very nice person and a great writer, and they love the show and the character, and they are just trying to answer the question as it was put to them, as in how they see Five. They just didn't see the potential for the hurt that could be taken with the way they wrote that reply. Again, it was an ask reply, and they were just giving their answer, but I see and feel the pain in the way these things come off, and I wish people posting would consider that before posting the way they do.

I never want anyone to feel embarrassed or be shamed by something as silly and normally fun as fanfiction and what they like to read or write in it.

If we could all see that nobody wants to be judged for how they feel and for who they are, I think the world would be a better place.

There is nothing wrong with romance, no romance, sex, no sex, hugs, no hugs, or whatever. By dividing each other by things like our desires or lack of them in certain things, we separate ourselves in ways that aren't good, and it makes the problems of understanding and accepting each other all the harder.

We are all people, and we are all okay no matter who we are. Thank you for making me feel that way. ❤️

Well fuck, this is a long ass ask, but thank you so much for trusting me with your feelings, anon. I don't know if I'm the best person for this, because I'm famously not a fan of Five in romance fics, and not because of his sexuality but the fact that his body is still a minor in most of the contexts they're written in, but if people age up his body I still find it strange because I do think he is on the aroace spec, but I would never find it disgusting or tell people what they can or can't do based on my headcanon no matter how popular. you wanna write Five fics that take place in or post season 4 or with him aged up? go the fuck ahead. not my cup of tea, but I would never harass anyone for it.

what I find troubling is that people want to discount the feelings he's clearly shown to have as a "trauma response" or "something he knows is wrong" in favor of their headcanon that isn't confirmed is frankly cringe as fuck. he's a complex guy that probably was genuinely romantically involved with the mannequin, no matter how weird. love is love until it's not allowed to be I guess.

Idk, again I find most Five fics weird as fuck but people are allowed to do whatever they want, it's not hurting a community that I happen to be a part of and I'm sure some of these people are not part of, and if you don't wanna read a fic (which again, I don't) just don't read it, nothing is being shoved down your throat.

Thanks for the ask.

#the umbrella academy #five hargreeves

2 notes · View notes

quarantineroulette · 11 months ago

Text

12 Things That Didn't Suck this Year, plus 12 Films I watched and Liked

For me, 2023 was a somewhat easier year than most in recent memory. In the wider scope, everything remains very demoralizing and bereft of even a shred of hope. With whatever motivation I can find, my aim in 2024 is to refine aspects of my personal life I'm currently unhappy about; outside of that, things feel pretty much unsalvageable. May the new year surprise us all and give us a few glimmers here and there, culturally or otherwise. In the meantime here are 12 points that brought me some sort of comfort or release in the past year -- and also a dozen movies as most would agree it's been a great year for those. Maybe just maybe I'll finally take a crack at writing a screenplay in the new year so long as the world doesn't careen completely off its axis:

Traveling: In late 2022 I got it into my head that it would be really cool and fun to plan a trip as if we were touring, going from location to location within a span of 2 weeks. I really wanted to go back to Spain, James has always wanted to go to Morocco, so I routed a trip from Madrid to Tangier and back, with stops in Granada and Seville along the way (and also we went to see Suede, because why not). This was an intense journey that involved multiple buses, trains, shuttles to ferries, and plenty of taxis, and I'm pretty shocked and impressed that we pulled it off without sleeping through any departure times or losing any belongings (apart from a pair of earrings of mine that fell out of my purse and got crushed in Granada). The whole trip was a highlight not only of the year but of our lives in general and I'll absolutely never forget getting lost in the Ancien Medina in Tangier, something which I still dream about on the reg.

I Think You Should Leave: This has been an intellectually rich year in terms of films and television shows. The third season of Tim Robinson's completely unhinged Netflix series isn't part of that particular conversation, yet nothing I've watched this year has brought me more joy. I've easily watched the "Jellybean" sketch alone about 15 times, and could easily watch it twice that many more with no threat of it ever getting old. Absolutely insane, ceaselessly hilarious, and sometimes even emotionally stirring. May Netflix renew this 100 times over.

PJ Harvey - I Inside the Old Year Dying: I'm maybe a minority PJ Harvey fan because I find her later output far more interesting than her early, more iconic records (excepting To Bring You My Love and Is This Desire? here). This maybe didn't stir me quite as much as The Hope Six Demolition Project, which I found to be truly radical, but it neither felt like a retread (although surface listens might lead some to write it off as a return to White Chalk-era atmospherics). Outside of the record itself, the video for the title song is outstanding, and all her collaborators (including the directors of the video, animators Cristóbal León and Joaquín Cociña) were expertly chosen. Personally, Ben Whishaw singing lines from "Love Me Tender" is something beyond even my wildest dreams (Fun fact: I met Ben Whishaw forever ago and gave him a PJ Harvey button I made, so this collaboration in particular is quite the full circle).

Books By Friends: This year I read several recent books: HellSans by Ever Dundas, Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez and The Ghost Theatre by Mat Osman, all very different novels but all incredible in their own right ( I believe I technically read Ever's book last year but including it here anyway because I loved it that much). HellSans is a dystopian cyber-horror that satisfied my love of experimental writing and body horror alike, Our Share of Night is a touching story about a complicated familial relationship with heavy occult overtones, and The Ghost Theatre is a lush historical fiction that at times reminded me of Patrick Suskind's Perfume in terms of sensory details. All three novels solidified all future output from these writers as must reads for me, regardless of genre designations.

Movies: A short sub-list of 12 movies I watched this year that I liked enough to rank:

12) The Passenger (director: Carter Smith): Kyle Gallner is the #1 scream king to me and I'll watch pretty much whatever he's in as he usual picks interesting roles - plus, he makes me happy to be from Pennsylvania, and I can't say that about many people. Anyway, I've watched like three movies he was in this year alone but The Passenger was the stand out for its Falling Down-esque intro and fucked up reveals.

11) Beau is Afraid (director: Ari Aster): Docking this a few points because I think Ari Aster is pretty overrated, but I can't deny that this was an absolute trip to see in a movie theater. A quietly brilliant performance by Joaquin Phoenix as well.

10) The Royal Hotel (director: Kitty Green): Anything set in Australia instantly piques my interest, even moreso when it's as indebted to Wake in Fright as this film is. It wasn't the strongest year for horror films, and The Royal Hotel would probably be largely categorized as horror-adjacent, but it made me feel absolutely dreadful all the same.

9) Infinity Pool (director: Brandon Cronenberg): The unease I got watching this didn't totally stick, but the weird as shit Mia Goth performance certainly did.

8) Dream Scenario (director: Kristoffer Borgli): Very on the nose but I still laughed like a fiend over the whole "dreamfluencer" bit. Tremendous Nicholas Cage performance to boot.

7) Saltburn (director: Emerald Fennell): Sorry, loved its audacity and the way everybody in it dressed and how everything looked. A bit shallow but sometimes if everything looks great, I can hardly give a shit about any deeper meaning. Also, Barry Keoghan is absolute superstar and I don't use that term lightly.

6) Talk To Me (director: Danny and Michael Philippou): Easily my favorite straight-up horror film (not horror-adjacent) since It Follows, to which it certainly owes a debt. Funny, fucked up, and an amazing debut by Sophie Wilde, who gave the most underrated horror performance of the year imo.

5) Oppenheimer (director: Christopher Nolan): I liked it enough but what I liked even more was an on the surface "men's film" being embraced and subverted by a diverse, sometimes irreverent, audience (just look up Oppenheimer on Know Your Meme or TV Tropes and you'll get what I mean). July 2023 was a glorious period of people celebrating films and for one brief moment everyone seemed to love small, beautiful men just as much as I do.

4) Asteroid City (director: Wes Anderson): I'm generally iffy on Wes Anderson but this was just gorgeous and a truly profound experience that I'm still revisiting regularly and piecing together in my mind. If Jarvis Cocker doesn't get an Oscar nomination for Best Original Song with "Dear Alien," I will punch through a wall and all the way into a different reality.

3) Killers of the Flower Moon (director: Martin Scorsese): No movie has angered me this much since Judas and the Black Messiah in terms of a despicable moment in human history, but of course it was extremely gripping and moving, too. Say it's boring all you want but nothing this year has packed as much poignancy as that ending.

2) Anatomy of a Fall (director: Justine Triet): Best ever child acting in a film, best ever dog acting in a film.

May December (director: Todd Haynes): Todd Haynes is so intelligent, I love hearing him discuss his films and he's without a doubt one of the all-time greats for me. Even with my high expectations for everything that he does, May December still blew my mind. The marriage of Lifetime aesthetics with arthouse cinema is insanely deft, the "final showdown" between Julianne Moore and Natalie Portman's characters is absolutely chilling, and Charles Melton crying behind that fence will stay with me long, long after this year has ended.

Protomartyr Live at Johnny Brenda's: I really liked Protomartyr's 2023 release Formal Growth in the Desert, but it didn't fully hit until I attended this gig. It's been hard to get excited for gigs in the post-Covid era, but when that happens I'm reminded again of the pleasures of live music and its overall importance. I've seen Protomartyr several times in the past but in my humble opinion they've never been better than right now. Wanted to experience the whole show again as soon as it ended. The projections were really cool, too.

Living with a Cat: My parents got a kitten this year and shortly thereafter a cat mysteriously appeared in our alley. She was very scared and hungry, so we fed her and she found her way inside our home shortly after that. Cats are a lot of work, but she also brings us a lot of happiness and comfort. Sometimes she'll for real wink at me and it's very cute. Her backstory is a total mystery but she was clearly a house cat and we're very delighted to give her a new, happy home.

Swarm: Atlanta is one of my favorite things ever, plus fandoms and horror are two major interests of mine, so it was pretty inevitable that I would love this. The show was brilliant in itself, but Dominique Fishback was particularly phenomenal and delivered the horror monologue to beat going forward. A wild, funny, wicked ride.

Our first gig in Boston: We only played three shows this year but the best by far was our set in Boston at the Dark Springs Boston festival this past May. We played a bunch of our new, as yet unreleased, songs for the first time, met some bands we'd been longtime fans of, and just generally had a great time. Sitting down at the bar afterward, we met some festgoers who were genuinely star-struck, which was both flattering and very, very funny. May that be the first of many such experiences.

The Bear Season 2: Fishes and Forks. Enough said.

Cillian Murphy's Radio Show on 6Music: I listened to previous series of Cillian Murphy's Limited Edition radio show and it was my favorite thing then, but 2023's iteration was somehow better than ever. Played lots of Aldous Harding, my favorite cover song ever (Sonic Youth's cover of "Superstar"), and I'm still shocked that he threw in something from Cindy Lee, whose music I had just discovered like two weeks prior (and from a Protomartyr interview! Everything is connected!).

The Curse: There's an episode of Succession in which Roman Roy utters the phrase, "I cringed so hard I turned into a fossil." That's me with every new episode of The Curse. This would be way higher but it won't actually end 'til 2024 so it could possibly show up on next year's list as well! Also, let's give it up for Benny Safdie, who rules in this and in every other role he's played this year (and also on late night tv appearances).

#year in review #2023 #films #music #whatever

3 notes · View notes

crybabychim · 10 months ago

Note

Hiiii! I just came by and saw your prompt game, and i saw that you were disappointed that not a lot of people were participating, and it’s not the first time that’s happened, i also remember something similar for you anniversary and i wanted to say something (not like an excuse but maybe for motivation? 😅) i don’t came by to often, maybe like every two weeks or so just to see how your doing or the things that you’ve been working on, and i wanted to say that even tho im not a person who interacts a lot or writes most of the time i do appreciate the time and effort you put in here, and i try to show how much i do like your writting, i hope you know that even tho my personal life don’t let me be here often i will always try to come by to interact and support you 🤞🏼🫂 (even tho i suck at giving ideas 🤣🤣)

I’m also aware of the people who complains about the kind of content that you write, like if they haven’t been on the internet like ever??? (There’s WORST things out there ya’ll, like maybe fight against real internet predators would be nice instead of discussing with a bunch of girls who like hard dom sex and role plays with fictional hot men 🤣) We all are aware that this content it’s not everyone’s cup of tea and it can be triggering but it not like they’re not warned tho 🤷🏻‍♀️ some people like what we like and that’s fine bc we are adults consciously aware about the fictional representation of all of this, ANYWAY i know you can handle the messages and the angry people very well but i though that maybe give you a little bit of support would be nice 🙂

Have a good day!! Im excited to read everything you and the other readers can come with for the prompt game 🙌🏼🌟

at first, I was really mad that I've received no requests even though people were very aware of it since they liked and reblogged my post. the number doesn't really matter to me tbh, I'd prefer my followers to participate and have fun! ty for your support, it means a lot to me 🫶🏻

ahah I totally agree with you. truthfully, I don't care at all, and anyway most of the hate is often by your own followers lmfao (sure some people come out of their way to hate you, but it's kinda rare)... so yk, I don't take it seriously because I know I'm just a girl with fantasies, like the big majority of us 🤣 but at least they give me a good laugh! ;)

thank you again and have a good day as well 🤍 xx

#asks

2 notes · View notes

sarah-cam · 1 year ago

Note

After listening to Slut! by Taylor Swift, it reminded me how a lot of the fandom really slut shames Belly for having relationships with the brothers, even though that’s literally the show’s entire premise. While Belly is not perfect, there’s no excuse for people (a good amount of whom are adults) to slut shame an insecure 16 yo girl who is processing her own grief. It’s also surprising to hear people who are Team Conrad slut shame Belly because while Conrad was disappointed with Belly choosing Jeremiah in s2, he would not approve of this slut shaming at all. Plus, I find it ironic how tsitp (a very Taylor Swift coded show) has it’s main character face the same slut shaming Taylor Swift experienced throughout her career. Despite tsitp focusing on Belly’s coming of age and her taking charge of her life, she deserves a lot better from the fandom.

okay i want to start this off by saying i wholeheartedly agree that belly gets unfairly slut-shamed and yes she is only a teenager struggling with grief HOWEVER that doesn't mean she should be exempt from criticism

the fact that she dates both brothers is literally the entire premise lol and i suspend a level of morality, i guess you could say, when it comes to fiction because it's FICTION!! it's supposed to be fun and emotional and dramatic

i love belly but she is so messy ☠️

my issue with her behavior is not based around the fact that she kissed someone else, there's nothing wrong with her trying to move on from conrad. that in and of itself is not the issue, which is what's different from the slut-shaming that i see in fandom. it's the fact that it's with jeremiah -- it's the emotional aspect. like she really went after the one person that would hurt conrad the most without even giving it a second thought!! but even so, it doesn't make her a bad person or a slut. and i know she's a teenager but also... that's fucked up to ANYONE idc how young you are. like i was a 16 year old girl not THAT long ago 😅 and that's just so messed up (but that's on jeremiah too, not just her)

slut-shaming is a huge issue that i see in fandoms because that's such a huge part of society unfortunately. if you watched nancy drew or follow me then you've probably seen me express frustration when nancy gets slut-shamed by the fandom. if not here's a brief summary - nancy has multiple partners throughout the series, several of which are while she's trying to move on from her feelings for ace. the first is while ace has a girlfriend and neither know of the others' feelings, and the second is after nancy and ace break up. there's nothing wrong with a single woman/person having hookups or flings or whatever with other people or even multiple people. the only issue that would rise for me would again be regarding the emotional aspect -- it's WHO she is with, like if it was ace's brother or best friend

it's not about shaming a woman for expressing and enjoying her sexuality -- it's about just having simple respect and consideration for another person's feelings

think about it like this -- you and your boyfriend break-up (when neither of you really wanted to) and are still in love with each other. and then your (ex)boyfriend almost immediately goes and makes out with your sister. or your best friend. who KNOWS that you're still in love with each other. that's FUCKED UP and in reality i would never forgive either of them for that

i know that belly not wanting to have sex with jeremiah before the wedding is part of the plot in book 3 so i am wondering how they will handle that given she has already had sex with conrad, so she's obviously not waiting for marriage to lose her virginity. if we do have to suffer through a sex scene (🤮), it's not uncomfy because she's having sex with someone else, it's uncomfy from the emotional standpoint and because we know she ends up back with conrad -- but AGAIN this does not make her a slut, she can absolutely do what she wants with her body and should not be shamed for it

i'm hoping that maybe this is how they approach it -- with belly feeling weird about having been with conrad and tries to justify her uneasiness (since she's also still in love with him) by waiting until after the wedding because then she can say "well obviously i can have sex with my HUSBAND"

AGAIN, at the end of the day, she can do what she wants and having sex with jeremiah certainly doesn't diminish her or her value, or her love for conrad. and hey, if conrad can get over it and forgive her for everything then who am i to judge -- it's fiction!!

in real life though, if i was taylor, i would be checking belly SO HARD about her behavior and if i was steven, idc if it's my sister i would be verbally destroying her AND jeremiah AND telling conrad to go to cali and never come back 💅🏼

(also the line in the song is "if they call me a slut, it might as well be worth it for once" and belly sweetie jeremiah ain't worth shit ☠️)

#the summer i turned pretty #anti fandom #anti jelly #tsitp meta #answered #anon #it's hard to put into words so hopefully this made sense #this got so long #pls don't think this is me hating belly bcos i don't!! i love her #but you can criticize characters and still love them

4 notes · View notes

tiffanytoms · 1 year ago

Note

Do you think one of the reasons why (the vast majority) of Jily fics consist of the same recycled tropes and characterizations is because the Jily fandom (or at least a vocal minority) is less receptive to anything different like fics where the characters are more morally ambiguous/not as perfectly brave+good as they’re usually portrayed?

Hello!

Okay, I am going to answer this question like it was asked in good faith and is not a trap - and really hope that one of the 50 trolls I've blocked doesn't come out of the woodwork bc their spidey-senses started tingling and they just can't wait to yell their Karen opinions at me (I've been traumatized... can you tell I've been traumatized? 🤪)

Yes, absolutely yes. And I would agree it is a vocal minority, bc my anon asks and reader stats have never been better than for my darkest fic. Even the ppl who ended up turning on it were some of the biggest fans/reviewers/ask-senders, etc, so, at the end of the day that's their problem with human psychology and not me.

Morally ambiguous content is DEFINITELY popular, but you got some really loud, obnoxious, morally-superior purity warriors who (can't read warnings and tags), I guess, are here to cleanse all our souls by chastising and bullying others (??) whenever they admit that they like anything different, and that (understandably) pushes ppl back into the shadows. You can one thousand percent enjoy something that you know is bad for you or that you shouldn't. (Hello, sugar? Alcohol? Anything fun? Hahaha) Guilty pleasures are not a crime and reading literal crimes is not a crime. Seriously. You can read about murder and no one has to go to jail! 😱

But let me explain myself further: do I think popular tropes are a bad thing? No! Obviously if so many ppl are writing them, ppl like them! I enjoy them too. I think that's great, write away, but I think there's a problem when ppl are actively trying to stop others from writing anything different bc it's not what they personally want to read. We don't cater to entitled narcissists around here. It's the internet. There's enough room for everyone and ppl gotta learn to share their toys, lol. It is really sad bc over the years I have seen other specific writers (weird that this seems to be a recurring theme...) bullying away several amazing, original writers and that's just all sorts of fucked up. You can't tout this perfect utopian community by ostracizing and lying about anyone who dares to think even slightly differently than the norm. It's dumb as hell, and really insecure on those writers' parts. And frankly, I'm pissed they keep getting away with it.

That being said, let's veer into less nefarious waters and say that these ppl didn't lash out due to jealousy and marking their territory, but bc ppl in general are scared of anything new and what they don't understand. Ppl are creatures of habit, so if enough ppl write Jily in a specific way, that way almost becomes canon. For example, I will never forget my complete 'HUH 🤔' moment when someone was sharing my non-problematic, canon story WAYDTM (so they were clearly a fan) and tagged it as 'OOC'. Bc in my head I was like............. how are they out of character? We literally only know xyz about them and THAT'S IT. But it was completely bc so many ppl had written Lily and James in that specific way that that was almost what was expected. Me making James actually be an asshole at the beginning was marked as 'out of character' even if it made complete sense for the way I told the story.

And to that I say, fuck that.

No one here owns Jily, no one here knows Jily, bc Jily does not exist, they are not real, so write them however the fuck you want. It literally hurts no one, it is a story.

If ppl read the story, cool. If they don't, also cool. But at the end of the day, this is fanfiction over fictional characters, and if you're not allowed to play, then what's the fucking point.

I think it boils down to 2 camps: ppl who want to read/write aspirational Jily, and ppl who want to read/write messy, real (sometimes bad) Jily. Both are completely acceptable and wonderful and AWESOME, and we can have both. We just need both camps to mind their own business (but feel free to travel between them! That's cool!) and live and let live and not pretend like either is better than the other.

It just gets so fucking weird when you have ppl trying to tell you what you can or cannot do. Cut that shit out.

Thanks for the ask 😁 Sorry I got a little heated, this has just been a lot.

#fandom etiquette #live and let live #don't like don't read #awkward turtle #anon asks #free the Jily!

4 notes · View notes

spoiledleaff · 2 years ago

Text

@x-aki-tsuki-x hello again! :D it's just me, haha! the comment character limit drives me crazy as well, so i hope it's alright that i chose to just respond to you in an extra post! :) i just know that i'd be sending you way too many little responses in your comment section, haha! so, i hope you don't mind, but i ended up making a separate post! :D

oh! yeah, i can certainly see where the concern would be, especially considering that i see much the same thing, haha! i'm a little biased, though, as i am a smut writer, hehe. although, i think i mentioned this before when touching on your fetishization concerns in the tags? but, porn/smut is actually super popular on ao3, as well! i mean, in just the ghost fandom tag alone, the explicit fics alone are over double the amounts of mature fics! let alone any of the other ratings! of course, not all of these works are porn! some are merely heavy topics safely tagged, but a good portion is still... well, uh, spicy stuff! haha! again, i definitely can't speak for all trans smut writers, but for me at least, i write trans smut as a means to project and cope. :) i mentioned this earlier, but some of the reasons why i love writing and reading porn that focuses on trans characters is mostly for the interactions and relationships between trans characters and their respective partners! it's just kind of comforting to know that there are people, even if they are fictional, that can love and accept trans bodies for how they are :) it's comforting! and, i mean, hey, it's kinda fun too, haha!

absolutely! i mean, to me, that's the whole fun about fanfiction! :D especially with such a vague universe like ghost! i personally love writing the ghouls as a genderfluid species in general! so, honestly, it just depends on how they're feeling! or, in this case of content creation, what kind of body type or identity or dynamics i may be itching to write about or draw! personally, it's not just dew or copia! i love writing and drawing nonbinary zephyr, trans mountain, intersex mist, and even trans sunshine and genderqueer cirrus! :D i mean, that's the whole fun behind this sort of thing! and, hey, if you prefer to think of dewdrop as a cis man with a cock? that's totally fine! :D i certainly don't mind if an author or artists depicts him as either or, or even as intersex! there's always some fun for some gender-fuckery, haha! mhm, respectfully, i don't quite agree with you on the trans community in the ghost fandom demanding that he's only ever trans. but, perhaps i'm a little biased and i just don't see it :0 although, unrelated perhaps, but i do believe it's important, especially in terms of published fanfiction, for respective pronouns and anatomical terminology to be acknowledged and addressed before reading :) i know that trans porn isn't necessarily everyone's cup of tea, so i always try to acknowledge these sorts of things in summaries or author's notes :0 i don't think this sort of preference is transphobia? i think this is really just... well, having a preference! i think a lot of people tend to gravitate towards content that can relate to and vibe with! i know that i'm certainly not writing content for cishet people, so, to be honest, i don't expect a lot of cishet people to be included in my audience :) nothing against them! that's just not who my content is for, and i understand that :)

i agree :) maybe this is the people-pleaser side of me? haha! but i don't think there should be any arguing about a character's gender identity, haha! i mean, to me that's just such a silly thing to argue over! i mean, if you vibe and relate better to cisgendered ghouls? that's totally fine! i'll just be over here transgendering all the ghouls eight ways 'till sunday, haha! our preferences don't quite match? but that's okay! :) doesn't mean we can't be civil about our preferences, you know? :) oh! i also saw one of your comments bringing up the subject of why it's always copia or dew being represented as trans characters? i don't have, like, a definite answer for you! but, i think that one of the main-ish reasons is that both characters already seem to have pretty prominent identity crises? whether it be canon or fanon, i think those sort of conflicts really resonate with a lot of people! trans people especially, hehe :) but! trust me my friend, when i say i'm working on trans-ing the genders of everyone? ohoho, i'm working on it! >:)

oh, that's amazing, haha! my regards to your friend! :D he sounds like a riot, haha! i actually just wanted to take some time to address a couple of your previous comments on dew's mannerisms towards the crowd? as well as the connection of genitalia towards identity! :) i know a good amount of women, both cis and trans women, haha! who use that sort of wanking off gesture! whether it's a joke or an insult, it seems to be a favorite among some people i know, haha! additionally, there are plenty of ways for modern society to help people feel more comfortable with their bodies! there's ways to pack to help achieve a desired look and feeling! golly, there's so many options for packing or even for tucking, wow! so, again respectfully, i do have to disagree on that point! :) oh! another kinda personal thing, haha! i personally don't experience bottom dysphoria! :D or, at least, not enough to look into getting bottom surgery :) for now, at least, i'm totally content with living the rest of my life with only having completed top surgery, and still living my life with a vagina/traditionally female reproductive system :) however! i know that there are plenty of people who are very much interested in bottom surgery as part of their transition goals! but, damn, my friend!! that shit's expensive, haha!! :'D so, again, i do have to respectfully disagree with you on those fronts :) gender identity is so expansive and inclusive nowadays! :D it's amazing, haha! people can feel more comfortable with who they are, and there's so many different options for people to feel more comfortable in their bodies! :D when i was younger, i know that reading generalized trans fanfiction where men were still dealing with periods, or maybe just take a moment to have a bit of confidence in how their tits looks in that one shirt? haha! those sorts of fics really helped me out in some darker times, as silly as that might sound! but, again, i understand that that sort of subject matter isn't exactly relatable for everyone. ahh, i'm rambling again, haha! my point is that, personally, i plan to live my life as a man with a vagina! but, i don't think that makes me any less of a man :) just as trans women who can't afford to or simply don't wish to have bottom surgery are still beautiful and amazing women in their own right! :D everyone's ideal transition is different :) again, i'm kinda bringing back the reality vs fiction idea! we have a lot to thank the actors for who help bring the inspiration for the ghost fandom to light! but, as with all headcanons, who's to say really, haha! everyone can be cis until proven otherwise, or, in my case! everyone is trans until proven otherwise, haha! i think this case would be very much different if there was fanfiction about per or tobias or any other members of the cast being portrayed as trans or something similar along those lines? now, to me, that kind of 'inclusivity' or 'representation' or whatever you wish to call it is a bit icky... but, you are very right in that there isn't very much representation in a lot of forms of media :') but, that's why fanfiction exists, haha! we make our own representation where we find comfort and a sense of inclusivity in it :D

oh, no worries! :D i know the character count on those tumblr replies are ridiculous, haha! and, well, i had a bit of a feeling i'd be sending another essay, ahhhh... :'D haha! again, i hope this doesn't read like i'm attacking you or anything like that? i mean, you have your preferences and i have mine! they just happen to not quite match up :) and that's okay! as i've started before, everyone's different :D whether it's our gender identities, the kind of fanfiction we want to read or the kinds of characters we want to see portrayed! everyone has their different tastes :) again, i apologize for the massive essays i keep sending your way, haha! but, also again, i do hope this may provide a bit of insight on this subject :) although, this is also just the opinion of one little trans smut writer, haha! i highly recommend giving a listen to other genderqueer authors or content creators who may have their own sides to the story, so to speak, haha! i'm definitely a bit more... lenient? i think? with my own gender identity? as well as things like anatomical terminology! so, for instance, i use terminology like 'breasts', 'clitoris', 'vagina' (albeit, in much more... uhh, smuttier terms, haha!) when describing smut scenes? but, i also use terms like 'cock' or 'dick' when transmasc characters are referring to themselves. again! everyone's super different, and this is just how i write and communicate the gender identities of my personal trans characters :) but, again, and i can't stress this enough! everyone's journeys with their gender identity is so different! and i'm just one little lad in a garden of trans/genderqueer fanfic writers! :D

#ooc leaf

2 notes · View notes