#anyway I'm too old for this fandom bullshit i just want to enjoy my fandoms in peace

[damagedfletching]

Something else the ship wars have made me aware of (and in turn made me want to rant again, so either buckle up or leave):

It's something that really bugs me, not just in fandom but in real life too- I spent the majority of my teenage years on 4chan, thinking I was a hardcore edgelord with the memes I posted and found funny. When I've had episodes in the past because of my mental health, I've done and said really abhorrent and immoral things. I used to call bad things 'gay' and joke about women 'asking for it'. Considering the way certain members of the fandom are digging up old posts from actors, I'm VERY glad my time in the trenches isn't accessible anymore, because dear god I was awful.

But you know what happened? I learned, I got better, I did my part and changed. Fandom, and the greater media in general, seems to forget (or disregard) that people CAN and do change and grow and learn. There seems to be an inability in general to believe that people can learn from their mistakes, and especially celebrities are constantly reminded of their wrongdoings instead of the fact they changed and the good that did. Some things ARE unforgivable, but y'all act like stupid memes from ten years ago is the equivalent to murder. I know if I was constantly attacked for dumbass 18yo me and their decisions I wouldn't get better, and I've seen others even double down on their bullshit SIMPLY because they enjoy being defiant and edgy.

Maybe I'm being naïve because I prefer to see the good in people first, and believe that everyone can change their views with education. But I've also learned in my optimism that people won't change if you attack them first. I also know from my own experience that apologies are hard, and personally I'd rather show I've changed my views by DOING good quietly than posting about it publicly. People can grow and change, you've just got to let them (and sometimes support them).

The people digging for old drama need to get a hobby, a real one. Posts I made decades ago have absolutely no bearing in the kind of person I am now, and I'll bet real world money that it applies to these actors too. We've all said and done dumb shit- hell, we're probably even saying things now that in another decade we'll hate ourselves for. In order to learn from our mistakes we have to make them first. But it's blatantly obvious these people are digging this up because they don't like a character or ship, not out of any real concern. And as another post I saw said- if you're gonna point fingers at one cast member, you need to point it at the rest too.

Anyway tl;dr- we've all said shit things in our pasts and grown from them, but if you don't want people harassing you for idiotic crap you said decades ago, don't do it to them.

[ken-dom]

You have twins? That's so cool. Mind me asking how old they are? Boys? Girls?

Also, it's kind of comforting/encouraging to hear that you're a mom, and still really active in fandom.

I wanna be a mom soon too, but I keep having this nasty thought in the back of my mind that I'm gonna have to quit any fandoms if I do that...idk why.

Sorry if this a weird ask!

It’s not a weird ask but sorry if this is a weird answer because I get into it a bit here 😂

I do! And I think it’s pretty cool too haha. They’re toddlers, about to start full time school and they’re non-identical (I’m a hyperovulator so it’s genetic in my case!) girls.

Honestly, in my case, I took a huge break from fandom BEFORE having them, not really by choice, I just fell out of it a bit when an old fandom I was in died down and then my pregnancy was hard and, well I shan’t bore you with the details, but it was a journey. Anyway, having my children helped me really find myself again and that’s when I got back into writing and being more active in fandom. The distraction of fandom from real life also helps soothe my trauma but that’s a whole other story 😂

All this is to say that a lot of people will tell you your life is over when you have kids. I think that’s bullshit (if you actually want to have kids, that is). For me, as someone who wanted children, it’s when my life kickstarted, even with some new trauma added to the old.

And I think there’s too much online about anyone over 20 or whatever being too old for fandom which doesn’t help, but fandom wouldn’t exist without ‘older’ people and there are plenty of us over 20 here enjoying ourselves. Being a parent is no different to that.

Basically. You never, ever need to quit fandom, and actually it can be a really helpful tool when you’re a parent to switch off the worries and whatever else comes with having kids! 💖

[svartalfhild]

A Case for Jezri

Listen, I know how the DS9 fandom feels about Jezri, but I just wanted to take a moment to explain why I like it. I'm not asking people to agree; I just want to give it some love because there are things to enjoy and to explore in that ship that haven't gotten any discussion.

(Also why is 99.9% of the Jezri tag just people tagging their hate? Who raised y'all? Please be respectful towards your fellow fans who may not feel the same as you.)

I'm no stranger to finding my gold nuggets in the trash heap when it comes to Star Trek ships. I'm the type to find the things to love about something that was executed poorly by the writers. Datasha is my TNG OTP. Need I say more.

So don't think I don't understand some of the main objections people have to Jezri. I get it. I do. So with that out of the way, let's get into the good stuff.

Julian's personal story, particularly in the later parts of the show, has a strong motif of loneliness, which comes from two or three different aspects of his life. The first one is of course the fact that he's an augment. He's socially isolated by his mental and physical superiority. No one can keep up with him, and he has to diminish himself to fit in, especially before the truth comes out. The second is the evolving lives of the people closest to him. There reaches a point where nearly all of his closest friends are either married or in committed relationships, and he's the free floater who has to hope he can still fit into their lives somewhere. The third aspect is his own shit luck with relationships. No one sticks with him for very long for whatever reason. And there was the everything with Jadzia on top of it all. Poor man couldn't catch a break.

And then along comes Ezri. Quark is quick to treat her as same old Dax with a new coat of paint, for whose affections he immediately tries to generate competition with Julian, because he is a sexist little toad. Julian, to his great credit, is like "what the fuck, Quark" and makes it clear that he sees Ezri as a different person, not Jadzia 2.0 who he now has a chance with. Ezri is his new friend, and he's not going to be pulled into Quark's bullshit.

The writing is unfortunately rather uneven when it comes to showing us the establishment and development of that friendship, so we have to piece together the vibes from several disparate moments, some big and meaningful and others more incidental, but that's not too difficult for me. Fandom has done more with less.

Anyway! Through all of that, we kind of get to see that Ezri sees Julian differently than Jadzia did in a way that allows them to click very quickly. Jadzia sort of saw Julian as an adorable puppy excitedly wagging his tail at her (and by the time he matured into someone who was more her type, he'd stopped pursuing her and then she was with Worf). Ezri sees him as the charming guy who knows how to have a good time. It seems natural to me that Julian would quickly latch onto someone who thought his holosuite adventures were demonstrative of a healthy sense of fun and not a sign of immaturity. Ezri is literally the bad bitch he pulled by being autistic.

And they are such adorable awkward nerds with each other! The big eyes! The soft touches! The fumbling! The trying to keep things platonic because they just like each other so much that they're afraid of messing things up! The breaking down and making out anyway because they can't escape the vibes! *chef's kiss*

The thing that completely sold me on Jezri, though, was their moment together at the end of the last episode where Julian is mourning Miles' departure and feeling lonely and then Ezri rolls up like "Hey~!" and expresses the desire to have dinner and do holosuite adventures with him. That was so beautiful to me. Everything is changing and so many of his friends have left and it's the ultimate pit of loneliness for him, but then there's Ezri. He has her now and he's not alone and the war is over and there's hope and the start of something new and soft. I cried, y'all. Like maybe it's because I'm at a place in my life where I feel left behind while I watch all my friends move on with their lives, but man, the way Ezri represents the light at the end of a dark tunnel for Julian just got me so good.

Here are some of the headcanons I have to supplement the sparse canon material and give further depth and enjoyment to my shipping experience:

They're both bisexual.

Since they're both healthcare professionals, they have a lot to talk about where their fields intersect. They make a great team when they're working, but this also results in them developing a shorthand with each other that is somewhat infuriating for others.

Ezri's closeness with Julian allows her to better develop her friendship with Garak, and there are several times when all three of them get up to shenanigans together.

They sometimes get each other new tea blends to try as a fun little surprise.

Ezri tries to teach Julian some of the gymnastics stuff she remembers at least once with mixed results.

Julian particularly loves hugging Ezri, and she particularly loves holding his hand.

Julian persuades Ezri to read Lord of the Rings, and she gets really into it, so they end up doing a holosuite adaptation as Legolas and Gimli. Ezri plays with her beard a lot.

Quark fucking hates how cute they are and Kira makes a point to tell him about every sweet moment she sees between them just to fuck with him.

Ezri very much gets in on the Fuck With Section 31 train and helps Julian do spy shit. The criminal psychology knowledge comes in handy.

Anyway, these are my feels. Please don't air your grievances here. I just want to sail on my dinghy and hope someone out there is sailing with me.

[cookinguptales]

i spent several hours the other day reading through all your old karabita fics to relive the magic and i just have to say, they fucking rule. my personal favorites are the flower shop au and the werewolf au, but special mention has to be made because you are the author of one of the only two good hanahaki fics i've ever read (hanahaki plots have a lot of inherent pitfalls that are very hard to avoid). you and i both left the fandom when season 2 started up, but i'll never stop reading these tbh

Thank you, anon. ;; I've had a rough 24 hours and it was really nice to hear something like this.

The flower shop AU was one of my favorites, too! It was a spitefic, lmao. I saw someone saying that flower shop AUs are always bad and I wanted to see if I could prove them wrong haha. And obviously people's mileage may vary, but I thought it came out really well!

The werewolf one... might have been inspired by a werewolf outfit from one of the mobile games? I can't quite remember, but I remember that they had some really fun Halloween events. IIRC a lot of people did werewolf!kara after that and I wanted to join in the fun by making an incredibly stupid (but hopefully still sweet) werewolf AU. I'm really glad that you enjoyed it so much! I didn't know that anyone was placing it among their favorites.

And my secret for the hanahaki fic is... I mean. I actually also do not like hanahaki fics lmao. I wasn't familiar with the trope at all back then! Someone requested that I write it and I had to google what it was, haha. It wasn't really a trope that appealed to me, honestly, and I took some time to think about the best way to make it fit the characters. Karamatsu's cringe-ass melodrama saved the day. :')

I actually thought that no one was going to like it when I posted it. I felt like it was impossible to do such a soapy trope without going high on the melodrama, but I thought that would probably turn people off. I was shocked when it became probably my most popular fic in that fandom.

You really never know what's gonna hit quite right!

tbh I had a good time in Osomatsu-san fandom. The show had a good mixture of stupid and heartfelt in the first season that meant that I could write whatever dumb shit I wanted and it would feel IC, particularly AUs. The presence of canon (stupid) AUs made that aspect of fandom really fun.

It wasn't a perfect experience (I had a couple semi-stalking situations and there was a weirdly prevalent issue with artists doing fanart of my fic, the fic getting 3 notes on tumblr, the fanart getting 1000 notes, and people thinking that the artist made up the characters/ideas/dialogue instead of me) but it was good, dopey fun and I really enjoyed writing unhinged bullshit.

But then, yeah, s2 happened. lmao

Anyway, thanks again for all the kind words. It's really nice to know that people are still reading and enjoying those stories. ;;

[jheselbraum]

They lierally weren't in a relationship. It's implied by the ganon awakening memory and her own diary and other dislogue she never actually proposed by chickened out. Why would she gasp seeing Link staring at Zelda if he was actually engaged to mipha? Media literacy dead

I just want to say congratulations to the Gravity Falls fandom. After nearly twelve years on tumblr and a truly staggering amount of blocked fans and admittedly incendiary posts on my part not a single one of you verifiably went on anon to get around a block and into my ask box. Not even that time I opened up about my personal family issues and got attacked for it by dozens of people. Everyone who got blocked stayed blocked. In fact, no one from any of the circles I post in has ever done this, hence why I'm even dignifying this ask from a pathetic individual who ships like they're an adult Harry Potter fan with a response: to commemorate the occasion.

In this time of mass exodus due to racism and transphobia from staff as well as our user data being sold to an ai model which will immediately die the moment it tries to train itself with it, it's wonderful to know that there are still parts of the true tumblr experience that I too can take part in, and that despite tumblr's waning growth and popularity, despite my own waning time on this site, when I do eventually log off for the final time I'll be able to rest easy, knowing that I truly was a part of this community... And knowing that the part of the community I primarily interacted with during the bulk of my time here, despite a brief period filled with completely untagged old man incest porn in the main character tags, never pulled this shit, and never got to the point where every third post in a given ship tag was a complaint, about random bullshit that doesn't matter and isn't actually something anyone was mad at in the first place.

Truly it would cheapen the experience, to complain about a bunch of unrelated topics, characters, and ships you don't like, in the tags of a ship that you do actually like, to the point where someone going into that tag looking for shipping content of the ship they like has to deal with a bunch of annoying crap that isn't shipping content and is rude to other people for no fucking reason.

The humble vagueblog has existed as a vital part of your fandom's existence since the beginning, dear Gravity Falls fandom, and you have used and honed the practice well. Your tags have not been infested with pages of unrelated crap from a new set of people very week who think the rest of us enjoy them spamtagging their complaints, and our tags have not been infected with people who don't like what's being posted in that tag posting in the tag anyways about how much they dislike the content of the tag they're posting in. All the porn is now tagged properly and no one is freaking out about people who don't ship their ship, not even when that ship consists of two characters who are at the same developmental stage for their respective species, and are not related to each other. As the fandom of a children's show from 2010s era tumblr you have truly exceeded all expectations. Gaze upon this ask, on this shadow of a shark beneath our little rowboat and know that I thank you, and that if and when I do eventually leave this site I will leave satisfied. Know that if there ever comes a time where I begin posting zelink content full time, I will be in hell trying to block annoying assholes all over again, because every third post in the zelink tag is made by someone like this who clearly has nothing better to do with their time than complain about a naked fish lady who is dead and does not interfere with the ships they actually like because she's not real and you don't have to include her in your fic or engage with the people who like her if you don't want to.

Because obviously the zelink ship tag is the only place one can complain about a fictional teenage dolphin with boobs being in a relationship with a fictional teenage human, and obviously a fictional dolphin with boobs is the biggest problem this fandom has so someone has to say something, it'd be rude not to tag this Voltron fandom level bullshit as zelink.

[exitvelocities]

on fandom and writing.

so that meme about showing how many fandoms you've written for is going around bsky and i assume twitter and here's mine:

the way i put it on bsky is that my purview is narrow and my start up cost is high. two of those (yowapeda and all out) are only in there as part of multi-fandom drabble dumps from the bygone saso days; chyf and oofuri i did at least write short (<1K) pieces for chocolate box. the last three are the main fandoms i've produced for in the last decade or so. daiya for about three years 2014-2018, bad buddy from late 2022-mid 2023 or so, and now mlc from april 2024 on.

i hope i'll be able to hold on to mlc for longer than i was bad buddy but i think i will -- i've been able to find enough community that i think it will stick for a while. part of that is the leap of faith that is the dihua discord server, but finding any cdrama friends at all has been a journey since my old circles are all dwrp and sports anime.

fandom for me is inherently a social activity or i would just stay in my corner and enjoy by myself like i do for most things; the main thing that motivates me to become active in a fandom is the desire to talk to someone about it. the desire to write may or may not be there without having someone to talk to, but even a little bit of encouragement goes a long way, so just someone saying "yeah i'd read that" was enough to get me to commit to my usual fic meme bullshit and that, i think, also helped find some more people to talk to, or at least interact with on some level.

i'm actually a very introverted person but i've been spending a lot of energy trying to foster a friendly environment on the server and hopefully in this space, though i can't see how well that's working as clearly. i gather the energy to throw myself at new people approximately once a decade lol so it's a little surprising that i'm managing so quickly after flaming out in my last fandom but mlc and dihuas in particular have been really welcoming.

anyway, this was supposed to be a post about writing. writing is pretty difficult for me in many ways, but it's also just. sort of what i do. so if i love something enough to want to talk to another human about it, it's not a stretch that i'll eventually want to create for it too. granted, for me, this is often expedited if i get bitten by the ship bug. i did actually watch mlc when it aired last year, but didn't really look into fandom or fic for it until earlier this year and sort of got delayed-reaction thunderstruck by dihua, which has so many elements that i love in a ship. the tension! the fondness! the trust and knowing! i should have known i was a goner but i didn't until i was falling headlong.

according to ao3 i've produced about 16K of mlc fic since april of this year. now, i know that's not a not for some, but to contrast my highest production year was 24K in 2015, so, for me: quite a lot! especially within that time period. i'm slowing down now/it's getting harder again but i don't plan on stopping so we'll see what my count is by the end of the year.

like many writers, i battle with self-confidence and mlc fic in particular has been a weird struggle for me. my writing hallmarks from previous fandoms have been atmosphere and poetics, succinct characterization, and imagery. for mlc fic i feel like i'm at 1 out of 3. i think (hope!) my character work is still good, but i feel like my writing for this fandom has been so plain. i want to write pretty things for this ship! i will keep trying. i may just need to eat more poetry and spend more time violently throwing myself around when trying to write, but hopefully i will manage at some point.

this post actually started with me thinking about why i choose to make my fic meme/drabble dumps chaptered rather than posting them individually when visibility/feedback/attention are unfortunately so important to me. every kudos, comment, tag comment, reblog, rec, etc really means a ton. writing is something that takes up a ton of energy and sometimes it can feel like you're pouring a whole lot of it out and not getting any in return and, for me at least, that's what burn out feels like. at the same time, like. in the end you're always writing for yourself so you sort of have balance that with how feedback or lack thereof makes you feel.

fic meme does get posted separately here on tumblr so maybe with that i get a little best of both worlds? i don't do it on ao3 because it would just straight up make me feel crazy to have literally 100+ 300-700ish word long ficlets scattered across my account over the decade, all needing titles, so my need to have things organized and in their place wins out over the need for validation there.

i don't know where i was going with this anymore tbh, but thanks if you read it! also thank you thank you thank you so much to those of you who take the time to read and respond to fic in some way, whether it's reblogging with tags, leaving comments, or just hitting the kudos button. i really can overemphasize how important these thing are as a fic writer.

[olderthannetfic]

I wanted to ask your followers and your opinion on something. I block liberally because I'd like to avoid starting shit on my blog. I have a couple piece of art (and other posts) that get notes despite how old they are. Some stuff like an old still popular ship and general fandom humor. But some stuff is cute art. Cute shit that anti's like to flock too. It sucks bc I adore cute things (I also adore cute thing + dark/problematic themes) and pastel colors. And this interest is really important to me because I spent a majority of my youth rejecting "girly" things bc surprise surprise it turns out I'm trans (NB) and was desperately trying to distance myself from being associated as a girl. It took years of work to allow myself to enjoy "girly" things without feeling guilty or like I was lying to myself. Anti's will have to pry my love for cute shit and pastels from my cold dead problematic fingers.

These posts don't get too many notes daily so it's relatively easy for me to do a quick search of some key words on individual blogs who interact with my work and then block on site. Sometimes however I feel a little unsure about the blocking because sometimes the only results that come up and stink of anti behavior are 3 to 6 years old. I'm left wondering if I should really block these people because none of their recent stuff sets off red flags. Like there is a possibility that they're no longer like that and just haven't bothered to purge their blog. I get that it's okay for me to set boundaries and be safe, but I also feel guilty bc if it is people who have changed/ex-anti's I don't want to contribute to the issue of isolating people that leave toxic groups. Since, like, the threat of isolation is something that's used to keep people from leaving cult-like spaces.

I understand that I'm overthinking a lot, and me blocking these people is probably not doing what I worry about. I know it's not worth my energy to worry about, therapy taught me that. It's just practicing telling your brain to cut it out is forever a journey.

But anyways, I was wondering what your guy's opinion is, especially for those who regularly block on site to avoid anti's if the only anti stuff you can find on their blog is years old. And if you don't is there a threshold? Like how recent does the anti behavior have to be for you to consider it a reason to block?

(I know you, OTNF, have mention you only block people who are a brand of asshole at you and not preemptively block like I mention, but maybe some of the people who read your stuff do? But I'd also like to hear your opinion if you want to share it/have something to add. I enjoy your responses and want to thank you for being consistently informative and interesting. That's probably worded weird lol, but yeah, thank you for taking time to read this.)

--

:)

I do preemptively block people, but it's generally for seeming extremely annoying at the time I block them, usually in their tumblr header or an inflammatory comment on another anti's post. These aren't subtle people is what I'm saying.

When I block preemptively, it's less about protecting myself and more about taking pleasure in going "U Suck!" even if they never know.

I generally don't bother digging back through someone's archive unless I'm just enjoying looking at the posts. Whether they'll have changed is hard to say though. 3 years just isn't that long, but it also depends if we're talking 16-19 or 40-43.

It's not your job to help cult victims escape though. Sure, it's nice if they don't get shunned, yadda yadda, but you welcoming them to your personal tumblr is not a public service you're honor bound to provide.

Also, maybe they haven't posted any anti bullshit in 3 years, but have they posted the opposite? I see no reason they should be coddled for once holding reprehensible views and merely ceasing to be vocal about them.

[hoghtastic]

What was actually agreed upon why he canceled the fan convention? He's just now flying to New York and seemed to have a lot of free time in Copenhagen. He did a small thing for Isaac Productions but that didn’t seem too time consuming either.

I'm curious whether Johanne will fly to him and whether he will stay there until his birthday. The script doesn't look particularly thick, I don't mean that in a shady way, it just appears that way. For me, Alex has an extreme problem with being alone and since Johanne is obsessive and loves the new opportunities and attention from him anyway, I can hardly imagine them staying apart for longer than two weeks or that Johanne would waste the opportunity to post New York Instagram content and make new connections. I would like to thank our admin for all the work she’s doing. I mean every single day you’re replying and reacting to asks, that’s actually work and it’s not like Alex deserves promotion anymore. It truly feels like you’re doing this for „us“.

Everything we discuss here doesn't matter anyway. It's really like a round of girls shit chat. Alex does what he wants anyway and that's what he should do. Johanne is a psychopath who gets what she wants anyway and sometimes it helps to endure this misery if you can laugh at this nonsense.

Alex communicated to us over many years that he had a certain mentality that we identified with. That's why we remained loyal supporters of him, it wasn't just his appearance. To the fans who say you have to separate him from his girlfriend and that it should only be about him, I have to say that doesn't work. Because Johanne symbolizes exactly the mentality that some of us may see as the exact opposite of what he communicated to us for many years. In addition, the couple-content is overwhelming anyway. She has completely taken over him. So you can no longer support him without having to support them too and it’s not like we had any acting we could enjoy of him.

I see this blog like an outlet to point out their bullshit because no one else is doing it. I also can't imagine that many of us will stay if he proposes to her or she gets pregnant, because then Johanne will feel so safe that Alex won’t leave her that she will market every aspect of their private life in an influencer way on Instagram and I don't want to see that, I'm not into that same old whole influencer "my past ist sad but my world is so perfect now" crap. And now let me show you these earrings. Tag tag tag.

Hello, dear anon! 😊 Thank you so much for taking the time to share your thoughts on these matters! In my opinion, you made a lot of valid points and explained the current state of the fandom perfectly!

As for your initial questions, nothing was ever confirmed, but it surely seemed like he cancelled the convention to spend time with Johanne — considering she also cancelled her show for the same day and her understudy took her place, and they later posted about having a date night. Even if the events were unrelated, their timing to post about such date on social media surely didn't do them any favors. 😅Regarding Johanne joining him in NY and staying with him until his birthday, I think it's unlikely, because she'll be busy with Askepot until June 9th, and the most free days she will get between shows are 3 days. But who knows? Maybe she'll visit him on one of these occasions? 🤷‍♀️ We shall wait and see. 😊

Last but not least, thank you so much for your kind words!!! 🥰 And for understanding what this blog is truly about — a place for "girls talk", uncensored and fun. It wouldn't be what it is without all your thoughts, opinions & jokes, so it has been my pleasure to be here with all of you! 💖

[inevitably-johnlocked]

Hi!

So, I'm a bit late to the party (I joined the fandom last year).

I've come across many old posts on Tumblr in this fandom and it seems like many people in the BBC Sherlock fandom had not liked it when Elementary was about to air. Mainly because Watson is a woman and people weren't interested in a potential straight romance.

Keeping aside the fact that Watson and Holmes remain platonic friends in that adaptation too, it felt a bit weird to me, seeing that so many people were averse to the idea of a straight version of Johnlock.

I know that LGBT+ rep is important in the mainstream media and a same gendered version of Holmes/Watson would have been a lot more groundbreaking, but Johnlock is Johnlock, whether it's gay or straight, right?

As long as the characters are recognizable from the original stories and well-written, I would've personally loved it if Holmes/Watson were a canon pairing in Elementary, despite the fact that Watson is a woman.

Especially after the queerbaiting bullshit in BBC Sherlock.

Not that I've got any problems with Holmes and Watson being friends in Elementary, because male-female platonic friendships are also important and frankly, quite less frequently portrayed in the mainstream media.

Anyways, it's just my 2 cents on this topic.

(Apologies for coming of as condescending; that's not my intention. English is not my first language.)

Hey Lovely!

Welcome to the fandom, and I hope you've enjoyed your time here so far!

I personally can't speak on Elementary since I never saw it, though I've heard really good things about it. I will admit to initially being turned off because I judged it before seeing it and thought that they did it on purpose to inevitably make it a heteronormative relationship, and I will admit to my own harsh preemptive judgements of the show, since my understanding is that it ended on a close friendship and nothing more. One of these days if I get some motivation to do so, I'll give it a watch, methinks. I do like both the lead actors so I am certain I will love them too.

But yeah, in hindsight, I was just SO SO hard up on having MY show be the one that made it canon, you know? I was an obsessive fool, and I apologize for that. Because you are right... Johnlock is Johnlock, and all any confirmation would have done is show that the subtext IS THERE in the original canon to those who doubt it.

My hopes currently rest – for "big mainstream media" – on RDJ Holmes, Sherlock Holmes 3, though the hopes aren't high, given it's Warner Bros. that distributes it. Maybe. I hope so. I dunno.

In the meantime, I'll enjoy my fandom content that feeds me all the Johnlock I could ever want :D

Thank you for your thoughts! And your English is fantastic! <3

Have a great day, Lovely!

[jandjsalmon]

Fic Reading Challenge Stats Dec & 2023 Round-up

Happy New Year! I come bearing reading stats and fic recs. I hope you're able to take some time and enjoy some of the stories that kept me company this year. 🖤

In 2023, I read (or reread) over 21.7 million words (1209 stories). My goal for this year was 20 million - so I'm feeling extra accomplished. I read 577 unique authors and 114 unique fandoms and 162 unique ships! The vast majority of stories this year were from one pairing - so the fact that I read even one story from this many pairings makes me happy.

I participated in the @fanfic-reading-challenge and completed every one of the 310 tasks this year! I earned the "You're Insane" badge and I couldn't be more proud of myself. The 2024 challenge is out now (and I'll post about it right after this one) - so I hope some of you will sign up and join the fun. There is no correct way to do it and you can read a little or a lot. It's just a twist to something you're all doing anyway.

And of course, thank you to everyone who gave me suggestions for stories and pairings and fandoms and who shared their favourite stories with me. I could not have gotten through this year without you and I’m SO grateful for you. 🥰

My 2023 Stats:

I always slide in first with December numbers before I hit the pie charts for the year... I read 1,773,452 words and 479 chapters in December. Since I'd already finished the Task Challenges, I mostly reread old favourites. I finished off the year rereading Viper Radio by @lucivar - and it was a DELIGHT as usual!

I was unsurprised by the fancy pie chart below. I know I read a LOT of Wenvier - and I reread a lot of Wenvier too. Ha ha. Of the 170 fics I read more than once during the year, only 15 weren't Wenvier. One series by @drollicpixiefanfic - I reread SEVEN TIMES throughout the year. For the Rare and Radiant Maiden is an AMAZING series. You should all read it!

The only "new" pairing I read this year was Ted/Rebecca - and that was because I was so incredibly unsatisfied by the ending of Ted Lasso. Apparently there were a lot of other people also unsatisfied because there has been a LOT of really great fic for them.

My favourite stat of the year was the author stat. Most of the stories I read this year were written by a large variety of different authors. 72% of the authors wrote ten or fewer of the 1209 stories I read… but then that 28% was full of 15 authors who wrote many more than that so I wanted to single them out. All but five of them are Wenvier authors - and I adore every one of them. Extra love to @ozmathegreatand @psychic-refugee @drollicpixiefanfic @donutcats @nevinimus @leftennant @thepointoftheneedle @smc-27 @myztify (and extra love to the Anon Author who wrote three AMAZING Percy/Jenna fics that I read four times each throughout the year. Kudos to you, Anon person. You were amazing this year and I hope we get more Black Keys titled fics from you in 2024)~

Some special favourites this year:

Sweet Nightmares are Made of This (series) by the_retro_witch (Wednesday/Xavier - E - Post Canon) - I remain DEVOTED to this story. It’s huge and awesome and hot and fun and yeah. SO good.

The Trials of Mairon by @jackpotgirl (Galadriel/Halbrand - E - Post Canon) - AMAZING. Finished up this year. Honestly one of the best fics I’ve ever read. Set AFTER Lord of the Rings but references stuff from Rings of Power. Galadriel gets to be Sauron’s judge and jury.

A Solitary Raven by my girl Agmo (seriously - read all of her work It's all amazing). (Wednesday/Xavier - E - Alternative Canon). Agmo really gets Xavier. And she writes this one from the perspective that he isn't going to let Wednesday slide on the "ravens must be alone" bullshit. It's so good. I reread it a lot this year.

Be Kind, Rewind by @ozmathegreatand (Wednesday/Xavier - T - Alternative Canon) --- It's a GROUNDHOG'S DAY CURSE fic! I love timeloops and this one kept me company over and over again this year. I get more out of it each time I read it. It's SO SO good.

Anyway - this is probably enough recs for now but if you every are looking for something interesting to read, hmu. 😘

Thanks for being here, friends.

Have a wonderful 2024!

[snickerdoodlles]

✨What's a fic you've posted you wish you could breathe life into again and have people talking about it? (or simply a fic you wish got more credit)

(prev) hmm, maybe Hair-Trigger? like, it got a good response, i'm very grateful to everyone who's read it ❤❤❤ i don't mean in a 'im looking for more hits' sort of way, i just really love Porsche & Kim as a duo and spin them around in my head like a shiny rock all the time. this mostly manifests in me spamming tortoise with Kim & Porsche snippets and thoughts that never seem to flesh out into proper fics, so Hair-Trigger has a special spot in my heart because it's my one finished Porsche & Kim fic and I want everyone to look at Porsche being extremely fond of Kim and Kim feeling all sorts of things about how fond Porsche seems to be of him (surely???? this is a trick????? he is so nice and smiley????????? a mystery)

💫what is your favorite kind of comment/feedback?

i like them all!! i genuinely enjoy all "types" of comments for different reasons, it feels weird to rank them against each other. so long as the comment is excited to engage with me/gush over idiot nerds together, i'm excited to answer and chat with them (although, i am. very behind on my inbox rn. hjghjg im sorry friends, i promise i will respond even tho it might be v late 😂💦)

💘Is there any posted fic you want to rework/re-edit/re-write?

I've actually been rewriting a *checks date* 5.5 yr old yoi WIP (*winces*) for a while now. very slow as my attention gets drawn away, but i love epistolary fic and there's a funny satisfaction without pressure to re-writing it.

but the story rewrite that actually has been sitting on my head for...forever really, is my ft story Jinxed. i was very new to fandom/writing fic when i first posted it, and at the time i'd just posted what i wrote and then went "...wait, how the fuck do you write a multi-chapter story???" and i really psyched myself out of posting more for it.

however, it's always like...sat in the back of my head, even after the fandom bullshit and when ft went to shit. because i just...don't like soulmate/soulmark AUs. 😅 the reasons behind my dislike for the trope are uh...kinda long and extensive actually, so i'll save that for a different post if anyone cares enough to ask, but the premise in this story of two girls with mismatched timers who fall in love and choose each other anyways is one i'm extremely drawn to. and i'm still like, figuring out how to write long stories, and i'm never going to write again for ft, so whenever i look over the old story drafts and notes, i'm actually thinking about it as an original story. not one i've started and maybe i'll stumble into a fandom that i want to apply this premise to, but...after i figure out long-form stories, i really want to swing by this one again, if simply to have it stop haunting my brain every few months.

(rest under the cut because i am rambly lol)

🌈is there a fic that you worked *really fucking hard on* that no one would ever know? maybe a scene/theme you struggled with?

hmm Silver for Truth is the obvious one since i whined about it taking a yr+ to write, but i think everyone understands when i say Tawan is an annoying ass bitch to write.

i'm actually going to cheat and say the freezer!Kim WIP i'm writing with @majestictortoise. there's a few different POVs in this story and one of them is Porsche's POV, and there is something about Porsche's POV specifically that i find very hard to capture. even when i know what i want from his arc and character struggles, post-canon Porsche carries around some conflicting beliefs and mindsets that i find really tricky to write, plus he's also a guy of action who's been forced to a standstill and i want to capture that trapped feeling without making it obnoxious. he's just tricky to me in a way that other characters aren't. (i actually ran into this issue with Hair-Trigger too, except it wasn't so hard because that's a fic about him Doing A Thing He Wants To Do, which is why i was able to write it within the timeframe i did. oh Porsche, ilu, why do u stick in my head so. orz)

🦋what are you most insecure about when you post a fic?

everything? idk, my reaction after i post a fic is to either Stare At My Inbox or desperately try to distract myself from the fact that i Posted A Fic, which really go to show how secure i feel about my writing 😂 i try very hard not to let a fic's reception get to me when i post because i've been down that road and it's really bad for me. all fic i post is fic for me, but i haven't hit the carefree attitude of "idc what you think, its for me first and foremost" yet.

🌻what makes you want to give up on writing? what makes you keep going?

there's nothing that makes me want to give up on writing specifically. i wail and cry when stuff isn't flowing right, but like. so i had an irl thing run me over like a truck april/may of this year and it's bullshit kept spilling out through june and july too, so i had like no time or energy to write or even spend much time on fandom stuff for four months, and i went absolutely bananas. i need to do something creative to feel good, and writing is my favorite of those.

posting...posting is a different story 😂 weirdly if im chasing the high of posting a fic/the high of comments on fic, i dont like to post as much. the hill in my head is too much to get around, so that ig.

🌿how does creating make you feel?

*points up*

also prev

🍉in what ways has writing helped you process trauma and/or navigate through your own life?

...this is such a weird question lmao (not u, the person who made the question list should have deleted this). i've always found writing as a good way of examining my internal biases and preconceptions i might not have otherwise had opportunity to find and reflect upon so clearly, and i'm going to leave it at that.

🎈describe your style as a writer; is it fixed? does it change?

fuck if i know what my writing style is 😂

🎀give yourself a compliment about your own writing

*curls up in more shy* hmm, i really like reading my own stories. like, i always have cyclic periods of "oh god this is garbage what the fuck was i thinking" feelings for each of my fics, but i know now that feeling is brief and it'll be gone soon enough and it will stay gone longer than it comes. the person who reads my stories the most is me, and the fact that i want to go back to read them again is really important to me.

🎉how often do you celebrate completing & posting a work? how often do you give yourself the credit/validation that you seek from others when you post? (if you don't, you should!)

i don't think i linger so much on the actual posting of the fic, but i return to my fics a lot and i've also started paying more attention to how much i post. i'm trying to find a balance between acknowledging that i posted stories vs "oh god, im not posting ENOUGH," but back at the turn of this year, i was really bummed that i didn't get as much posted during december as i had set out to do, specifically because i felt like 2021 had been a really strong year and i'd let myself down not finishing as many fics in 2022. then i actually checked my AO3 stats for 2021 to 2022, and realized i'd posted 4x as much in 2022 than i had in 2021. over 100k words altogether even!

i think i'm getting off topic, but between rereading my own stuff pretty frequently and trying to get a better grasp on how much i've actually posted vs what's in my head, i think i celebrate pretty often? idk 😂

💞what's the most important part of a story for you? the plot, the characters, the worldbuilding, the technical stuff (grammar etc), the figurative language

characters!!! everything's built around the characters. i love worldbuilding, making up worlds is a lot of fun, but i worldbuild through the lens of "what am i interested in?" (which starts with characters) and "how does this affect x?" (because if it doesn't matter to/affect the character, it shouldn't be a priority to me). similarly, plots exist for me to put Specific Guys Into Situations. a plot can be objectively interesting, but i'm not going to stick to it if i don't care about the people going thru it, my brain just doesn't focus like that.

the actual writing of the story is lowest priority on my list. there's a lot of writing types i don't like, but i can muscle thru a lot in the name of a good cast or plot. similarly, i don't give a flying fuck how pretty or polished a writer thinks their sentences are, if the actual story is boring or OOC, i am not reading it. or i am reading it and bitching extensively in friends DMs, which is worse. 😂

💝what is a fic that got a different response than you were expecting?

honestly, hard for me to answer because i'm actively trying not to think about what sort of response i do get. i guess one that still amuses me quite a bit is the response to my fic Shining Dishonesty (howls moving castle AU for haikyuu!!). i love this story to bits and i really love the comments i have on it, but it's weird/funny to me because it's my most recommended and mentioned fic on twitter, but it's one of my lowest in terms of kudos & comments. idk what's up with that 😂

🤍what's one fic of yours you think people didn't "get"?

*big shrug emoji* nothing that comes to mind???

maybe Silver for Truth, just a little bit???? everyone got the message of "get fucked Tawan" but there was also a little more pity for Tawan than i'd expected. like, not really, because Tawan's annoying, but i don't know that everyone quite caught Khun's trap for Tawan in it. Tawan could've completely turned things around for Vegas and ruined Kinn's lie by confessing his own failures/betrayals and accepting the consequences, except Tawan puts himself before all others, even someone he claims to love.

🕯️was there a fic that was really hard on you to write, or took you to a place you didn't think it would take you?

honestly? i don't remember the specific writing issues once something is done. even for something that takes me a while to write. usually my writing hang-ups are related to irl stressors. Pitch It was an extremely hard fic for me to write, but that was because it had a deadline attached to it while i was also trying to come up with money for a new car after my previous one was totaled 😂 and while i approach all stories with a vague plot in mind, it's purposefully vague so i can adapt to where's best for the story to go. that's the part i look forward to the most when writing lol.

💥find your least kudos'd fic - say something wonderful about it.

lol i don't even have to sort my stories to know which one is my least number of hits/kudos. it's by dawn's early light, which i wrote for the bnha myths zine, and it is literally one of my favorite fics i've ever written. there's some stuff i would've done differently now, but i liked it when i finished it, i liked even thru that fucking project's mess, and i liked it enough to post it after the project was finished, and that is probably the highest praises i can give that particular fic.

(this response probably doesn't make much sense to anyone who hasn't participated in a zine before and i'm not going to burden you with context if you haven't, but like. trust me. that's saying a lot 😂)

🍭why did you start writing?

to make a dick joke. i haven't changed.

💎why is writing important to you?

it's just fun. i really like doing it and i really like connecting with people over it/through it.

🪄what is your post-writing/sharing aftercare? How do you take care of yourself or celebrate yourself when you've finished a fic?

i re-read the story about a bajillion times in that first week. you'd think i'd be sick of it by the time it's posted, but the satisfaction of having finished something changes the way i read it and i just bask in that.

📡why is writing and sharing your writing important for fandom?

another terrible question in this otherwise nice questions list.

i like it, so i do it, and i'm lucky enough to have made friends through it.

🎙️which one of your fics would you like someone to make a pod-fic of?

i'm excited if anyone wants to make a podfic of my work and i give general permission for it, but it's not something i seek out specifically. i have very bad ears, it just doesn't really cross my mind.

🤲what do YOU get out of writing?

*points up however many questions ago* it's very fulfilling for me and i like it a lot. i'm lucky enough to have also made connections to others by way of writing, but first and foremost is i enjoy the actual act of it.

💋when you leave comments on a fic, do you want to hear back from the writer?

maybe? idk, i leave comments because i like to leave comments. i like hearing back, but its not like im leaving a comment looking for that. wrong mindset for this question, u know?

☯️how do you think engaging with each other through tumblr, twitter, comments, kudos, creates healthy fandom experiences? How do you deal with that if you're not a social person/experience social anxiety?

*sighs* this fucking questionnaire maker lmao.

responding to fics is fun for everyone. it's a great way to make new friends if that's the fandom experience you're hoping for (same goes for responding to edits, art, etc). if you're anxious to start talking to people or leaving comments or whatever, take the babysteps you need to try to push and expand your comfort zone. and be gentle on yourself -- there's no "right" way to interact with fandom, and you don't have to be perfect at what you want to do right away either.

but if that's not the way you want to interact with fandom, you don't have to. there's nothing wrong with "lurking" and frankly i care about my stuff being enjoyed (even if i never hear about it!), not the ~proper~ way to be in fandom or whatever. furthermore, my healthy fandom experience is regulating and maintaining my own reactions to the reception (or lack of) i get when i post so that it stays fulfilling for me, and that's how i create my healthy fandom experience.

🧿what steps do you take to not take things personally if a fic doesn't do well, or if your writing/posting/sharing experience isn't going how you'd like it to?

mostly i look inwards to see what exactly im dissatisfied with and examine why. there's plenty of stuff that i wish had a bigger reception, but i focus on things that i can control (what im happy with in a story, what i enjoyed about the process, talking about it more in my own blog space so people can choose to engage or ignore, etc) and push myself to that framework of mind. the worst thing you can do is focus on things you can't control, especially something as random and fickle as other people's reactions or a post/story hitting the trend wave just right.

💌share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

timeloop AU!! (prev)

timeloop AU will be 3 chapters + an epilogue. first chapter is Kim POV, the second one is Big POV, and third is Chay POV. Kim is the first one trapped in the timeloop. Big joins him later. Chay never does.

💌share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

in my fic Single Star Review, Khun goes to university and then starts seeking extra therapy help. i am Extremely excited for this one, but one of my favorite-favorite parts of it is Khun dismissively says "it's not like i can call Kim and gossip about boys" and Flop (the therapist, no that's not actually his name) asks Khun "why not" and Khun stares through a wall for a solid three minutes realizing hey, he CAN call Kim to talk about boys actually.

-later that night-

Khun: Kim! Kimmy-Kim my littlest kin! forget your other plans, tonight we are painting our nails and gossiping about BOYS

Kim: what the fuck

Khun: my therapist thinks i should try talking to you about stuff

Kim: THERAPIST?!

Khun: THAT'S NOT THE IMPORTANT PART HOW DO I HANDLE HAVING A CRUSH

(Kim is, ofc, over the moon and extremely excited when his brain catches up with his ears, even though he's a total little brother about it.)

💌share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

Red Line fic is the first installment of a 4-fic series (tortoise is laughing at me for thinking it'd stop with 1). mostly because it immediately dived into one of my favorite variations for how Chay kills Korn.

Korn's death is not a fix-it.

[ngalu]

~On this episode of Ngalu rants~

I LOVE how a lot of put-downs for shit people like are always "tHe MajOrITy oF faNS arE (Insert further description) gUrlS".

Like- no. I FUCKING hate this copy-paste argument that's used in every fucking fandom I go to like it's a be-all-end-all statement when it doesn't mean shit.

First of all, there is nothing wrong with girls liking things. LET GIRLS LIKE THINGS. So, what if a certain piece of media has a fan base of mostly girls? Does a fan base with a majority of girls somehow make it invalid? Stupid? Not worth while? NO!

This put down is so fucking misogynistic with the implication that because something is mostly an interest of girls, it's somehow less valuable and worthwhile to interact with and enjoy, so anyone that is also interested is therefore stupid/obssessed for liking the same thing. (I see this SO often, and the people that say it are always so proud of themselves for their little 'gotcha moment' like they did something)

Second of all, straight people including straight girls are free to enjoy queer media and ships too. I know, ✨SHOCKING✨.

What also ticked me off about this redditor though is that, on top of their bullshit misogynistic argument, they called everyone else that might enjoy this ship outliers because every other demographic, that isn't a straight girl, enjoying queer stories and romances is impossible to comprehend. I would LOVE to see how they worked that out. I wanna see their PowerPoint presentation outlining every other demographic, that is not a straight girl, as an exception proving the rule SO bad.

Thirdly, gen z girls? That's so specific of a demographic that now I NEED to see that PowerPoint presentation (I'm assuming it has a pie chart, I love pie charts).

In all seriousness though, referring to gen z as teenagers at this point is ridiculous - the oldest of us is almost 30. The label cannot practically be used interchangeably in that way, when the oldest is (at time of writing) 27 and the youngest is 12 - that's way too big of an age gap to refer to an entire generation as "teenagers".

Furthermore, the targeted ridicule of teenage girls is SO FUCKING GROSS AND OLD. You can circle back to the first point for this one, but it's such a common cultural phenomenon to automatically hate anything young girls show interest in (whether that's music, movies, food, make up, and ships of fictional characters!) that you can base a whole discussion of its on it. And in fact, people HAVE - the number of articles that are out there describing this topic in detail is baffling and sad.

Fourthly, there's one more thing about the comment that I wanna talk about: "straight gen z girls who just want Will to get who he wants".

With how specific this comment is (and spoken with such confidence too) I want to assume that there is a specific person they had in mind when they wrote that. It's the only explanation I can think of.

Even if a Byler shipper did just want Byler to happen because they like Will and they want him to be happy with the boy he likes in the show, that's fine. Like- it doesn't hurt anyone, it doesn't really affect anyone except for one or two people that will get annoyed with that opinion, because that's just another way of enjoying a ship (it's really not that serious). But to project that on to an entire fandom is a bit much, I'm looking at you ClemandLee- dick for brains- fanatic.

Anyway, thanks for coming to my Ted talk *wiggle dances off stage*

......

Bonus rant:

Where the fuck in their asshole did they pull that statistic out of?? How the fuck did they collect the data to definitively say with full confidence that a majority of Byler shippers are "straight gen z girls who just want Will to get who he wants"? That is SO fucking specific like- how long did it take them to research that???

Did they have a survey? Questionnaires? Interviews? Did they set up a website or something so they could collect all this data? How the fuck are Byler shippers supposed to obssessed if that's somehow the case???

went to check out the st reddit 😭😭😭

umm WHAT?????

hey guys, are all of us bylers straight gen z girls???? AM I a straight gen z girl????? are most of us bylers little kids who are overly obsessed weirdos????

BREAKING NEWS: stranger things redditors can't fathom the fact that queer people like queer ships as well as representation and bylers can come in different ages and sexualities!!! 😱😱😱

[thaleleah]

awe yeah your mom was vulnerable and stepshit took advantage of that 😭 dw tal, your person will come at the right time 🩷

ikrrr his dick needs to be snipped 😂 man is almost 80 years old, it's nastyyy

my stepmom is a literal child, she actually throws tantrums it's actually so fucking embarrassing. a literal slipper 😂 now i'm worried cause are you gonna hit your 2 year old like that if he acts up or doesn't listen to you? LOL tal ilyyy for not liking my dad either cause he doesn't deserve it! too little too late

omg you write for avatar too? 👀 look at you go girl! what's the avatar fandom like? it seems like it's chill and drama free. the reason i starting watching avatar was because of jack 😂 i'm a huge scream fan so i needed to see what else this man has been in and was so surprised he was in avatar 2, i actually didn't recognize him because of the hair but he still looked so fine! i need to rewatch avatar 1 and 2 because i actually really enjoyed it! and the cgi is amazinggg (much better than marvel) - and yes ghostface is so fucking hot, especially in the new one, i think cause it was more serious and the mask was like decayed. ughh i have a predator/prey kink too it's just so so hot! getting chased and hunted by those two was soooo ughhh! can you tell i only have a thing for villains? the heros barely capture my heart 😂 look and you and both simping for tom and jack; we have amazing taste in men 🩷

i'm so glad you got some writing done and it didn't feel forced, never force yourself, tal 🥰 you got this babe 🩷

🍯🐝

Babes, the way I tried to respond to your ask TWICE with a rant about how my stepdad must want me to hit him with my car because of how he treated my mom this weekend on her birthday weekend, and Tumblr closed out on me both times without saving my long af rant. SOOOOO maybe that's the universe trying to tell me to let that shit go. Which, like, okay. But . . . OOOOO THAT SHIT MADE ME SO MAD. So, anyway - thanks for listening to me tell you about a rant I would have made you read had Tumblr not told me no twice lmaooo

I feel so sorry for the two year old. Hopefully your stepmom will refrain from being a vile evil bitch to him. At least I hope. And yes, nothing your dad does could ever make me like him. Fuck that man lol

I doooooo write for Avatar! Avatar is the only fandom that I've consistently been in for nearly my whole life and I can't ever see it going away. I have such huge respect for James Cameron cause the world that he's created is just so amazing and beautiful and the detail and meaning of it all has me in constant awe. I could literally watch the movies over and over again and never get tired of them. December 2025 can't come soon enough for A3, I'm practically vibratingggggg. The fandom is def not chill and drama free though, especially on the smuttier side. It's actually been super toxic recently which is really disappointing cause I feel like Avatar is one of the fandoms that should be the least problematic but...here we are. My mutuals get tons of anon hate messages daily and sometimes there's even drama between accounts. Thankfully, I haven't had to deal with as much bullshit as they have since I'm a smaller blog, but I have gotten my fair share too. I know it really doesn't matter what fandom you're in, all fandoms have haters and most writers or artists get nasty messages, but it still sucks. All my mutuals are great though and they remind me of why I started being active in the fandom in the first place when things get a little too rough. Some people write some good Spider fics since you're a Jack Champion fan 👀

Love youuuuu 🥰

[dragonfire2lm]

So, if anyone else is like me and wants to reread Harry Potter, but either can't find their old books (I got mine during the big craze when they were still releasing, well before the author started spouting terf bullshit. But neither myself nor my mum are physically well enough to go looking for them), or want to get into the series without supporting the author, I found a link to a pdf file of the books.

As much as I wish this was a H.P Lovecraft situation, where we can still enjoy the writing despite the author being a not-so-nice person, I don't really see this being the case with HP. My views on this are as follows, J.K Rowling still makes money off of the Harry Potter franchise and as we've seen, her views are kind of...yikes. So I personally will stick to reading fanfiction, and pirating the source material rather than give Rowling any more money (remember, I bought the books years ago, back at the height of the HP craze when new books were being written and the movies were in production).

Because honestly. the characters and world are interesting. I've started reading HP fanfiction as a way to de-stress and unwind because I remember enough of the original books and movies to not be fandom blind and enjoy all the hard work other fanfic writers put into their works...and its free, fun, and somewhat nostalgic getting back into a series I dropped out of by the time I was writing my own fanfiction for other things I enjoyed.

Also...kinda fun feeling like I'm sticking it to J.K Rowling by pirating her books. Sure she already got my money years ago, but my stance on HP hasn't changed when i started hearing about some of the stuff Rowling has said or posted on social media, and by that point I had already lost interest in the series anyway.

With all that said, if you want to get merch, buy the books, play Hogwarts Legacy, that's fine. This is all just my own belief and how I'm going to be enjoying the HP series, by pirating the heck out of the books and binge reading fanfiction, I know full well the want to just enjoy something without thinking too hard about it or anyone involved in said thing's creation.

[mvsicinthedvrk]

Was that [ZHANG ZHEHAN]? Oh no no, that was just [MO XI], a [CANON CHARACTER] from [YUWU/REMNANTS OF FILTH]. They are [THIRTY] years old, use [HE/HIM], and [ARE] aware that they are not actually from Washington DC. Too bad they can’t stray from this city for long. {it is me, ollie}

me, banging pots and pans about meatbun's webnovels constantly: if u are a cnovel / cultivation world / danmei enjoyer, read yuwu.

i'm also not 100% set on his fc yet so that may change, but we'll see. anyway. non-spoiler info about mo xi below the cut!

how long has your character been here

3 or 4 months by april 2023.

what is your character’s job

tba-- i'm still trying to decide. i don't want him to join the army lol so i'm trying to figure out what job would make most sense based on his skills.

where has your character been pulled from in their fandom

for now he only remembers gu mang being brought back to chonghua as a traitor & captive, and running into him again the first few times. so early novel-ish when everything is still very yikes (as though the whole novel isn't yikes, lmao)

has any magic affected your character

no!

and any other information you might find useful for us and the other members to know:

mo xi is a general of the northern frontier in chonghua; technically his title is xihe-jun. his cultivation level is fairly high, both naturally and through his hard work.

he's known for being strict, boring, and a buzz-kill, essentially. people working under him generally respect him on the battlefield but don't particularly like him and occasionally even fear him, because he can be harsh when it comes to judgment & punishment. BUT he is very kind-hearted as long as people aren't terrible.

he looks unhappy 99% of the time, does not enjoy being social, prefers to keep things clean and organized, and has an extreme dislike for dirt/germophobia. control freak mo xi my beloved <3

the man is deeply in love with his shixiong, the former commander of the army who mo xi believes betrayed him by defecting, and also, literally stabbing him in the heart and leaving him for dead. big yikes. so he has not had a great time since then. love and hatred, gratitude and resentment. it's all very confusing for him !!

he feels so much all the time! and is just bad at showing it in a healthy way. unfortunately, he represses all emotions until they explode. you can imagine how well this has worked out.

he's more than capable of being civil when dealing with people, though he does not put up with bullshit or nonsense, and when he loses his temper it does not usually end well.

may add more details later but those are the basics! i love him! thanks!

[youaskedfurret]

Twisted TikTok is such a fucking mess y'all are so desperate for drama LMAO (read tags if you're interested)