#also also this isn't recent this was a few videos from 2020 that I think about at least once every two months

[imissthembutitwasntadisaster]

People on tiktok saying you should never walk off the path in the forest how does it feel to be little red riding hood's mom-coded

[w2soneshots]

Hey there can you please do something like y/n (also a YouTuber and she’s a very nice a sweet girl )y/n and Harry r dating and living together and Harry is doing one of those videos he does with Stephen,Chris and Will and maybe it’s just like she’s kind of in the background and cute little moments of her being in the video.

Lockdown -W2S

words: 0.6k+

warnings: none.

summary: you and Harry spend an average day in lockdown together.

notes: thank you so much for your request my love! I hope I did it justice��🫶🏼

Liked by tobjizzle and 349,120 others

y/username: good morning🌅 @wroetoshaw

-comments-

freyanightingale: morning beautiful💞

-> y/username: 🫶

y/nfanpage21: you're both practically matching🥺

user81910592: what's Harry filming??

I've been with Harry for around a year. We got together just before January 2020, and when covid hit Harry asked if I'd move into his apartment with him. We spent all of the first lockdown together and became even closer, due to spending every day practicing trapped in his room. When September rolled around constrictions were being lifted but we were still spending a lot of time inside.

Harry, Chris, Will and Stephen have recently started doing group videos on YouTube. I've been in the background of lots of them but usually go into the living room (when Cal isn't doing something in there) and watch tv. Today they're filming "Ranking the top 10 YouTube videos of all time".

"I'm gonna start filming in a sec, are you gonna stay?" Harry asked, his keyboard clicking. "Mhm," I hummed "I'm just gonna put my AirPods in." I said. "Ok." He glanced at me with a smile. "Alright boys!" He said loudly to the computer, a few minutes later. After around ten minutes Harry said my name "y/n?" "Yea?" I said pushing myself up from the mattress to lean on my elbows. "Can you quickly react to this," he pointed to the screen "for the video?" He asked. I nodded "sure." I got up from the bed and Harry moved his chair back so I could sit on his lap. "Here." He said passing me his headset. I put it on and immediately the boys said hello.

I reacted to the video with a loud laugh as I leaned back into Harry. Then I said a quick goodbye and passed the headphones back to Harry. I sat back down on the bed while Harry finished the video, which seemed to be taking a lifetime.

Once he was finally done he plopped down on the bed. I took my earphones out and smiled at him. He smiled back "I'm gonna get in the shower, wanna join?" I raised my eyebrows then giggled "yes, yes I do." I said and we both got up off the bed. As we stepped into his bathroom we stripped our clothes off.

After we finished "showering" we dried ourselves off, got changed and headed into the kitchen to get some dinner. "You alright there Cal?" I asked the man stood looking at the oven with a confused look on his face. He looked toward both me and Harry "uh- yea, I just can't figure out how to turn this on." He said. I laughed "you've been in this apartment for over a year and you still can't turn the oven on?" "I haven't needed to use it, we've got an air fryer ya know!" He exclaimed. Harry chuckled "just press," he stepped forward to point to one of the buttons "that one mate." He said. Freezy nodded "oh, thanks."

Cal took his food to his room and me and Harry began making some simple, quick spaghetti bolognaise. "Mmm, this is just what I needed." I said taking another bite of the pasta. "Yea, this is bangin." He said with a quiet hum of satisfaction.

We cleaned up and headed back to Harry's room. We sat on the bed and Harry began scrolling through his phone while I tried to decide what movie I wanted to watch on his large tv. Harry hates anything that isn't a documentary or based on a true story, he thinks it's pointless watching fiction because you don't actually learn anything. Which I understand so usually while I watch something Harry will sit with me, but doesn't actually pay any attention.

I lay with my head leaning comfortably on Harry's chest, our legs slightly intertwined and his arm wrapped tightly around me. Just before the movie finished I drifted off into a deep sleep, lulled by the sound of Harry's heartbeat and the calming sound of his breathing.

[dreamcatcher-roulette]

Can I admit to something? Is this a K-pop safe space? It's not drama it's just deeply personally embarrassing.

So there’s two halves to this. The relevance of both might become apparent some time before I finish rambling and get to the point but bear with me. I'm desperately trying to justify my situation.

Firstly. I'm a girl group fan. Dreamcatcher are easily and effortlessly in a tier of their own but I do enjoy and even keep up some other girl groups rather attentively. The obvious follow up question here is well, what about boy groups? Here is a collection of excuses I have previously attempted to offer up in my own defence:

Musically, I like bass and I like high notes. This kind of lends itself to prefering female vocalists, but, as I may have mentioned before, I'm not actually into K-pop that much for the music (Dreamcatcher just happen to also make the music that fits my taste perfectly on top of having the best aesthetics).

Boy group fashion kind of blows. I mean, I have high and somewhat unrealistic expectations for any stage outfits due to the standard Dreamcatcher set, but Jesus Christ the baggy pants epidemic amongst boy groups is something else. Mens fashion can be fun. I think it frequently isn't for the stages I have seen though.

The boy group hair meta also kinda blows. I'm perfectly capable of realising when something just isn't catered to me (and may well have cultural context that's flying directly over my head) and the bowl cut adjacent curtains look that's almost a default hairstyle is one of those things. Just cannot get behind it. Sorry to all the enjoyers.

And now, even though there is truth in all of those excuses, here's the actual reason why I'm making such broad, sweeping statements about an extremely diverse subgroup of artists:

K-pop is an industry that loves to feed on parasocial relationships, and I am gay in the direction that makes me immune to girlfriend fanservice but really fucking succeptible to the right boyfriend fanservice. So long as I keep pretending every boy group sucks I am safe. If I get sucked into one of them it will probably just straight up ruin my life.

Okay. Secondly. Many years ago when I was still in high school my neighbour got really into K-pop. She was a big fan of EXO, and then, this new up and coming group called BTS (anyone heard of them?) She tried, unsuccessfully, to get me to share her passion multiple times. Of the videos she showed me, these are the ones that made an impact:

LEDApple - Time is up

SHINee - Ring Ding Dong

BIGBANG - Fantastic Baby

I liked them enough to watch them on my own a few times, but that was the end of it, until in 2020 I got recommended Scream on YouTube and the rest is history. However, one of the things that amused me getting into K-pop myself was realising 2/3 of those songs reached somewhat legendary status in the time since. Even being a GG fan news from the "other side" certainly still flies across the river, sometimes with recognition, e.g. G-Dragon's semi recent drug "scandal". I remember seeing those articles and thinking huh. Wild. That's what he looks like now. It is at this point I would like you to imagine a bullet narrowly missing my head as I'm looking the other way.

On to the present. I watched MAMA 2024 live nearly 2 months ago. I like the end of year shows. My only complaint is they should invite Dreamcatcher lmao (thank you AAA 2023 that performance still lives rent free in my head) but overall, great fun. Now I must confess, for the aforementioned reasons, I always* mute boy group performances when watching shows live. Happy to critique the fashion, don't want the songs stuck in my head, which is an inevitable outcome of listening to music whether you like it or not (and I'm well aware some of it is probably good).

*Technically I have one exception in either direction, but both are irrelevant to the point.

As you may be aware, G-Dragon performed at MAMA. Everyone seemed pretty hyped. Normally this would have been a mute for me but well, momentous occasion isn't it. The king of K-pop is back. Might as well get the full experience. And it was good! I'm not exactly a fan but I did have enough nostalgia for fantastic baby to appreciate the bigbang stage, and watching all the idols freak out was so adorable. I want you to imagine three more bullets narrowly missing me while I'm looking at the aespa reaction shot.

Like, you're probably aware of where this is heading, right? But it wasn't even the stage. AFTER the stage they still had to give him the award they made up for him being there. And man. Okay. All the actual real life crushes I've had on men that I knew started out having very little if anything to do with their appearance. I'm ace so maybe that changes it but also I don't think that's exclusively it because I'm not the only person I've ever heard say that people you are attracted to become more attractive in some kind of self enforcing feedback loop. Thats why the K-pop content vortex is so brutal because as soon as you're in the variety content rabbit hole suddenly you don't just have some guy who is pretty you have some guy who is funny or thoughtful or he likes all of your favourite movies and you start feeling like you know him, even though you don't. I know that the force of that connection if you let it happen easily overpowers the baggy clothes and the shitty haircut and every other flimsy excuse but given only a muted performance stream or occasional acceptance speech there is not enough room for that personality to break through. I can watch Dreamcatcher accept an award and I see them because I've watched hundreds of hours of vlogs at this point but groups I don't know are just that. Groups I don't know.

Yeah. So about that music visionary of the year.

Holy shit man. I've never seen anyone get up and accept an award with such fucking weird and awkward vibes. I think I was gone from the moment he reached the podium. I said to the friend I was watching the stream with hey. I think maybe I should turn this one off actually. And she said no :) Because she is evil. You know how sometimes a single event can recontextualise over a decade of vaguely knowing about someone's existence? Head in my hands. Of all people. G-Dragon is really fucking attractive. Which is like. In twenty twenty four? Really? Profoundly humiliating discovery. What am I even supposed to do with this one? It's literally G-Dragon. I know there are discourse minefields the likes of which I cannot even fathom wading into this and what am I anyway? A fan? I don't think so. I saw one singular awards show and went holy shit why is G-Dragon the hottest K-pop man by actually one hundred thousand miles and then I just had to go to work again the next morning and be normal. And the thing is that I was not even remotely normal because I then decided to dye my hair bright red the following week which to be fair I have always wanted to do but well it's not UNrelated to the current crisis is it. I'm just. Existing. Really thought maybe it would wear off by now but WELL. It has not.

[chunkymamatam]

Hi again, didn't wanna be annoying, so I'm making a new post for this. I'd appreciate your help (your great wisdom and experience <3), but don't feel forced to answer if you don't want to.

Alrighty, so...

My shifting attempts (and successes) have been quite scarce, because I'm not as desperate as I used to be (I have a plan to finish my education in about 2 years, so I will have more time to myself apart from uni. I suppose I've become a bit more patient). However, due to the fact that I'm like "meh" when it comes to shifting, I cannot get myself to actually gather the determination to do it.

For example: Recently I had a lucid dream and I tried to shift through it, but for some reason it didn't work (I think I didn't ground myself enough), so after saying "I'm in my DR" 3 times, I literally gave up.

Like that is so crazy, because the me 4 years ago would NOT have given up and so now I feel like if I were more determined, I would have shifted long ago, because I do understand how easy it is and I occasionally manifest random things too, but I just wish I had more determination </3

I will literally lay there for 40 minutes and feel incredibly numb and like I'm in the void and then I'll get up because I'm "bored" and its like SIT THE FUCK DOWNNNNNNN YOU ALMOST WENT HOME </33333

This has been causing my anguish for about a year now </3

Oh great mother Tam, have you any advice for this poor soul? (Any reply appreciated)

-Reena

LMFAO PLEASE 😭

I get it. I've been going through something similar lately too. Its been going on for like 2 years damn near. This is perfect timing though actually because I've been steadily regaining motivation and determination. Disclaimer I'm not the best at advice like this and what worked for me might not for you but I'll do my best!

Also if it sounds like I'm just talking about myself I swear I'm not my autism is just "ah yes, we went through this and maybe people can relate to it and maybe hearing how I dealt with it will help them grow too"

So there were actually a few things holding me back. I let myself get sucked into a cycle of talking about going places but never actually going and at some point I stopped actually expecting to go there subconsciously. I actually ended up cutting off the people who dragged me into that cycle and now have a new group that I actively try to shift with. Unfortunately they're busy so we haven't gotten to attempt to group shift yet but there's a lot more trust that we actually do intend to go to the places we say together than the last one . This isn't to say my last group was doing anything wrong but they would move on to new media and make a new DR each week and spend like no time actually getting to know the world or actually attempt to shift together to DRs we were going to as a group. So it didn't feel like there was enough time and energy spent immersing myself in the worlds I really wanted to go to. It all felt really surface level imo.

The point is there could be external factors that you wouldn't have necessarily considered before so maybe evaluate the shifting groups you're in if any and work from there maybe? /gen Sometimes the encouragement and sharing your joy in shifting with a good group can really spark your motivation and determination back up! I feel like I'm back in 2020 when I first found it thanks to them (❁´◡`❁)

I also stopped writing down the experiences I did have for a while there. You obviously don't have to post them like I do here but writing them down like a diary entry is so helpful with the motivation aspect because I love the people I met and I want to see them again and have new experiences with them when I write it down or talk about it. I used to talk about it on TikTok so much when I first found it haha! I was having the time of my life sharing them like I was on a video call lol I just had a realization actually. Maybe its just started to feel routine and like a bother? Maybe you need to have more fun with it. Is there anything that you used to do when you were motivated that you stopped for one reason or another? I used to draw the things that happened out and now that I started doing that consistently again I'm so motivated.

Tarot readings for your DRs are always fun IMO so maybe that'd be a good way to motivate yourself, channeling your DR or SO(If applicable) in the music you listen to, making playlists, etc. can make you feel closer to it too.

Maybe you could just need a break too? I took a break from thinking about shifting for a few weeks and the desire is slowly but surely coming back. I fully believed and trusted that I'd come back to it because it genuinely made me so happy but I needed to work on some things first. I had to come to terms with not being as desperate as I used to be and knowing that, that's okay and just means I'm growing, not that I can't shift or can't want to shift. I needed to adapt my approach to the whole thing for who I am now and not for who I was because we're not the same people anymore. I don't want to shift because I want to run away from this reality, I wanna shift purely to meet everyone and have new experiences and feel everything that comes with it. Idk if that resonates or makes sense haha ❤ /gen

In short, You've grown into a whole new person over the years so your view of shifting should evolve and grow with you. Consider what your reason's for shifting are now, how have they changed? Are there outside factors that are limiting me? Reflect, get back to your roots, and learn how to love it again essentially.

I just wanna actually take a second to thank everyone that follows me and enjoys reading about my experiences, genuinely y'all have been so helpful in motivating me and if it weren't for all the questions and stories I see in my inbox I probably wouldn't post as regularly as I do. I'm very grateful to have your support ❤

@owlettie @mxzanstoy @familiar-rat (And Katelynn but I don't have her Tumblr Tag lmfaoooooo) A special thank you to you guys. You mean the world to me and I hope you know that ❤❤❤

[therealalexhera]

Musings on: Walker Creek

Walker Creek is a project I haven't thought about in a while. Well, that's not true. It's a project that I haven't consciously thought about in a while, but it sure does cross my mind more often than you'd expect. And today is its fourth anniversary, so I feel like taking a trip down memory lane.

I grew up with the Slenderverse. I don't think that's really new information for anyone who keeps up with my work -- but I believe it was 2011 or 2012 when I first stumbled upon Marble Hornets and Slenderman, and fell in love with found footage, immersive storytelling, and horror (my only prior exposure to horror had been the original Alien and 'Blink' from Doctor Who). Marble Hornets and EverymanHYBRID were what pushed me into filmmaking and especially into ARGs from a young age. I proceeded to spend years wanting to make an ARG, until finally, mid-pandemic in October of 2020, I decided that there was no time like the present, and I spent basically all day every day for the following 14 months working on the project. What started out as, let's be real, a very Local58/Gemini Home Entertainment inspired analog horror series, turned into a sprawling transmedia horror project. 100 episodes, 7 websites, and a feature film finale later, in November 2021, I finally finished it. Walker Creek isn't a Slenderverse series, technically, but it's not just an analog horror series either. Nowadays, when I look back at its style and its inspirations... I know it's basically a Slenderverse series in every way except the presence of Slenderman. But one of the things I like about it is that it is also an analog horror series. It is also a web ARG harkening back to many of my favorites from the 2000s and early 2010s. Like most of my projects, I spent a few years observing what other artists were doing, and then synthesized everything I liked about it into a project of my own.

My feelings about it are complicated sometimes, though. On one hand, Walker Creek is a project I feel incredibly proud of; a project that is so vast I can't even comprehend how I accomplished it with so few resources. A project that gave me my first and second feature films, two online friends, a space to experiment as an artist and find my voice as a storyteller for the first time, and a foothold in the ARG & indie film space. Walker Creek was never 'popular', but I can't say it was anything other than a success; I grew an audience from nothing (by self-promoting as 'adamtheargguy' on Reddit - yes I'll finally admit that was me), gathered a dedicated base of players for the ARG elements, and genuinely impacted people. One of the most stunning aspects of that project to me was how much Walker Creek mattered to the diehard ~10 players who kept up with it 24/7, investing themselves in the story, making friends with the characters, making memes of me and my friends from the videos, and even moderating a Discord server (which, occasionally, still has people who send messages every once in a while). Inversely, it's also wild to think about how much that community mattered to me while it was running. There's a reason I came back to do a little mini anniversary sequel ARG in October 2022 (though nobody really knows about it!) and it wasn't because Walker Creek needed a story continuation; it was to celebrate the community. Walker Creek was a story and a playerbase for me to interact with, but it was also a social outlet. I think, for as much 'roleplaying' there was in the character accounts, there was a lot of the real me in there too. And as mentioned above, I am still friends with two of the people from that community; one of my most recent reminders of Walker Creek was one of them asking to name a character of theirs after a character in Walker Creek. And beyond that, Walker Creek spun off in so many other directions too. I have a Trailhead research post on the Night Mind Index about Walker Creek, and a video on his channel about that post (and even though I hoped for it for the entire duration of the project, NightMind never covered the series... but from my perspective now, I think being spotlighted in his Trailhead research project is actually way cooler). Also Nexpo watched the series and Wendigoon said he was going to make a video about the series and then just... didn't? LOL. God, I haven't thought about those things in ages. It's funny how big all of it felt at the time, and how inconsequential it seems in retrospect. It hasn't even been that long. I mean, I still remember the day that Walker Creek gave me probably the most important development in my career - in late November 2021, when I was invited into a Discord server with a bunch of major ARG creators because of the 'Making Of' documentary I made about the series. It was the moment where I finally felt like I was part of the ARG creator community. Without all of that, I might never have made The History of Analog Horror, or Slenderverse: A Documentary Film Series, or What I Remember, or my other unannounced projects. That's why Walker Creek still got a reference in the Slenderverse doc series, and in my upcoming feature. It's a core part of my journey as a creator, of the development of my skills as a filmmaker, and even of my knowledge base as an ARG historian/researcher.

And yet at the same time -- the 'other hand' I've been trying to get to for the last paragraph: I feel a dissonance with Walker Creek. A feeling of dread sinks in every time someone tells me that they watched Walker Creek, or the 'Making of' documentary that accompanied it. From time to time, I go back and rewatch bits of my old projects just for fun, but I never rewatch any of Walker Creek or the documentary about it. Hell, there's a part of me that thinks I might not even going to publish this blog post when I get to the end of writing it. I'm here because there's a part of me that doesn't want to forget it, yet another, stronger part has an intense aversion to revisiting it. There is so much that I would cringe at, yes, but beyond that, there are so many of my personal feelings bleeding through and so much to be reminded of regarding what was happening behind the scenes with all the former friends I made that project with.

It's shocking, in a way, how distant it feels to me despite how recently it concluded, a mere three years ago. In the intervening time, I've made so much more material, grown so much as a filmmaker, and have gone through so many seismic shifts in my life and my perspective as both an artist and as a human being. Like let's be real, I still thought I was cis when I made that series! But more than that, I've now gone from an amateur with almost zero experience to an indie filmmaker funding my own films and building a career, now with eight features under my belt (six released, two in post production). It's quite literally a different era of my life -- and it's not like that's something that's hard to conceptualize; I even said something almost identical at the end of the 'Making Of' doc... but it doesn't always feel like the end of an era when you're in it. Chapters in real life don't start and end cleanly like in a book. There's bleed. And so, as much as Walker Creek 'ended' in November 2021, it didn't feel like it was over in those next few months, when I was adjusting to no longer living in that imagined world every single day. It didn't feel like it was over when I made The History of Analog Horror, since I was literally using Walker Creek & its companion doc as a foundation to get resources and as the basis for exploring my own inspirations. I guess in retrospect, that doc was a bit of a personal sendoff for Walker Creek -- a full circle moment where I got to finally bridge my work and the work of those that inspired me into a single project. I was able to get some distance from it with that, but even then... it didn't feel completely over in December 2022 when I was writing scripts for a spiritual successor ARG taking place in the same world. It didn't feel completely over in February 2023 when I did an interview for the Ludic Society and, unexpectedly, half of the interview was about Walker Creek.

I think now though -- and part of the reason I'm writing this post -- is it does feel over. I don't know when that happened. I wish I knew what that exact moment was. But I just know that now, after my identity and life has changed so much, and after spending two years on the Slenderverse series, while simultaneously spending the past year working on my found footage feature, and now working on a new doc series and another feature screenplay, there's so much distance between me and Walker Creek. And yet, as I said, I don't want to fully let it go. My found footage feature has a reference to it, as will my next screenplay, as will the webseries I'm working on (Grimoire), as will my next doc series, probably. It's a weird feeling and Walker Creek feels weird to think about, but I'm so glad it happened. Its DNA is present in every project I do, because I wouldn't have been set on my current path without it. Even if its now only in indirect ways, pretty much everything I do has built off of Walker Creek in some way. Even my email signoff, 'kind regards', comes from a character in Walker Creek. And in the end, I think all of this is why I'm not really able to shake Walker Creek, even if it feels over, or distant, or dissonant to my current self. And one day, maybe I'll be able to revisit it properly.

One final note: today is the 4th anniversary of the series, but in-universe, yesterday, October 23rd, was the 'Harvest Festival' (chosen because it's the same date as the bombs dropping in the Fallout universe). So... happy (late) Harvest Festival to anyone still hanging around from that era who remembers why the Harvest Festival is important. And for one final deep cut reference... long live Yvrisil.

Kind Regards,

Alex Hera

[felassan]

Do you think were going to see a Dreadwolf reveal trailer at Dragon Age Day or at the Game Awards?

hello!

I'm not sure, and I'm also hopeful/excited (so.. a regular felassan state of affairs hh..). if it's in a place where they feel ready to show it to the world more then that'd be neat, it'd be cool to see what's being worked on. and ofc anything said here is only speculation.

it's been at TGA before (2018 trailer, 2020 trailer), the last time being 3 years ago in 2020. if the 2024 internal currently-aimed release window mentioned in error on a dev profile recently is indeed still current (I'd guess that the change to "TBD" won't have been because the aim changed since the dev put that there btw, it'll have been because there isn't supposed to be any public info about the currently aimed release window yet but the games press noticed it on the profile, prompting BW/EA to ask the dev to change it. separate note: this being the case doesn't mean that there's no possibility that the window will slip more though), appearing at TGA 2023 wouldn't be a shock. maybe it depends on whether the possible 2024 release window is in early (but still after April 1st 2024 because of the fiscal quarter & FY24 slate stuff) 2024 or late 2024? as if it's later in 2024 (like say November) I could see a world where it isn't at TGA23 but is somewhere in the summer video game event/news expo period instead, because of the recent trend that's been observable in the industry generally and commented on by a former bioware dev re: an industry move towards shorter marketing periods (like more in the realm of a few months-6 months than a year). it's been said that the policy for this for a lot of AAA games has become a lot shorter, tending towards a lot shorter and louder marketing campaigns.

jeff grubb recently said on DA:D, "The Game Awards 2023 sounds right to me, they’ve done stuff at The Game Awards before. I’m expecting them to be there. If they’re not, it better be soon after, because Dragon Age: Dreadwolf, was, you know, there was a chance Dragon Age: Dreadwolf could’ve came out this year. Obviously it did keep moving internally, as I’ve reported before. It’s now, they’re looking at, you know, by the mid of next year, something like that.” and "The reality is, we very well could get Dragon Age: Dreadwolf content at The Game Awards. They’ve had teasers there before, it would make all the sense in the world for something to show up there." [link] this is interesting bc i'm pretty sure I remember a tweet from him last year about TGA22 where he straight up said "no it won't be there" or something basically when he was asked about it.

what I would say is that if it's gonna happen in a substantial way (as in not a codex entry and a blog post) in early December 2023, it'd likely be at TGA, not on DADay. this is based on how it was done previously and also on what's been said about DADay (an unofficial fan holiday event that just happens to occur very close to when TGA is held, thereby being overshadowed by it in terms of scale) vs TGA (a massive industry-wide high publicity event). DADay has seemed to have been more of a community-focused thing, a place to announce something smaller in scale like a tv show or a new book or to have something smaller highlighted like short stories or a codex. it's more of a 'today we are announcing we will be at TGA' with a new trailer-type [hypothetically] context rather than a 'here is a new trailer that isnt an ingame cinematic' type context, if that makes sense. saying that if it isnt going to be a 'big' trailer at TGA23, maybe there's something at DAday like last year where they showed an ingame sequence, which is smaller than a 'big substantial trailer' but still a video.

(idk if this post/ramble made sense but there you go). guess we'll find out in < 3 weeks. (❁´◡`❁)

[akfamilyhome]

YouTube 2023 Year in Review

Welp! Guess it's that time of year again. I'm sure 2023 has been a...pretty interesting year to say for quite a few people. And for me personally, it's also been a weird little year that's great in some parts and could be better in others.

What have I been up to?

My life right now is kinda divided into three parts:

A) the "IRL" stuff, as in working on my editing day job and spending time with family.

B) working on YouTube videos which I still have the passion for,

and C) playing video games, collecting cool things and socializing with my online friends.

I've always felt that it's difficult for me to put equal attention to all three, and lately, it definitely feels like I'm focusing on 'A' and 'C' more. Of course, my day job is kinda how I make a living at the moment so that obviously gets priority, but that doesn't mean I want to ignore my YouTube stuff! It's just hard to sneak in a few lines of script-writing while multitasking at a day job, and only being able to freely spend time on 'B' and 'C' during night isn't the most productive way to go about things, especially with other things that aren't YouTube production. I also have games I want to play, art I want to draw, folks I'd like to hang out with etc.

And that's a fine, healthy way of going about things online for regular folks! But I don't want my YouTube channel to stagnate as a result of this, because I still love making videos! I have support from folks on Patreon, and I still hope to continue growing the channel so that it becomes more sustainable to do frequent updates.

Part of me has always thought about just quitting my day job once I have a decent amount of money saved up and just try doing YouTube full-time and rely on Patreon, even if there's a very low chance it'd be sustainable. Of course, that's a big gamble, and I'm not truly sure if that's really the best way to go about things. But those are just my inner thoughts and I've rambled long enough...

So, I apologize for the above situation sort of being the root cause of the recent slower pace of my YouTube channel! The pace of the channel this year is about the same as in 2022, if not a little slower. I didn't really get a lot of dormant scripts from 2020-2021 off the ground, but being true to what I said in last year's Year in Review, I did end up working on a lot of spontaneous ideas even if there wasn't a "big" core video! In fact, I think almost every video released in 2023 that we'll discuss below were spontaneous ideas.

I'll talk more about what's to come for the channel in the end of the post, but for now, as usual, we'll take a look at each video I made during 2023 and I'll share my thoughts and some fun facts about each!

A Trip to the Hong Kong Kirby Pop-Up Store

Various things were put up on the channel from January to March, including a funny little short for Mario Day and a new trailer for a revamped Patreon, but the major thing I put out was a look at the Kirby Pop-Up Store in Hong Kong! This was my first time doing a scripted documentation of an in-person event, and Nintendo Hong Kong would eventually do more events like Nintendo Live 2023 Hong Kong, and I'll definitely be talking about them on my channel eventually!

As for fun facts...uhh...I suppose Patreon patrons get to see the full unedited raw footage I took from the event lol

Top 10 Nintendo Trivia You NEVER Knew

This year's April Fools video...was also a last-minute sort of idea, if I recall correctly! The concept is simple: it's a parody of generic Top 10 trivia videos in terms of presentation, but the curveball is instead of just doing other blatantly obvious fun facts, the facts would actually be super obscure, inconsequential Nintendo facts that barely anyone would've known about, so in the end it's kind of a legit trivia video in a twisted way. The facts in the video were sourced from new research, me asking friends for suggestions and some of my old posts on Twitter, so there were a few 'fun' facts that were left on the cutting room floor, and here's a good place to share them!

In an early version of the GameCube instruction manual, Mario 64 was used as a placeholder game

The infamous 'black box' in Super Mario 64 DS is not a visual glitch as commonly believed, and briefly appears in E3 2004 footage

Prototype screenshots of Mario 64 have appeared in an early print of the game's box art...and on a Nintendo Monopoly board in 2006 (next to the ? Block on the right side of the board if you're looking)

The Onion in Hey! Pikmin has white and purple in its colors, even though white and purple Pikmin never appear in the game

The original 3DS had two separate sets of black & white colors, for some reason

And to finally come clean...yes, around 30% of the video's script was generated using ChatGPT, as part of the joke. Mostly the introductory bits at the beginning of each segment, since it definitely did not give me the results I wanted when I asked it to describe the specific details of each fact, so y'know, hopefully that's a sign it's not coming for my job of talking about obscure Nintendo things! And don't worry, this will probably be the only time I ever use AI in my videos.

The Better N64 Wavebird Experience

This is a follow-up to a 2021 video where I also used the N64 Switch Online controller on an original N64, albeit with a different adapter! This actually isn't a case where I received a free product to do a review on, I just happened to read about a better alternative, pre-ordered it online, it arrived in April and I decided to knock out a quick review/comparison video in 2 days!

As such, this is more of standard informative review video, but in all honesty, I still really like this setup, and it's in my opinion still one of the best controller options for original N64 games. So much so, that I recently completed my NSO controller collection by picking up a Sega Mega Drive 6-button NSO controller to eventually use with my original Mega Drive! I'm still looking for the compatible 8bitDo adapter though, so maybe when I eventually do, that can be a quick little video on the Plus channel for patrons!

The Most Expensive amiibo

This is my favorite video I put out this year! The Qbby amiibo has always been in my sights for a while, and I've gone on record saying that I'd make a video on it if I got my hands on one.

Back in 2019, I once saw a Qbby amiibo being offered on Yahoo Auctions for a relatively cheap price, but to afford it I asked for extra donations via Ko-fi. Looking back on it now there were probably better options I could've taken, but either way the listing got cancelled and I refunded everyone who donated for that. Then sometime later I saw another relatively cheap BOXBOY package in a local listing, but then the seller never replied and deleted the listing, so the amiibo has eluded me until now, and there seems to be no signs of Qbby stock going down any time soon. My hope for a Qbby reprint continues, and hopefully this video still serve as a little awareness boost for folks who are wondering why he's one of the most expensive amiibo around!

Some of the gag editing on this one got spruced up a little bit which I enjoyed doing, but you also probably noticed that I got a turntable specifically for those glamour shots! ...yeah, I'll probably get more use of that thing later on as well.

The Kirby Battle Royale online joke wasn't exaggeration: I couldn't find anyone to play online with! I suppose that is to be expected for, y'know, playing a mid 3DS game in 2023, but it's a shame that Kirby Battle Royale doesn't at least offer a option to play with friends, and from some experimentation, it seems that two of my US-based friends were able to match with each other online while I couldn't, which also suggested some region-based matchmaking was at play. Oh well! There are some better 3DS games out there that I'd still like to play online one last time before their servers shut down this April.

Tetris...on a McDonald's Nugget

Continuing the trend of 'make video on a recent find' for the third video in a row, it's the China-exclusive McDonald's Tetris Chicken McNugget! For an unscripted Things of Interest video, it turned out pretty well, kinda like the Rhythm Tengoku arcade video in 2022! Compared to the first unscripted TOI back in like 2018, I've definitely gotten a bit better at rambling since.

I was kind of a few days late to the party, and some other videos about the Tetris Nugget from larger channels have racked up more views since, but that's not really the point! As a casual Tetris fan that happens to be in proximity to mainland China, something as bizarre as this is totally right up my alley. Covering China-exclusive gaming stuff just kinda reminds me that I have yet to do a video on the iQue Player though, which I really want to...

FlashBoy Plus: The $95 Virtual Boy Flashcart

I haven't really taken a YouTube sponsorship deal yet, but I do get emails about doing reviews or ad reads of items on occasion, like new Switch gaming accessories from different third parties and whatnot. Unfortunately, that's not really the type of stuff I do regularly on the channel unless I find a great angle to tackle it from, so the only review offer I've done on the channel until now is a limited Switch physical release in 2020.

When I was offered to review the FlashBoy Plus, I was definitely intrigued despite having already previously covered the HyperFlash 32, a technically better option! Virtual Boy flashcarts are already a very niche thing, so I gladly took the opportunity to take a look at any new option out there, and even if it's not a mainstream topic at all it does kinda appeal to me specifically.

In the video, I mentioned the (very cool looking) clear cartridge shell was not a publicly available option yet at the time of the review, but looking at the order site now, it has been added since! So hey, good for them! It is honestly pretty sick to have a transparent Virtual Boy cartridge.

Playing PC Games with the SNES Mouse & Famicom Keyboard

I started work on the next core video right after the FlashBoy Plus video (more on that in the last section), but getting sick during early December forced me to delay it, so for that month I decided to do one last spontaneous idea: a followup to the 2021 video where I used the Famicom keyboard and SNES Mouse on a computer...but this time on a proper PC!

A thing that was brought up in the comments was one setting in particular: when I was changing the mouse settings in the Control Panel, there was a 'Enhance pointer precision' option that I didn't uncheck, which presumably slows down the mouse for precise movements. There wasn't a super noticeable difference when I unchecked it during further testing, but when I coupled it with further increasing the mouse sensitivity in games that allow you to change it in-game, I was actually able to get the SNES Mouse to move at a decent pace in some games! Of course, that requires tweaking with additional settings that would normally be overkill for a regular mouse, so it's still not practical, but at least there was a setup that would alleviate some of my complaints in the video.

Akfamilyhome Plus videos

Over on my second channel Akfamilyhome Plus, once again there's a variety of stuff! There's Mario Wonder memes, a new high quality video game rip album, archival footage and more. If there's one thing you should check out though, it's the supercuts of me playing Everybody 1-2-Switch with my Discord server. It's the best kind of chaos. Long live Kitchen Timer 4.

This year, 8 new unscripted bonus videos were released publicly! You can enjoy watching me:

Visit the 3DS eShop on its final day of operation

Check out the Nintendo DSi XL Demo Video carts

Look through gaming goodies on a Chinese second-hand market

Unseal Captain Toad Treasure Tracker for the 3DS

Read through the 2010 Nintendo Anti-Piracy Manual

Unbox a complete copy of the original GBA Play-Yan

Compare the two popular 3DS capture card models

And check out the Nintendo Power...rewritable cartridge!

And over on Patreon, 8 more exclusive videos are also available, featuring things like a slew of Nintendo cleaning kits, iQue DS games, the Chinese Mario Movie DVD and more! As always if you don't want to wait till some of them rotate into public availability, they're all available on Patreon for just $1 USD a month!

The fuuuuture

Okay, so what's next for 2023?

I mean 2024. Oh god the typos are already starting.

Right before the FlashBoy Plus video came out, in late June 2023, I did a video topic poll on Patreon, asking what idea I should do next. Out of the four options given, one of them is a continuation of a limbo project from 2021, and the other three were spontaneous new core video ideas I came up with and wanted to do.

Well, one of the spontaneous new ideas won the poll, so the next core video is...

A look at the camera and sound apps on both the Nintendo DSi and 3DS! I originally wanted to get this out in December, and you all know what happened to that plan, BUT the script is done, the VO recording is done, footage recording is well underway and I am confident I'll be able to get it out this January. I really like how the script for this one shaped up and am commissioning some banger thumbnail art for it (🐦), so I REALLY hope you'll look forward to it!

Afterwards, there are a few in-progress ideas that I also want to work on for quick videos afterwards. As mentioned above, I visited Nintendo Live 2023 Hong Kong which was hosted on November, and ALSO the Nintendo Hong Kong Pop-Up Store which is running from December to January, so both of those would make for a perfect video in a similar vein as the Kirby Pop-Up Store video last year!

I also went on a trip to Japan last August, and took quite a bit of photos and footage. I still want to share my findings and experiences of being in Tokyo for the first time that I could remember, so there will be a fun little piece about that going on the Plus channel in the future!

And don't forget, I'm making a video about every game I beat during 2023, continuing the thing I started last year!

And after ALL of the above is done, I still have the remaining core video ideas from the June Patreon poll I did, since I did say I'd eventually love to do all of them, and that desire still hasn't gone away. I don't know how the rest of 2024 will go for this channel but I'd say this is a fantastic starting point, and I hope it'll all go up from there, since I'd really love to be more productive on here, while trying to keep that A-B-C balance in check!

So yeah! That's it for the 2023 Year in Review. If you've made it all the way to the bottom, thank you for reading! Here's a 25-use invite link to my Discord server as a little something! Thank you to all of you who've supported me this past year, whether you're a viewer or a patron, and I hope to keep up the work this year and try to strive for better!

[droughtofapathy]

The Gilded Age's Broadway Divas: Aurora Fane (Kelli O'Hara)

Beloved by all, Aurora Fane enjoys a powerful position in Mrs. Astor's New York. Having suitably recovered from impending financial ruin last season, this season, Aurora has done some ill-fated matchmaking, worn some fantastic hats, and provided beautiful window dressing to scenes where she just sits there and looks pretty.

One of Broadway's (few) leading sopranos, Kelli O'Hara is a dying breed. As trends shift towards a more pop/rock sound, and classical musical theatre becomes a thing of the past, Kelli nevertheless finds her niche. A seven-time Tony nominee, Kelli has won Best Leading Actress in a Musical for the 2015 revival of The King and I. You'll recall another Gilded Age Diva who won for that same role some years prior. A proshot of the NT Live production can be found online. It is a gorgeous shoot, even if I take issue with that show as a whole.

She has also been nominated for Kiss Me, Kate (2019), The Bridges of Madison County (2014), and The Light in the Piazza (2005). Ironically, though Aurora Fane supports The Academy, Kelli is a classically trained opera singer who has appeared on the Met Opera stage three times, and will play Laura Brown in an encore run of The Hours this spring. (See my breakdown post over costumes here.)

However, prior to her opera appearance, Kelli will be starring in the new Broadway musical Days of Wine and Roses for a limited 16-week run, opening on January 28th. Kelli has been nominated for every role she has played since 2005, and this will almost certainly be no different. Booked and busy.

#1: "Shall We Dance?" The King and I (2015)

Kelli's voice is otherworldly angelic. That much we already know very well. The King and I opened in 2015 at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre at Lincoln Center, the third musical Kelli has starred in at that venue. The Beaumont is, of course, right next to The Met Opera, and the only Broadway theater outside the theatre district in Midtown.

As Anna Leonowens, Kelli travels to Siam to teach the children and wives of the king how to speak English. Orientalism aside, the show is a classic Rodgers and Hammerstein, and the score is divine in Kelli's mouth. Fun fact: Kelli's replacement was Marin Mazzie in one of her last onstage roles. Marin was the Passion co-star and dear friend to Donna Murphy, our Mrs. Astor.

This video is from the 2015 Tony performance and showcases the incredible quick change Kelli makes between singing "Getting to Know You" and "Shall We Dance?" aided by a team of unbelievable dressers. It is a marvel to witness. As is Ruthie Ann Miles, Kelli's co-star who recently performed in the Encores! production of Light in the Piazza.

#2: "What More Do I Need?" Take Me to the World: A Sondheim 90th Birthday Celebration (2020)

In 2020, despite a global pandemic, the theatre community still found a way to honor Stephen Sondheim's milestone 90th birthday with an online concert. Kelli performed a song from Saturday Night, Sondheim's first professional musical that was slated for Broadway in 1955, but was scrapped. It only got its New York premiere in 2000. This particular number is a cabaret favorite, and Kelli is an absolute delight with just a camera and digital accompaniment.

Fun fact: it wasn't until this particular performance that I truly started to appreciate the wonder that is Kelli O'Hara. I had previously seen her in concert just that March, and loved her, of course, but I have a complex relationships with sopranos. I now recognize that I love mature sopranos, but it's the ingenues I can't listen to without wincing.

#3: "They Don't Let You In the Opera" (2016)

Lest we think Kelli is limited in her range and style, this song was written especially for her to showcase her vast talent and comedic timing. Kelli, an Oklahoma farmgirl, isn't the sort of person you'd expect to be both classically trained and country literate.

Kelli, who has been typecast as refined and often repressed characters who go through harrowing emotional experiences, much like Aurora Fane, is more than capable of bringing a rollicking comedy to the mix.

This number is a favorite in Kelli's concert repertoire. There isn't much more to say, except that you need to witness its hilarity for yourself.

#4: “Heaven? Somebody else’s heaven?” The Hours (2023)

Speaking of opera, here is an excerpt from a scene in Act II where Laura Brown has fled to a hotel room to contemplate some very serious courses of action. Kelli, alongside soprano Renee Fleming and mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato, makes up a trio of phenomenal women in Kevin Putts' adaptation of the book and movie.

The Met Opera theatre seats nearly 4,000 people across six levels. The performers do not use body mics or amplification of any kind, but rather rely on intense vocal training to be heard across the theater. For this reason, alongside the vastly different vocal techniques and styles, musical theatre actors rarely cross over into opera, and vice versa. Notable exceptions include Renee Fleming, Kelli's Light in the Piazza co-star Victoria Clark, and Mary Beth Peil, who made her musical theatre debut in The King and I as yet another Miss Anna, hers in 1985.

#5: "So in Love," Kiss Me, Kate (2019)

Starring in yet another Golden Age musical revival, Kelli brings a different take on Lilli Vanessi, a glamorous movie star in a turbulent relationship. Kelli's vocal talent, of course, speaks for itself. For Kelli, this role was a tribute to her dear friend, the late Marin Mazzie, who had passed away some months before the show opened. Marin, who replaced Kelli in The King and I, had played this same role in the 1999 Broadway revival to great acclaim. In her first entrance of the show, Kelli wore a costume that featured the very same hat Marin wore in her show.

Though this video is beloved, my personal favorite rendition can be heard below. It was taken at a concert Kelli put on at the 92Y in New York last February. In it, Kelli sings for and to Marin, and the entire theatre wept.

Bonus: "Back to Before," Ragtime Reunion Concert (2023)

The role of Mother was originally workshopped by Donna Murphy in Toronto in the early 90s, but she left to do King and I, which worked out well for her. In came dear friend Marin Mazzie, who originated the role on Broadway, and established a precedent no other has been able to top. Also in that cast? Audra McDonald as Sarah, for which she won a Tony, of course.

In 2023, after years of pandemic-related delays, they staged a one-night reunion concert of this special show. And who better to take on Marin's iconic role than Kelli O'Hara? Listen to her "Back to Before" here, and then do yourself a favor and run, don't walk, to listen to Marin's.

[mdhwrites]

Jumbled Thoughts: Romantic Rivals With Spy x Family

"What do you mean you love him!? You may be best girl, the tsundere and the one who spends 90% of your screentime with him but I'm in love... With..." "You want to go get a drink as a consolation prize?" "Yes please." And then I'm going to poison her drink so he can be all mine!

A lot of good, long term romance works have what can easily be identified as the romantic rival, regardless of how actually effective those rivals are. A character essentially designed to be an obstacle between the main couple and true love. There's a lot of forms this can take and luckily, anime has given us two great examples recently with Spy x Family's Yuri and Nightfall... But first let's get a few things out of the way.

Despite my bit at the beginning, a romantic rival actually doesn't need to be a direct competitor. Quintessential Quintuplets' romantic rival is the 5 girls' father and it'd be real creepy if he was actually trying to bang him.

"SIS!"

We'll... We'll get to that. No, instead the point of a romantic rival is simply to be someone who has to lose if the main couple ends up getting together. Their happiness and desires are essentially impossible if the main couple's happiness is achieved. That's why they're a rival since there can only be one winner. The most direct way to do this is with someone else who loves one of the two MCs but it can take on a lot of forms.

Secondly: For them to be a rival, they do actually need and investment in the potential of the two MCs being together. The best rivals are likely going to relish in destroying what might have been just as much as they'll enjoy either capturing the one they love or dooming them to misery. For their role to function though, they can't be unaware of what they're doing. Otherwise, they fall more into cruel twists of fate or comedic interventions depending on the severity of the moment and the tone it's portrayed with. Like Joe from Big Time Rush moving for her work isn't because her agent is a romantic rival, whoever they are doesn't care about the romance going on, it's just business. One that tragically breaks up the head of the band and her.

We did get one hell of a song out of it though. (Yes, I loved this show as a teenager and still think their music slaps incredibly hard. Also, I'm linking this video because it portrays more what happened but I do think the 2020 acoustic version done during lockdown is better.)

Another thing necessary for the character to be a rival though is that they are inherently a bad option. While one could call all the girls in your typical harem romance rivals to each other, it's better to call them contestants. They all have a real, viable case for taking that spot of best girl/boy, both in the hearts of our MC and of the audience. You are supposed to be okay with any of them getting with the main character. They are simply a competing ensemble.

A romantic rival is a villain. Even when not explicitly portrayed as one, you're supposed to want them to lose. They VERY rarely are real people besides maybe a sob story but that's not really the point of them. Romantic rivals are meant to elevate something into soap opera levels of drama, not for a nuanced discussion of love. A way to heighten the stakes and force the cutesy, potentially eternal lovey dovey elements of a work into what will be an even more satisfying conclusion.

Or for some EXTREMELY funny jokes. Speaking of, let's get into Spy x Family.

Nightfall versus Yor.

Yuri versus Loid.

Or, er... Well, see, why these two are so useful is that we actually have an incredible romantic rival and one that mostly entirely falls flat on his face in the role and is arguably the worst element of the show to me. As such, let's start with him: Yuri. Yor's baby brother.

He is a member of the secret police, the best at what he does despite such a young age and has a sister complex. Like... 80% of his character is sister complex. 19% more of that is screaming about his sister and then 1% of him makes you remember "RIGHT! This guy actually claims to be a functional human being!" Yuri's inability to actually function as a person is one of his biggest flaws because that single minded obsession makes it hard for him to really have more than a handful of jokes, all of which just increasingly become more stale (at least for me) as the show went on. That's a real shame too because as a rival to Loid, he's actually about as good as you could ask for.

See, while I have problems with Yuri, his failure in this role actually has a lot more to do with Loid than himself. A rival is meant to push the couple out of their comfort zone, potentially make them fuck up and do something that will upset the other, or challenge some aspect of a person's love for their partner. Loid... Doesn't have any of these traits. His whole gimmick is being the man with a thousand faces. To have so many layers, you'll have cried an ocean by the time you get to the core of this onion. That also means he has no comfort zone to push him out of, only fuck ups because of himself and...

Well actually, this is the one way I think Yuri does screw up as a potential rival to Loid. He makes big declarations about whether or not Yor and Loid's love is real but his love isn't real either. He doesn't actually know his sister. He doesn't engage with her genuinely, just like Loid doesn't. He has this nostalgic, permanent image that would take literally seeing his sister kill a loyal citizen to the country in order to even crack. That's not actually more genuine than Loid using her like he does. The only difference is that one will never ask Yor of anything and want to stay by her side while the other will only stay until the job is done. It'd be much more effective, in this role, for Yuri to genuinely know his sister and be able to call things out because of the genuine care versus Loid's artificial care.

Otherwise, what Yuri really does is be a reminder of the world these characters exist in. Someone who genuinely can NEVER find out the secret between the main couple, that they're not married nor actually in love, or else Loid is a dead man and Operation Strix is over. That's because Loid is an enemy of the state so while Yuri would lock him up for the wrong reasons, he is still one of the few people who could actually cause trouble if only he knew the truth. Too bad Yuri has been a spy for like an entire decade less than Loid and so Loid can run circles around him also making this tension somewhat tenuous at best.

He is only a threat in essentially the same way anyone is. In that he cannot know the secret. That is the exact opposite of Nightfall, Yor's rival.

Nightfall is a fellow spy from Loid's agency. She actually was a pupil of Loid's and mistook being told you can't have emotions on a mission to mean she must deaden all emotions. She is also a super spy on a similar level to Loid, making her the idea working partner for him.

But that lack of emotions is also why she can never be Loid's romantic partner. Yor is a bundle of energy and a precious cinnamon roll who wears her heart on her sleeve and couldn't help but be earnest even if she tried not to be. She is exactly the sort of warm, open person that Loid needs to ever make him consider retirement. To peel back the layers so that he can one day be himself instead of one of the many faces that he has. She will only ever love Loid... Not Loid's job or codename: Twilight.

Immediately we have the reason why these two contrast and why you will never root for Nightfall. Nightfall loves Twilight. Loves the image and ideal of Loid as this unstoppable super spy who she could essentially conquer the world with. Who she could help alleviate the woes of before they both get back to work. She'd be devoted but to all the wrong needs of Twilight. We even know she has the skills with which to do it, something Yor very clearly lacks as putting her in the kitchen is a surefire way to attempt mass genocide.

Not to say Yor is incapable of challenging Nightfall in a more practical way like how Loid entirely destroys Yuri. Yor is still superhuman in her physical capabilities which is why despite how clumsy and dumb she can be, she's still a very capable assassin. It's just that being an assassin is essentially all she's good at, besides empathy that is. Yor's care runs deep, just like how deep the tennis ball she sent into God only knows where is or the ball she played with Anya with when she did her own signature shot. Since Nightfall can't convince Loid to drop Yor due to her wifely duties, she does only have this and one other tactic to use against Yor and here she fails ENTIRELY.

The other one she's a lot better at. See, in her eyes, Yor is a bad wife. Yuri thinks the same about Loid but as a bad husband. Unfortunately for our cinnamon roll, she does not have Loid's confidence or the homely skills to back that up and so questions about her capabilities, especially with a smooth motherfucker like Twilight, shake her to her core. Luckily, she has the empathy and care that helps with Anya and makes her not just a good wife but what is even more important here: A good mom.

Here is where we get Yuri's last failing. See, a good romantic rival should be like any good villain. They oppose not only the couple but the whole premise and theme of the show. Yuri and Nightfall both do actually attack the themes to some extent by asking for stagnation and pulling the two back to their past where they will be trapped in the violence they have known all their lives. This is attacking the Spy part of the title. Only one of them actually says anything about the Family part of it though.

The most disappointing moment of the entire series for me was when Yuri finally interacted with Anya, Loid and Yor's adopted daughter, and hated her. Now, admittedly, his goal of arresting and killing Loid would pretty much certainly mean Anya's death too since she was adopted by Loid. Best case scenario for Anya if Yuri wins is going back to the orphanage but... That's the same case for if the operation that brought these three together fails in anyway. He adds nothing new with this that the base premise of this being a sham family doesn't already add.

Meanwhile, Nightfall knows from go about the operation and her opposition to Yor is specifically so that she can take the place of Loid's wife for the operation. This introduces two new elements that very, VERY few other characters can so directly. The first is that if Nightfall wins, it dooms Anya. Her desire to keep Loid as Twilight, rather than as himself, means that the warmth that Yor and Anya are forcing out of him will likely shrivel back up and die so that when the operation fails, Anya will go back to an orphanage and the family will end.

You also might have noticed that I said WHEN the operation fails, not if. While we haven't gotten it in the anime directly, we know a lot of Loid's methods for getting Anya to succeed fail and Anya at least likes Loid enough to try. Yor has made monumentally better strides in getting Anya to listen, be better and try harder than Loid ever has because, well... Anya is six. She doesn't need a cold, calculating spy, she needs parents and Yor's earnest and honesty makes her a great parent who is constantly trying to do the best for her child. From the brief glimpses we get of what Nightfall would try to employ as a parent, we have good reason to assume she'd fail just as hard as Loid has and so either Anya would run away, happy to be away from a family that no longer has Yor's warmth and has a slowly deadening Loid, or she'd be sent away once the stress and pain of that environment crushed her.

It is a unique threat that quite only someone from Loid's agency can present and it's a much more interesting reason to hate Nightfall and want to see her fail than Yuri just hating Anya regardless because he sees her as an extension of the sister stealer. It makes her a genuine villain that the regular populace can't replicate. It also allows her more dynamism as she'll do whatever she has to to gain the place of Loid's wife, even act kind to Anya, until finally she no longer needs to. She's a spy after all and this is her mission.

There's one other element here though I want to give a shout out for that is actually easy to overlook for romantic rivals: I want Yor, Twilight and Nightfall to be in a polycule. For Loid and Nightfall to finally have a real conversation and fix the lesson that has poisoned Nightfall so thoroughly. For Yor's kindness to help Nightfall see herself as a real person and not a slave to her image of Twilight. Hell, I even do want to see Nightfall be able to help shore up Yor's skill weaknesses and give Loid someone who can 100% understand his worldview, even as they both fight against keeping up those barriers. Nightfall is mostly a joke, mostly played for comedy but her genuine care for Loid, and how much it devastates her to fail, makes her into a more complex, sympathetic villain who you don't want to see be splattered on the pavement.

I... Well, I won't say Yuri is such a bad character that I want him literally dead but if he got shipped over to this world's version of America for the rest of his life, I would not miss his presence. He is a creep, a man child and quite frankly the best ending for him is probably to literally never be able to see his sister again so as to grow up as a person. Even that implies I even care enough to want to see him grow though as two seasons in, I don't really care. He has ONE truly great sequence that shows his potential and even it shows his critical flaw as a romantic rival: It has literally nothing to do with Loid or Yor. He is only an interesting character outside of the context of those two.

And for a narrative role who's whole job is to complicate and add excitement to the context of the main couple, that makes him a complete failure. So for as great as yuri is in most contexts, make sure you don't write the character Yuri if you're trying to make a good romantic rival. Not unless you wish for night to fall on your story and leave it in the dark.

======+++++======

It's kind of fun how much romance anime I've watched in the like past six months. It's still only three series, Kaguya, Quintessential Quintuplets, and Spy x Family (the last of which is SO many genres) but it did help me have some actual examples when I finally sat down and wrote this. Also, I'm currently poking at theoretically going back to my roots and writing a harem story, though also keeping it PG-13 like my current stylings so honestly, have any anime recommendations for me?

Also, this is probably another Jumbled Thoughts post that goes too much into the example, even if highlighting how Nightfall is a good contrast to Yor is so important to understanding what a good romantic rival looks like.

I have a public Discord for any and all who want to join!

I also have an Amazon page for all of my original works in various forms of character focused romances from cute, teenage romance to erotica series of my past. I have an Ao3 for my fanfiction projects as well if that catches your fancy instead. If you want to hang out with me, I stream from time to time and love to chat with chat.

A Twitter you can follow too

And a Kofi if you like what I do and want to help out with the fact that disability doesn’t pay much.

[halfbakedspuds]

Thanks to @orion-lacroix for the tag! I was gonna get to it earlier but... life happened and I forgor.

Eto bleh. Anyways.

(Also I'm writing this while incredibly tired, so I'm sorry if my English isn't up to scratch)

Writeblr Questionaire

How long have you had your Writeblr/writing Tumblr?

I've had this Tumblr account since the beginning of lockdown (March/April 2020 by us) and I created it because of a PM Seymour video. I made like one post that has now been banished to the void, then forgot I even had a Tumblr account until about ¿June/July? last year when a friend of mine brought up the idea of using Tumblr to share her writing, and I decided to do the same.

What's one thing you'd like your mutuals to know about you?

Due to reasons that include but are not limited to me barely having time anymore, I have a tendency to sometimes take a while to reply to people on here.

Don't worry if it takes like a week for me to respond, I'm just like that sometimes.

What's your favourite thing about the Writeblr community?

The amount of people who are infinitely more skilled than me that I can learn and take inspiration from.

Which WIPs or Writing Projects have you been Noodling about recently?

I've had a few emotional scenes for the Tempest Prince brewing in my head (plus I have like an hour with nothing to do after every exam I write, so daydreaming it is)

I'm also somewhat noodling for a small game I'm working on as a side project, but that's less story-related and more technical shenanigans at this point.

Do you remember what inspired them/got you started?

Children of the Stars I don't remember exactly what inspired the story aspect, but I know what the setting evolved from. Basically, I was a huge Mass Effect fan in primary school. Actually, I was a fan of Scifi overall but Mass Effect was peak gaming for me back then. Then somewhere along the line I played Bulletstorm and Warhammer 40k: Space Marine, and this half daydream of an Alien Empire locked in an eternal war for survival began to evolve in the back of my head before turning into the first recognisable precursor to Children of the Stars somewhere in late 2021.

Echoes of Shadows was inspired by the game Tails Noir, Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo, and a Call of Cthulhu campaign run by a friend of mine way back when.

The Tempest Prince was originally conceived of because my first playthrough of Bloodborne coincided with my first reading of the Percy Jackson books.

Is there anything you'd like to see more of on your dash?

Comics and short stories. Look, I don't have time to read a full length book until, like, November again, so a little episodic escape is a nice way to detox from the crap we need to deal with for these exams.

Name any characters you've created: side characters, protagonists, antagonists, characters who've never been written, the first original abomination you pulled from your rear... whatever you like!

Artemis is a Siberian ARX-11 mechanized shock-drop trooper who was deployed in a conflict so violent that future historians in-universe consider it less of a war than a outright cataclysm.

Quite literally, like the humble sea-turtle: she was born feet first into a hell she never asked for.

She's also one of the incredibly few Androids who not only survived the Fall of Earth, but after her inevitable 'death' by running out of fuel sources, she managed to remain intact for another six hundred years before a Union archaeology team found her and her enclave and managed to restore some of them to working order.

How much time- in your best estimation- do you spend thinking about them?

Outside the story of Children of Strife, this also makes her one of the oldest sentient beings in the known universe and technically the great great grandmother of almost all modern Androids and Biosynths.

It's also rumoured that she helped to raise a child orphaned during the fall of Earth who would grow up to be the military advisor of the first Empress, which technically makes her an important theological figure in the (now dying) Imperial cult.

Yes

Who's the most unhinged?

See, I'd say Adrian from Children of the Stars because he has a tendency to just do shit that makes you worry about his safety, but the thing with him is that he is fully aware of what he's actually capable of and is very cautious to not overstep those limits.

Lyanni, However...

One of Adrian's many nicknames for her is Miragran, which is Callistoan for "Big miracle", because that's what it must've taken for her to have not gotten herself killed yet.

Who comes the most naturally for you to write?

The fact that the answer is Adrian Castellan does not speak kindly about my mental health, does it...

Do you ever cringe at them?

How much control do you have over your characters? Do they ever write themselves, refuse to co-operate or do things you didn't expect? To what extent?

Not really.

Well, except for Adrian being a typical 27th century child who has no conception of sexism/racism/homophobia etc. beyond it being a footnote in a half-forgotten history textbook, which puts him in situations where it takes him a minute or two to realise that someone's being a prick to Lyanni.

I'd say I have relatively decent control over them. With the exception of the Haliday brothers in the Tempest Prince, 'cause they speak the same dialect of English as I do but I need to dial it back a bit because what's understandable for us has moments where it barely looks like English to foreigners.

And every so often I need to go back and un-Saffa their lines a bit because guess what? My dialect is annoyingly insistent on manifesting itself in these characters.

Are some less co-operative than others?

The old version of Adrian's character was really damn uncooperative. Like, he kept feeling like he was sitting on a story that he couldn't tell, and that was why he kept feeling like he was acting wrong no matter what I wrote him doing.

His current iteration tells that story in a way, and that element of tragedy playing into who he is has made him a lot more co-operative.

When someone asks the dreaded "What do you write about?" question, what do you usually say?

See, most people who know that I write are either close friends who already know what I write, or don't care enough to ask.

My grandmother, however, did ask the one time. That was also the day I realised that I know absolutely no scifi terminology in my home language.

Do you enjoy people asking questions about your characters and do you have a preferred way of receiving said questions?

Listen, if you wrote the question as a note, folded it into a paper airplane and threw it through my window, I'd firstly be very concerned about how in the nine hells you figured out where I live, then I'd be utterly ecstatic for the rest of the day because someone asked me a question.

I keep all my socials separate, though, so if you have any questions then asks, comments, and reblogs on Tumblr are pretty much the only way to go.

What makes you follow another Writeblr account? Do you follow them as you see them? Scope them out first to make sure you align with its content? Or do you follow based on WIPs or vibes?

Imma be honest there are like two people on here whom I followed simply because I know them IRL, and like three total writeblrs whom I followed first.

Everyone else followed me and I said "Ey, sha'p," before following back.

Do you interact with non-mutuals often?

I try to.

Do your mutuals' OCs occupy a space in your Noodle?

Absolutely!

No pressure tag for @honeybewrites and @thatoneterrariaplayers-vault,

[vacantgodling]

Writeblr Interview

On the Tumblr Writing Community

How long have you had your writing Tumblr/Writeblr?

been on tumblr in some way since like 2013. been on writeblr specifically since like 2020-2021... ish?

What led you to create it?

ended up leaving twitter (back when it was still twitter) around the time the pandemic happened. i wanted to get back into tumblr because i'd been focusing mostly on twitter for awhile and the yeehan community/my old friends kinda weren't doing shit for me so i wanted to focus more on my original stuff. so i ended up making a writeblr when i heard that was a thing.

What’s your favorite thing about the Writeblr community?

how we really do just be on here talking about our blorbos and having a good time. its nice to have a place to escape with people who also get the importance of not being connected to reality at all times.

Is there anything you’d like to see more of on your dash?

i feel like ask games have kind of died down compared to how they were a few years ago so it'd be nice to make a resurgance of that.

What tips/advice do you have for someone who made a Writeblr today?

honestly just post what makes you happy and actually interact with other people. just trying to promote your own stuff doesn't really work (unless you're an artist tbh) but interacting with other people and making posts talking about what you're making with enthusiasm instead of the "woe is me idk how to talk about my wips but i hope someone will talk with me... :((" like bro idk just talk about it. have a good time. you don't have to follow for follow or follow someone just bc they're a writeblr either i kinda hate that shit. like only follow me if you're actually interested in my shit and vice versa. but that's just a pet peeve. tumblr isn't twitter we are about having a good time here not about promo.

WIP it Good

Which Works-in-Progress (WIPs) or writing projects are you noodling about, lately?

that's a funny way to put this. rn its mostly been tcol just because i've been on a worldbuilding history kick because i've been cramming my brain full of a fucking alternate history youtube channel that my brain is mildly hyperfixated on. but my brain kinda flip flops around to any of my main wips when its convenient.

How long have you been working on them?

tcol's a wip i've had since i was 12 so like. pff 14 years at this point? jesus it sounds so old when i put it like that. paramour just had its 3 year anniversary on 6/19. vdtrt i've also had since 12. btaf is a couple of months old. like. maybe 2 months old lmao.

Do you remember what inspired them/what got you started?

tcol -> the video game etrian odyssey, lotr, history (in general) paramour -> there's so many influences frfr. but the original start was crimson peak and wanting to make something like that but also beauty and the beast and goth lit or whatever vdtrt -> percy jackson btaf -> twilight, but specifically the bella pregnancy arc

How much time, in your best estimation, do you spend thinking about them?

literally all day every day in some capacity

When someone asks the dreaded, “What do you write about,” question, what do you usually say?

"fantasy" i don't really talk to people about my writing at all in general irl anymore tho. just sets up for annoyance and disappointment.

What do you want to say (if it’s different from what you do say)?

"fantasy" like. i really don't like people knowing about my wips esp if i don't think they have the bandwidth to appreciate them. not to sound uppity but like ik the people who i'm around and the shit that intrigues them is just worlds away from what i'm writing whether it be because its fantasy, because it's horror, or because it's queer.

Let’s Rotate Blorbos

Name any characters you created.

so as of counting (and not counting the plethora of flesh blood recently added to tcol) i've got 419 characters and counting. this also doesn't include any of the ocs i have with my partner which is a decent amount. i'll just stick with the mcs of the main wips. so those would be:

hyacinthus, amon, darren, sjaak, biscella, azelie, piper, forte, deux, san, clear

Who’s the most unhinged?

least to most hinged of this list:

SJAAK -> amon -> san -> piper -> hya -> clear -> deux -> biscella -> azelie -> darren -> forte

Who comes the most naturally for you to write?

hya and amon are the easiest to write because i've written them the most. darren is a close second but not first because his whole thing about not using adverbs really trips me up.

Do you ever cringe at them?

nah. i don't cringe at them. i disdain at them. but not really cringe. i get really bad secondhand embarrassment so i don't tend to make characters that make me have that actually cringe reaction.

How much control do you feel you have over your characters?

kinda a weird question for me but tbh i feel like its sort of a 50-50 situation. i tend to make characters firstly out of some utility (aka i need a character to fulfill this role in the plot) and then as i develop them its like the two of us become collaborators on writing the story together. sometimes characters can be a bit stubborn about what they do or don't tell me about their backstories (hya is notorious for this) but for the most part they can't really "hide" things from me or wholly not do what i want them to do. a lot of times i'm going to put them in a situation anyway, they just need to tell me how they'll react to it. if any of that makes sense.

Do you enjoy people asking questions about your characters?

of course :) i sound kind of dead in this questionaire because i'm at work ready to kms. but, sending me asks or talking to me on discord/tumblr messages about any of my idiots is always loved

On Writeblr Engagement

What makes you want to follow another Writeblr account?

i look at the vibes of the account, who they are, if they have an intro and what kind of wips they're writing. i mostly only follow people if i see that their wips interest me. some exceptions can be made, ie: if they interact with a lot of my stuff first and we become friendly and i'm not following them i'll follow after the fact and then get invested in whatever they're doing. but on initial contact i like to see who you are and if your wips are interesting to me.

What makes you decide against following?

wips don't interest me or have things in their wips/in their sphere of focus that i just don't care about or aren't really my cup of tea. like let's say someone puts in their wip/personal intro that they hate fantasy. i write fantasy all the time. so like. probably not gonna follow you. that kind of thing.

Do you interact with non-mutuals often?

not often? i wouldn't mind it bc i actually don't follow that many people (always under 100) but this is bc i can't keep up with people that much and i want to make sure i properly give attention to others if i'm going to be invested in them. but like. i enjoy talking to people about my shit so like. /shrug. i have way more followers than i follow which is why i mentioned i hate when people follow me just bc i'm another writeblr lol. i'd much rather you follow me because you have interest in Me but like, i can't control people frfr.

Do your mutuals’ characters occupy space in your noodle?

yeah! that's why i try to keep who i follow kind of in lower ranges. i have bad memory and it takes me awhile to warm up to people, but when i follow someone its because i want to be friendly and get invested in what they do. so like, i try to do that. i'm not the best but i do try.

[coles-scythe]

Very very rough WIP of my man 2D for a redraw of a redraw of a screenshot of a virtual live performance. Sharing on here bc I don't want this to get much attention and I wanna gush about him a lil. Old art + screenshot and f/o gushing under the cut.

AAAA the improvement from the sketch alone holy cowwww. The drawing is August of 2019, so nearly 4 years ago. Very excited to finish this one, hopefully I can tomorrow.

Anyways-- I wanna talk about my history of listening to Gorillaz and my slowburn crush on 2D. Plus a little of what I've figured out about my S/I.

2D is one of my older F/Os by technicality. I never actively self shipped with him until recently, but I've had that big crush on him since I was a freshman in high school. So around 2016/17. I was vaguely aware of Gorillaz before then, but only because my cousins had shown me two different music videos. One of Clint Eastwood, and the other of Devil Inside by Slipknot. Watching those back-to-back + having a phobia of eyes did not turn out well and for the longest time I was terrified of 2D because my cousins told me he didn't have eyes at all. I later learned from a friend I met in my freshman year that isn't entirely true, his eyes just have eight ball fractures and are drawn to look like they're gone. I had also apparently confused the Slipknot music I had heard for the Clint Eastwood video, so that friend made me watch the video again with them and I realized I actually really like the song lol. From there I fell down the whole rabbit whole for Gorillaz and 2D quickly became one of my favs. Russell is sorta still my fav because I'm biased towards drummers, but Stu is a very close second LOL. I read a bunch of fanfiction, mainly X Readers of him on Wattpad. Fun fact, this is also around the time I started seriously questioning my gender, and started reading/writing male readers to explore those feelings lol.

So then I listened to their music and doodled them occasionaly when I was first starting art in my sophomore year, but I didn't really get involved in the fandom or anything besides reading fanfiction on Wattpad. 2017 was peak for me since they dropped Saturnz Barz after years of silence from Plastic Beach. Despite all the new music I was constantly listening to, my mini-hyperfixation on the bad quickly faded. Two years passed before I realized it, it was suddenly 2019 and I was a fresh high school graduate with a massive hyperfixation on Splatoon. Phase 5 had concluded a few months prior and my brain decided it was a great time to have a little redux of my Gorillaz hyperfixation.

I started drawing them, mainly 2D, more often and got very into the fandom on Insta and Tumblr. Met some pretty chill people, a few of whom I'm still mutuals with on my main :D!! But the entire time, I was still in my "self ship is cringe" phase and kinda ignored anything I was feeling towards 2D. I was still reading and contemplating making my own X Reader fics of him on Wattpad, but that was all irrelevant to me I guess. Eventually that hyperifxation on them passed and I returned to my regularly scheduled Splatoon hyperfix.

Fast forward to another year later in 2020 and into 2021, I finally embraced my cringe and started self shipping again for the first time since I was like 9. First with Erik from Dragon Quest, then several Persona characters (most importantly Adachi lol), then Happy Chaos, and I've been jumping around from crush to crush I've had since I was a kid. Very good for the soul, 10/10 would reccomend reconnecting with childhood F/Os lol. As of a few months ago I starting thinking of 2D as a potential F/O before officially naming him a romantic F/O!!

All this time I've been tossing around different ideas for a self insert, but haven't really explored it until I named him my F/O. I'm still figuring that stuff out, but I at least know they knew each other before D-Day! Not too sure about Phase 1 stuff, but I do know they'll reappear in Stu's life during the band's break between Phases 1 and 2 and maybe they start dating each other by the time Phase 2 does roll around OwO. And then my insert also gets kidnapped by Murdoc and gets shipped off to Plastic Beach with 2D. They become the stand-in drummer for the band while Russ is MIA. Then for Phase 4 and beyond? I have no idea lol.

Sorry for just rambling about this, but I like sharing the origin stories for my F/Os and 2D is one of those that has a very long and somewhat complicated story. I've liked him a lot since I really got into the band's music, but I was so absorbed into cringe culture and avoiding being called cringe that I just ignored any potential story I could tell between us. Plus all the gender dysphoria and less than stellar reactions I got from my friends didn't exactly help matters lol. But I'm no longer an egg, those unsupportive friends are out of my life, and I am cringe and I am free babey!!!

[bougonia]

Hey OP, sorry in advance for the essay but you stumbled upon something I've been thinking about a lot recently. Yes, perfumes are more popular due to advertising but it extends far beyond scentbird.

So... I just (rather abruptly) snapped out of a several-months-long fixation on fragrance. I had always been somewhat interested in fragrance from a sensory-seeking perspective but a few months ago I was reminded that there were various online communities about fragrance, a switch flipped in my brain, and I became completely obsessed. Spending hours and hours per day on various subreddits, websites, and blogs dedicated to personal fragrance.

While I did spend a lot of time just earmarking different scents that I wanted to try (most of which I never actually tried-- it was more of a "the research is the fun" kind of thing), I also became familiar with the culture surrounding perfumes, how we talk about them, and why they're having such a big cultural moment right now.

Up until recently, fragrance had more or less been a woman's game. There was enough cologne enthusiasts to keep the industry going and your average man would have a bottle or two, but if you pulled a random person off the street and asked if they wear fragrance daily, more women were going to say yes than men. Here's a survey among university students from 2020-- 56% of men vs 81% of women.

But as much as the recent trend targets women and girls, it has affected men and boys far more. In January 2023, r/perfumes had 21.2k members and has now increased by (a still absurd) 480% to 123k. r/colognes, on the other hand, had a mere 7165, and has now increased to 92k, an increase of almost 1200%. That is more than double the rate of growth. For context: reddit's userbase as a whole has increased about 21%.

(I wish I could get better data, including when the majority of users joined up, but because of reddit's API changes last year that's not really feasible)

To be clear, I do get that a certain amount is just due to the natural consequence of diminishing returns. Since more women were interested fragrance in the first place (enough to join a subreddit, anyway), there's a larger body of potential men and boys who could become consumers. But what makes people get "into" them in the first place? Obviously (and as OP pointed out) advertising.

And boy howdy are they advertising to men and boys. Specifically cisgender, heterosexual males aged 13 to 25. (Yes, 13. There was a New York Times article about the rise of designer cologne among teenage boys.)

There are so many tiktokkers and youtubers who are recieving promotional bottles of very expensive scents (seriously, it isn't uncommon for a single bottle to cost >$250, and a $100 bottle is often considered inexpensive) in return for hyping them up.

There are so many youtube videos that are top 10 lists of perfumes you need to buy Right Now using terms like "panty dropper", "smellmaxxing", and "beast mode". An emphasis is put on how the perfumes will get you compliments, how ladies love them, and how they are "the best scent" (which I find absurd; scent is a very subjective experience).

But why are boys watching these videos in the first place? What drew them there?

I actually don't necessarily think this was initially a calculated move by the perfume industry. They're encouraging and capitalizing on it now, for sure, but I don't think the initial domino was intended at all.

In my opinion, ground zero for the cologne phenomenon: Jeremy Fragrance.

Jeremy Fragrance has been a fairly popular youtuber for some time now, having been reviewing fragrances since 2014. But around December 2022, he began to go viral for his odd behavior. Interest in him died down for a little bit, but then again in March 2023 he goes viral again. After that, the previously eccentric man began an extended meltdown (theorized to be the result of cocaine usage) that cemented him as a target of parody and mockery. For lack of a better term, he became a lolcow. Clips of him would frequently go viral on tiktok-- particularly (albeit not exclusively) among teen boys and young men.

And that tiktok virality had an interesting side effect. As anyone who has ever used tiktok can tell you, it has a tendency to send you down rabbit holes. For all intents and purposes, Jeremy Fragrance was a fragrance reviewer. So you and your buddies watch a few of his videos, have a good chuckle, and then tiktok keeps showing you fragrance reviews. And hey, this sounds kind of interesting actually, maybe this would help me with women...

Eventually the tiktok algorithm recognizes that other content for teen boys and young men is frequently viewed alongside cologne reviews. So other members of that demographic get those reviews. And so on and so forth-- a self-reinforcing loop.

This is a major win for fragrance companies. More interest in reviews = more reviewers = more people to get to shill for you.

Of course, I don't think Jeremy Fragrance is the only factor. I don't think people would have taken to fragrance in the same way if there wasn't already fertile cultural soil for such a trend.

I suspect the (perceived or real) disenfranchisement of boys, the same atmosphere that bred manosphere content, is at least partially to blame. There's certainly some overlap in rhetoric. I can also imagine it's a reaction to the ubiquitous punchline that teen boys are smelly and gross.

I think a similar thing happened among women, except with a bunch of smaller, less conspicuous factors. Instead of the viral smash of Jeremy Fragrance, they had the "clean girl", skincare, and other trends that encouraged girls and young women to buy all sorts of products to perfect their bodies, fragrance included. Fragrance companies, having perfected social media marketing, could pull the same tricks.

(The idea of needing to have a different perfume for every occasion/season is more or less a new phenomenon outside of hobby circles. Sure is convenient for perfume companies, though...)

The increase of girls' interest in perfumes is more or less ignored. Granted, it's not as striking as teen boys suddenly spending thousands of dollars on niche and designer perfume, but it is a massive increase. But hey, women are supposed to be into perfumes, after all. It's just another one of those costs of femininity that we expect women to bear.

Obviously a lot of this is just speculation on my end. My suspicion that it's Jeremy Fragrance's fault is especially suspect. But a lot of this is based on trends that I have noticed, and I'm far from the only one.

Anyway, I love the idea of perfumes. I love having a scent that you really like that you can smell whenever you feel like it. I like coming across something and thinking, woah, I didn't know perfumes could smell like that. However, I am very disillusioned with the perfume industry, and I especially hate the way that they utilize social media to push their overpriced products (which have been getting more and more expensive!), especially to young people who lack the critical thinking to realize they're being advertised to.

"advertising doesn't work" the increase in scentbird ads and people talking about a "personal signature scent" directly correlates with my family's interest in perfumes. Even if they're not using scentbird, something probably changed to make them want perfumes more, right?

[notebookmusical]

Hi! I'm so glad you had fun! Oh that's so interesting about your accent. I've heard about people losing their accent. It actually reminds me a little bit of Taylors country accent and if it was more of an act and if she will do it for Debut TV. I hope so..even if it's just a little bit. I do actually like hearing her baby voice unlike some people. I guess I have a California accent.

So I think I mostly agree with your choices. I read that they are cutting out Damian's song and they're also adding a song by Renee featuring Megan Thee Stallion. I haven't heard it yet but I think it's out now. I know it's to probably appeal more to audiences that don't like musicals but I do like Megan so it's fine. Maybe it's a girl power type song and I'm sure it's in the credits anyway. Either way, I don't like listening to a musical soundtrack before the movie so I won't find out until I watch it. I don't know why..i guess I like being surprised by the songs, so if I see Wonka, this will be the case. I am curious to see how the music will be in that one. But Megan was also in a scene in another musical called Dicks the musical which I haven't watched either so I find it interesting. That one was more a parody of musicals I think but Nathan Lane was in it so that's something. Also I keep forgetting to listen to Renee's music! I think her deluxe album came out recently so hopefully I will soon.

I haven't listened to Sabrinas yet either but I definitely will..maybe on Christmas day. I saw a video of her performing the new years song and I was intrigued. It was almost like sexy..and different than I expected, but I liked it. I also forgot that Laufey has Christmas music too so I will play that as well and Kelly Clarkson has new Christmas songs too. But I totally know how you feel about the two weeks in between. I also feel that way from Christmas to New Year's Day. I always thought it would be weird to have a birthday close to Christmas honestly but yours isn't that close. I can't believe it's so close already..I hardly ever feel in the holiday spirit anymore. But I also wanted to ask you what are some of your favorite Christmas movies?

I love Lana! I would recommend listening to Born to Die. That's her first album and where her overall vibe and aesthetic come from, and why she was so popular on Tumblr back in 2012. That's how I found out about her and a lot of other artists back in high school. Yes..I have been on Tumblr for like almost 15 years lol. My sister and I were actually just talking about this. Like there are a lot of people on here who are two or three years younger than me and it doesn't seem like they're into Lana. Instead they're more into Lorde or Halsey which became popular a few years later. I still like them but that was past my high school years so I was never obsessed like with Lana. I also found Marina and the Diamonds, Arctic Monkeys, and the 1975 kinda and I still like them. So I do find it interesting a 15 year old would like it so much now but I was also 15 so maybe it makes sense. Anyway I would also recommend Ultraviolence and the album Norman fucking Rockwell. Honeymoon album has a more cinematic sound if you're interested in that. She also released two albums close together in 2020 like Taylor. I'm not sure if it was that back to back, but the albums are sort of a pair to me and it kinda matches a more stripped down Folklore style too. Her newest album is also good but overall I think her newer albums have gotten slower and some people don't like that vibe. She always has one or two songs like the old Lana though. I can always give you some song recs too if you want.

Thats one of my goals for this next year for sure..to read more books on my shelf. I'm still working on a list for now. I'm not sure if I will be able to finish Night Circus in January though just cuz it seems a little long so maybe I will move it to a different month. I also don't know when I will read Chloe Brown..maybe in February cuz it's a romance but thanks for letting me know. If I like that one, hopefully I can read the rest of the series. What are some of your other reading goals? Do you have a list of books you wanna read for next year yet? Also what were some of your favorite books of the year? Sorry that I was just kinda rambling about memoirs for a second there. I do remember liking Crying in Hmart but I think I was listening to an audiobook or something that I never finished. I think I remember reading it around this same time last year actually cuz I told myself I would finish it before the year ends but I just didn't. I definitely wanna finish it before the movie comes out though. Maybe I will try to finish a book I'm in the middle of now by the end of the year but I just have to make time for it. I forgot to ask you..what is your favorite sitcom? Mine is..no surprise, and a basic answer..Friends and the Office! Which is why I got their memoirs haha. I also really wanna finally start watching Abbott Elementary eventually next year.

I have seen both the movie and musical bootleg of Once. I saw the movie way before and am not as familiar with the musical. I think they made some small changes though so it does make me wonder about a La La Land musical. Falling Slowly is one of my favorite songs ever though. I also liked Begin Again with the same writer or director. This was not a musical but it did have some music in it and all of his films do. I also enjoyed Sing Street and I think he has a more recent film I haven't watched. But even Sing Street was on Broadway I think and that had changes too but I'm not really sure. I loved all the songs from Sing Street. They were all pretty different but music connects them and I like them all. I will pretty much watch any movie with singing or songs in it.

I mostly still love Taylor and always will but I do think parts of the fandom have to do with it. She was still my top artist mostly cuz she put out two long albums I played a bunch. I don't know why it feels different cuz I didn't feel like it leading up to 1989 or anything so maybe it has to do with me more than Taylor. I've actually had a dream where I met her recently and another where she revealed some rep vault or it could've been TS11 track titles. Lol those were probably way off but I am still excited for it! I hope you have a good weekend and holiday if you wanna take your time to reply! It was actually funny cuz I was scrolling my dash when I saw your reply to my ask come up yesterday. It made me realize how long my messages really are lol so sorry for that or to all of your followers haha. But it also made me laugh and I just couldn't reply until now. It's been a long time since I have made a new friend in general and that could be part of it too so I always appreciate you replying. I guess you are an easy person to talk to.

hello friend!! sorry this is late :( — guess who is sick again :/ i hope you're having a good weekend!! merry christmas, if i don't speak to you before that 🤍

i think debut tv will sound very weird without her accent, but then again maybe it won't! i'm torn because sometimes with the rerecordings, things don't sound the most ... natural (like the laugh in hey stephen / the end of stay stay stay) so we'll just have to see! ugh i loveeee her little baby voice. i was out grocery shopping earlier and heard her version of last christmas and was so excited about it!

i don't know how i feel about all of these changes! i'm trying to keep an open mind, and i will say that i always thought the mean girls score was weaker than what i was hoping it'd be (like legally blonde) but it is quite fun! i listened to part of the credits song, and then got distracted and then never went back to it! i've heard of dicks the musical, but haven't seen it yet (which should not be a surprise)! i think my friend saw it and said it was fun though!!

i rewatched white christmas last week, and i also have a soft spot for holiday inn (both musical + movie)! and i loveeeed love actually! i know some people think of little women as a christmas movie too, so little women 2019 must be on my list! and then i ironically / unironically love the christmas prince netflix films; they're so awful! what about you? do you have any favorite christmas movies?

i listened to some of born to die yesterday and was like "ah yes, i do remember listening to this one back in the day and liking it"! i've also been on tumblr for far too long :) i do like lorde and halsey! and i liked some marina stuff that was popular at the time — my tumblr favorite was definitely the 1975 + taylor! i listened to some of Did You Know That There's a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd when it first came out, and i really liked margaret! you know i'll always take recommendations from you 🤍 even if it takes me a while to get through!

i'm almosttttt done with my night circus reread! i'm hoping to be able to be done with it by tuesday, and then finish les mis by the end of the year and that'll be it for me! i haven't thought about my 2024 reading goals toooooo much but that'll be my first blog post on my book blog for the new year, so i'll have to start thinking about it soon!! i think i mostly just want to work on reading arcs/gifted books/books already on my physical tbr, but we'll see! some of my favorite books this year were: conversations on love, half a soul by olivia atwater, when broadway was black: the triumphant story of the all-black musical that changed the world by caseen gaines, the missing of clairdelune by christelle dabos, and the seven year slip by ashley poston — on a whole i think this year was kind of a mediocre reading year, but that's okay! what about you? what were some of your favorites this year?

i've never seen friends or the office! i think my favorite sitcom would have to be schitt's creek! a lot of my friends love abbott elementary so i've been thinking about starting it too!!

i've been meaning to watch begin again but haven't! i didn't realize it had the same writer + director as once! and yes!! sing street had a very short stint on broadway; i hope it makes its way back someday, i really loved the cast recording and what i heard of it!

i'm with you; i do think the fandom noise unfortunately has soured some of my feelings towards her at times. but i still love love love her music; i just need to distance myself from her + the fans! omg that dream must've been so cool! do you remember any of the titles? and no worries; i can always put my responses under a read more :) i love chatting with you 🤍!! hope you're having a good day! xx

[free--therapy]

Hii it's anon! Thank you for all the advice again, I'm always grateful 🫶 I thought about it a lot and honestly, recently, it's been weirdly better? I mean, it gets bad then it gets good again...kinda like that.

I know it's very much up and down still. It's like two steps forward and one step backward and so on. At the beginning of the week, I read your responses and I have better perspectives on whatever I'm worrying about but even I don't know how the week is going to turn out, what new or old irrational thoughts will pop up and affect me, etc. So even I don't know how my mind is going to be by the end of the week, it's kinda adventurous and funny lol

Even now, any worry related to the same old worries pops up, kinda affects me and makes me worry but then eventually in a day or two (or sometimes maybe a week or two haha), I can see with more clarity how it's no different than any other irrational thoughts and worries.

It's just a cycle and like you mentioned, healing isn't linear. I very well know this is just a setback. One of the worries I started overthinking about two years ago is just back is all. I also know that while things may seem like they get bad again after some momentary peace and clarity, but one thing that won't ever go away is that I know my mind better now and that's something that is definitely different now.

I just wanted to talk about the thing I mentioned with me being worried about if things will get back to how they were two/three years ago and about the whole forums and videos situation. I just thought maybe I should clearly share what exactly it is that I've been thinking about and worrying related to that.

So when I first had a panic attack (I remember it was August 2020- I was a 19 y/o back then), it was around when I had lost a friend due to an accident. We weren't that close but I still considered him a friend and a classmate I could depend on. After that incident, for some days, I kept thinking things like, what did he do to deserve this, he was such a nice person, why do we get to live so carefree and he didn't, I thought it was so unfair. I was down and in sort of disbelief but then thought, I should let it go. On top of that, around that same time, I had ongoing health issues so I was troubled by that too.

So both those situations together led me to have a exhausting day and one night, I started feeling dizzy from all the worrying and health issues, I was feeling weird so I searched the symptoms up on google and heart attack came up and I was instantly triggered lol

I had my legs shaking on and off for hours that night lol and to make things worse, I didn't know what that shaking was. So I was convinced that I really was having a heart attack or something 😆 I didn't know what panic attacks were and had never even considered the idea of being anxious. The search results even said, that after symptoms of heart attack, it could occur after few days too and I was on high alert lol

This sounds ridiculously funny to share now but it was a very major problem for me three years back 😆 Anyway, after a crazy amount of searching on the internet, I came to the conclusion that this was anxiety. But that conclusion triggered me too because I only read bad things about it online and started worrying if it meant I already have a disorder within a few days. I was worrying about everything going on because I didn't understand what was going on lol

After that, I caught COVID and lost my sense of smell/taste and read articles about how some people didn't get it back and that triggered me so bad. My family caught COVID too but no one had that symptom so it was scary. It took me about 20 days something for the sense to come back and until it did, I would experience that shaking of legs at night every single night. I would even wake up around the same time every night due to the worries and anxiety and had so bad sleep. I mean, I was worried about the smell/taste thing and I was also worried about the panic attacks.

Right from the first time I experienced a panic attack till the time my sense of smell and taste came back, it was a period of a little over a month. And for that whole period, I was so anxious and just a whole different person. I was constantly just googling and reading stuff about my symptoms and watched a whole lot of videos about anxiety and related stuff.

But in those videos and redit forums, the people were talking about ALL the negative experiences. They talked about stuff I didn't know about like de-personalization, panic/anxiety attacks, and whole lot other stuff that they had struggled with or were struggling with. I didn't know any of that but somehow my mind ended up coming to the conclusion that when or if you have anxiety, it means you'll have all those symptoms those people were talking about.

Basically I had it all backwards. I thought if I had anxiety, I'll get all those symptoms too. So I completely rejected the idea and told myself "this is just stress and overthinking" I kept convincing myself "it wasn't anxiety and just too much stress" or something like that.

After my sense of smell/taste came back, I forgot all about it and just moved on as if nothing had happened but I did sort of develop health anxiety after that. Because I already had health issues, there was the whole pandemic situation going around and things like oxygen shortages in people and my COVID symptoms- all of them led to me overthinking any minor health change and googling it.

Anytime I had any change in health, I would google and read articles and forums what it meant, etc. But I got over it. Then again, around December that same year, I started experiencing jaw pain all of a sudden and the googling habit came back. Somehow all that searching led me to read something about fibromyalgia (serious chronic pain condition) and I was convinced I was developing that. Again, I was VERY conscious of anytime any part of my body ached or hurt even a little. And since I was so focused on it, I noticed all the minor aches and pains that we usually ignore. I was so worried about the chronic pain thing. Then I read that anxiety might make you feel more pain too and I was triggered again. I thought maybe this was anxiety and it might lead to me developing chronic pain. Until my doctor said I was deficient in vitamin d so maybe the pain is from that. I was relieved and started taking supplements and forgot about the worries again. I wasn't until early February 2021 that I realised I was actually having a wisdom tooth lol 😆

Now all this on and off worrying and extensive google searching about any health problem and about anxiety symptoms, etc. lasted from August 2020 to early February 2021. I mean, I had months in between when I didn't think or worry about anything but also months where I was obsessively worrying.

I had some other things related to health that I worried about too but it'll get too long if I mention it all. But that whole period was crazy.

After that, by end of February, somehow, I came to realise that every health problem that I had worried about had turned out to be nothing but a false alarm. I realised that it wasn't any problem and I was just focusing too much on normal health issues and worrying about it. So I decided to stop googling anything related to health at all. What I decided was if I did notice any pain or health problem, I would give it three to five days and if it still persist only then would I think of visiting a doctor or searching for relief online. And it worked and I completely got over any worrying after that. But I also convinced myself all of that wasn't anxiety at all but just some stress which was wrong of course but since I had gotten over the unhealthy behaviours, I stopped thinking about anything related to that completely.

About the aches and pains, I also came to the conclusion that it wasn't anxiety that was making me feel pain in random parts of my body but that almost all times, the minor aches and pains were already there. But I also realised that it's the same for everyone, every person feels aches and pains here and there but it's just we usually don't focus on it so we don't realise it until it hurts enough to notice. But since I was so focused on it, I was noticing every minute ache/pain in my body that we usually don't even notice. I realised the aches and pains were not something new that I was developing due to some condition or due to anxiety, but rather it's something that is always there and it's the same for everyone. We just don't notice those until we really tune into our bodies and focus on it. And This is something I still believe as well!

Anyway, so I was doing great again until August 2021 when it was raining one night and I suddenly remembered all the worrying and panic attacks and the whole depressed state I was in that same time a year ago. After remembering it, I was so scared of it coming back that I ended up having a panic attack again. And since I had not accepted that it was anxiety, and I didn't have any ideas on how to combat those thoughts, I didn't know what was going on. I was remembering all those youtube videos about anxiety and what people had said and all those posts from those forums and stuff. Remembering all that negativity mad eme remember a post about one person talking about how they had enough and wanted to die or something and remembering that post triggered me so bad.

I decided to go for therapy since I had some savings around that time! In my first week of therapy, I remembered many random negative posts I had read on those forums and that one particular post made me think of the word "death" and I was SO triggered. I didn't know where it came from and so it got stuck. I made the mistake of googling it (I hadn't googled anything in a long time) and all kinds of stuff about intrusive thoughts and OCD came up which further triggered me because again, I started worrying if i was developing intrusive thoughts or OCD or something like that. Searching it up was a mistake because it led me to about a month or two of more and more worries popping and up and a cycle of reading those forums and watching those youtube videos again.

Of course, this time I had a therapist so she helped me understand how those habits were bad and asked me to let go of it. Around end of September 2021, I stopped searching stuff again but I was still worried about intrusive thoughts and OCD though. I would worry if any random habit of mine was a compulsion or not and what I would do if I started having intrusive thoughts too, etc.

I read about ALL kinds of intrusive thoughts people with OCD had or worried about and ended up somehow just subconsciously making it a problem for myself.

What I had concluded again was if I had OCD then I would have intrusive thoughts. I again had it the other way around basically. That's why I developed a fear of OCD and similar disorders because I thought if I had them then it would mean that I would have intrusive thoughts all my life too.

But I would tell purposely imagine all those thoughts/images I read people talk about and realise "oh I'm not bothered by these thoughts/images though" so I thought maybe those intrusive thoughts didn't affect me like that. I was following some mental health positivity pages here on this site and I did ask one or two of them about intrusive thoughts even though I wasn't particularly bothered.

Around that time, since those people on the mental health pages were so nice, I started feeling guilty for asking them. That led me to spiral about the whole thing with mistakes and guilt. I would remember any mistake or bad thing I did in the past and start worrying what I should do about it. I felt like if I didn't do anything about it, I would keep feeling guilty. I thought maybe I should then apologise or tell the people involved about whatever I did, but apologising for every small thing from the past was practically impossible. I remembered any random thing I did that could induce guilt and/or shame and start overthinking about what I should do about it now. I started worrying if this meant I no longer deserved happiness, peace, healing and anything good. I started worrying if i didn't deserve to hear anything good from others. I started thinking in a negative way about myself like if someone was nice to me, I would think "if only they knew the things I did, they wouldn't say this or wouldn't want to be associated with me"

And my therapist told me this was just anxiety making me think like that. I didn't "have" to do anything about all those mistakes and that I could move on without doing anything too, that I didn't have to feel guilty about things since I was still just young and was overthinking. But still I had many worries and was anxious, I was worrying about the mistakes thing and about the intrusive thoughts and OCD too. But therapy was helping me stay positive.

This was also the time when I found you on here! I can't explain how much you and your page helped me understanding so many things too. I'm always grateful 💗

I stopped therapy in January 2022 and soon got the news that lockdown was completely ending and university was starting up again  with physical classes instead of online. So I was happy that I would finally start going out. And as I started going out again, I started seeing how trivial my worries were. I saw everyone around me made mistakes and experienced things like me but maybe they just didn't overthink too much so I decided to do that too!

I moved on with my life and was doing so good. Around the end of June 2022, I had vacations and did experience a setback where I started worrying about the mistakes again and you helped me with it too and by this time, I had better healthier thinking patterns. About a month or so of worrying, I decided to move on again as University was starting again in August 2022 and university started and again, I got over the worries.

Throughout 2022 and first half of 2023, I did have those worries about mistakes and guilt come up here and there sometimes but it was very minor so I was doing great and living life and having fun. I saw how everyone made mistakes but people didn't stay stuck on those so I decided to do that and was doing great.

But at the same time, since I was overthinking and worrying about the same topic (mistakes) every now and then, so I got comfortable with dealing with those worries. Because I knew "this worry is the same as always" so I knew I could leave it behind.

It was around last week of June this year (last month I mean), all those worries started coming back and while in the last one and a half year, I was dealing with the mistakes thing very good but I didn't think much about the intrusive thought worry. So when that worry came up around the end of last month, I was ended up getting into that overthinking and worrying cycle again.

And since unlike the past year and a half where most of my intrusive thoughts would be what ifs about my mistakes and guilt, this time, the topic completely changed to intrusive images and associations and other old worries that I thought didn't affect me at all or that I thought I had gotten over.

Of course, now I have much better and healthier thinking patterns and I know I won't lose them or forget them. I also know that intrusive thoughts is something everyone has and associations is something everyone has too. I also know I ended up worrying about them because I had read all those posts two years back.

However, I don't have any of those negative thinking and behaviour patterns from two/three years back now. I never search things up, don't read any forums and watch videos. I share this with you and I know that I can share it with my sister too! Maybe if needed, after some months, when I get a job, I'll try therapy again too. I'm trying my best to look at the positive side and think more rationally!

I'm sorry for writing SO MUCH, I just thought I should share this because it helps me explain my other worries more clearly too. That said, I'm still sorry for writing too much. I'm also thankful to you for being here as well! I know I always say this but it's because I always mean it 💗

Hey Anon,

That's so great that you seem to be getting the hang of it and that you're starting to get a handle of how it works and even what to anticipate. It's true that you'll never know what your worry/worries of the week will be, but even that shouldn't be a reason to worry. The whole goal of dealing with anxiety is being able and ready to handle anything that comes your way because you will never not have some sort of anxious thought pop up to try and take you over. The idea is to make sure you conquer these thoughts before they conquer you ;)

I'm so sorry to hear about your friend. That's awful and I can totally understand how unfair it feels to lose good people so soon. Loss can definitely trigger a lot in people, especially when it's something you haven't really experienced before, or at least with someone so close. I know I used to obsess over the deaths of kids who went to my high school or even people who were my age at the time. It's so sad to know that their lives were ended so quickly and you get to continue on with your life.

Covid was a scary time for most people, so I can totally understand what you were going through. I lost my sense of smell/taste too so I went to those reddit forums to see how long it took others to get it back lol. But I know my limit with these forums because I was like you and would spend countless hours on end just reading other people's experiences, but a majority of them are negative because people with more positive experiences or mindsets don't typically spend their time on these forums. So that's why I say it's very easy to be triggered or have your anxious thoughts enabled because you're around people who are stuck in unhelpful thinking patterns and negativity biases. I've also noticed that a lot of people will convince themselves that they have something that they really don't because they may have a few symptoms of something, but not the others, but they also almost unconsciously try and make themselves have those symptoms so they can fit themselves into the boxes better. It's not helpful at the end of the day for someone who is trying to look for something comforting as opposed to something that will only make you feel worse.

Anon, you make me want to cry. You've come such a long way and you're doing amazing! Never feel guilty for wanting to share what you want to share. Thank you for sticking around with me as I try my best to communicate with you all the things I hope that helps you. I'm grateful for you as well and knowing that I can help others the same way I wished someone helped me. I appreciate you

[hesnotsinging]

Adore You

TLDR: it's my personal belief that he started lip-syncing Adore You during the second show of the European leg of Love on Tour 2022 (Manchester Night 1) and has been doing it ever since. So, just to be clear, if he is lip-syncing this song, it's a very recent development.

I fully admit that this one is tricky and I could be wrong. Let me explain why: this is a song that I truly think Harry has a lot of trouble singing live as it was written and always has which isn't ideal as it's one of his most well-known songs. It's why he lowers parts of the majority verses and chorus an octave for most performances. He especially struggles with the ending of it in the current tour arrangement when he finally attempts to bring the chorus up to its original higher range. Realistically speaking, this could simply be a case of him singing the song enough times that he's now gotten the hang of the harder parts and doesn't struggle with it as much as he used to. Singing is like anything else, you do it enough, and you're going to improve in certain ways.

...but I'm still like, 99% sure he currently does not sing it live anymore.

The first thing I'm going to do is show you a video of him clearly lip-syncing it. It's his performance of the song at the 2022 Capital FM Summertime Ball and it's absolutely insane how mechanic his vocals sound here. If I'm right about when he started lip-syncing Adore You, this was one of the first times he did it. It'll also not only be a great reference for the rest of the videos in this post both actually live and fake but it's a great opportunity to tell you exactly what to look for when it comes to this song being lip-synced. Here it is:

A lot of it has to do with the fact that he never strays from the current arrangement. Ever. All performances of it sound exactly the same verbatim but there are some particular moments to look out for:

0:55 he never sings the 'you' to finish the phrase 'adore you' at the end of the chorus, just goes right into 'like it's the only thing I'll ever do.' While this could simply be a phrasing choice, the fact that he never sings it is interesting.

1:00 he never sings the second 'like it's the only thing I'll ever do' at the end of the first chorus.

1:30 the lyric 'I just want to tell you something' always sounds exactly the same with ascending notes.

1:35 he always does the riff at the end of 'baby you've been on my mind' during the word 'mind' and it always sounds the same.

1:58 This time, he sings the second 'like it's the only thing I'll ever do' and comes in late on the word 'only.' It always sounds like this. I'll give him and his team credit for this cause it's really clever. It seems he pre-recorded a line to start late so it sounds like he's singing it live.

2:20 I'd like to point out that his mic seems to randomly shut off here cause he says something but nothing comes out. The lyrics even seem to come out just fine but his cute-sy little "okay" is extremely quiet. Technical difficulties? Maybe but the arrangement of this section is always the same with or without his "okay" being loud. He always lets the audience sing 'just let me adore you' here.

2:42 the "hey" is one of the only things in this song that he does live anymore, at least as far as I can tell.

2:47 his little riff at the end of 'walk through fire for you' is always there and the ending is always the same, with no changes ever.

Just as a quick comparison, this is a video of him singing Adore You live at the Capital FM Jingle Bell Ball in 2019:

It's pretty obvious if you ask me.

As always, I'll be fair. Here are some actual live performances so you can tell the difference and again, you can watch as many or as few of these videos as you want:

SiriusXM 2020

Howard Stern 2020

Today Show Soundcheck 2020

Graham Norton 2019

From what I can tell, he sang this live during the entire American leg of LOT 2021. Here are some examples of that:

LOT Las Vegas 2021: this was the first show of his LOT tour, he also forgets words during it so it's absolutely live.

LOT Los Angeles 2021

LOT San Antonio 2021

LOT Glasgow 2022: This was the first show of the European leg 2022 and I honestly believe this is the last time he sang Adore You live on tour.

LOT Manchester 2022: (warning to headphone users!) Just based on what I've watched, I do believe this is the show when he started fully lip-syncing this song. After this, every performance of this starts sounding exactly the same.

LOT London 2022

LOT Stockholm 2022

LOT Hamburg 2022

LOT Vienna 2022

LOT New York 2022

LOT Austin Night 1 2022

LOT Los Angeles Harryween 2022

LOT Los Angeles Night 1 2022

LOT Buenos Aires 2022: as of writing this, this is one of his most recent performances of the song.

In conclusion, if he is lip-syncing it, he hasn't been doing it as long as TPWK which has been for the majority of Love on Tour.