#anyway. count how many times i say ‘for example�� in this post
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devilsskettle · 9 months ago
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i think some of the popularity that meta horror has garnered is a little bit disingenuous tbqh even though i do like some of the movies that have come out of the subgenre, people don’t realize that the foundation of the slasher genre was established in the 60s/70s and a lot of the 80s movies that have become so classic were already riffing off of the tropes established by those movies before full fledged meta took off. the idea to make friday the 13th was sparked by the commercial success of halloween. the original script for slumber party massacre was a parody of the genre and the movie retains much of that humor which is referential to past slashers by nature. + it intentionally uses typical slasher tropes around gender and sexuality to bring forward the concerns of teenage girls. is that not something that meta horror is frequently touted as doing? child’s play is like a slasher, “except —” which is what a lot of meta horror comedies do now (“slasher except it’s a possessed doll” is not that far off from “slasher except it’s freaky friday” and whatnot). this isn’t to say that scream isn’t foundational to what the slasher genre evolved into or that contemporary meta slashers aren’t doing something interesting but i also think they tend to lean towards cynicism towards the movies they’re deriving their themes from + they’re not even as different as they think they are from “classic” 80s movies that already are borrowing from classic slashers which in turn borrowed from even older horror (for example, in halloween, laurie is watching the thing from another world from the 50s which was adapted into the now classic john carpenter’s the thing in the 80s). and of course many of these older horror movies were adapted from literature which also inspired more literature. like the shelley/byron/polidori scary story writing contest is now legendary but also you don’t get the shining without the haunting of hill house (and you don’t get the haunting of hill house without turn of the screw, for example) and the shining is probably one of the most referenced movies by other media of all time. horror has always been an intertextual genre let’s stop pretending it didn’t become “self aware” until 1996
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pomefioredove · 6 months ago
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Hello! I was wondering if you could do the Dormleaders' reactions to Yuu who, given that they're from another world, is immune to any and all magic spells.
Example: Riddle's 'Off With Your Head' doesn't make a collar on their neck, 'King's Roar' doesn't affect them at all, 'It's A Deal' doesn't take anything from Yuu and acts like any ordinary contract, etc.
However, this means any healing spells has no effect, forcing Yuu to heal on their own.
Thank you for reading this!
*ੈ✩‧₊˚ magic immune reader
type of post: headcanons characters: riddle, leona, azul, kalim, vil, idia, malleus additional info: romantic or platonic, reader is gender neutral, reader is yuu
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out of all the dorm leaders, Riddle would be the most annoyed
...not that 'Off With Your Head' would've done much, anyway
you have no magic to take away
but... it's the meaning!
it's symbolic!
even a plain old collar would be punishment enough
but he can't even do that!
hopefully, you're not the type to misbehave, so he won't have to worry about it
if you are...
...expect to spend a lot of your week trimming the hedges around Heartslabyul as punishment
*ੈ✩‧₊˚
Leona doesn't even know until his overblot
...well...
until after his overblot
everyone keeps going on about how lucky you are
(personally, he doesn't see what's so great about being magic-repellent, but sure)
he's... glad you're okay
not that he'd ever admit that...
just don't let it get to your head, alright?
being immune to magic means both bad and good spells
and he's not going to be sanding you again anytime soon
*ੈ✩‧₊˚
Azul is PISSSSSED lmao
all that work he's put into his latest business venture
and for what??
you're not even BOUND by his contracts!
he has a hard time saying goodbye to Ramshackle...
what a nice cafe it would have made...
but, still
there's got to be some way he can use this to his advantage
he's an adaptable man
and he's always looking for a new assistant
*ੈ✩‧₊˚
Kalim is only a little disappointed
first, you can't even cast a spell
now you can't have any cast on you?
you're missing out on all his great party tricks!!!
but... oh, well
he thinks of it as an adventure, or a fun challenge
magicless parties sound kinda cool, right?
and Jamil says it's probably for the better, and Kalim trusts his judgment
(...for now, at least, cough cough)
*ੈ✩‧₊˚
not counting the... VDC incident, Vil doesn't care
unlike your annoying friends, he has no reason to curse you
and he can certainly think of many magicless punishments should you ever misbehave
so, no
not really something that crosses his mind
even when you're unwell (because, of course, he's the first to tend to you), he prefers using natural remedies before magical ones
to him, it's just another piece of the strange puzzle that is you
*ੈ✩‧₊˚
honestly what is Idia going to do
open the gates of hell on you?
nah
even boring spells would be too much effort for a guy like him
he does find you kinda interesting, though
I mean, being immune to magic in this place is a total buff!
imagine a group of NPCs firing magic at you, and you're like, wham! whew! zoooom!
...in his own words, anyway
(it's not actually that cool)
*ੈ✩‧₊˚
Malleus...
where do I even start?
he's so reliant using magic that he can almost sense there's something different about you right away
one on hand, it's a good thing
he worries about you, you know? the students at this school can get... unruly
on the other hand, knowing that you won't respond to magical healing is... worrying
he tries not to think about it so much
his overblot is a different story, though
if he can't put you to sleep, what can he do? trap you at NRC with him forever?
actually... I take it back, he'd totally do that
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kelaeri · 5 months ago
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The Many Languages of Dick Grayson
Apparently, according to Nightwing #54, he can speak 12, so I went on a little quest to see just how many I could identify.
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Starting off with The Essential Batman Encyclopedia, the entry for Dick Grayson lists him as being trained in French, Spanish, Russian, Japanese, Mandarin, and Cantonese with having some proficiency in an unknown Romani dialect. Given there are multiple examples of him speaking these languages throughout the comics, I am inclined to trust this claim. To start, we've got several examples of French (Gotham Knights #14, Detective Comics Annual #12, Nightwing #73, Grayson #10-- also featuring Spanish)
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In Grayson #1 he speaks Russian only briefly, but in Detective Comics #36 he speaks it throughout.
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As far as the Chinese languages go, while I believe Dick can speak Mandarin and/or Cantonese fairly well (Batman/Superman World's Finest #3), his Hanzi recognition and literacy could use some work.
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Similarly, when the Titans head off to Japan in Titans Annual #1, we have Nightwing speaking Japanese in battle; however, when it comes to the prospective job of being a manga translator in Nightwing #125, he claims he doesn't know Japanese, which leads me to believe he is only proficient in speaking Japanese/Chinese and struggles with the writing systems.
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So what about the languages not covered in the encyclopedia? To start, we have another romance language: Italian (Nightwing #72).
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Followed by some alleged German (Nightwing #51, JLA #44)
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And conversations in Farsi (Robin #175)
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While I've seen some Tumblr and Reddit posts claim he knows Kikuyu, The Power Company: Manhunter #1 only says he "brushed up" on his Kikuyu before going to Kenya, so it is unknown how much of the language he actually speaks, but to me it doesn't seem likely to be a lot.
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He also, to some unknown degree, speaks Tamaranean-- at least enough to hack into an alien computer (Action Comics #842).
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As far as unspoken languages go, Dick is fluent in ASL, which is proven numerous times when he communicates with Jericho (New Teen Titans 1984).
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And lastly, the two languages that remain rather uncertain are Romani and Cant-- largely due to the nature of the languages themselves and their representation in comics. "Romani," for instance, has several different dialects, and when Devin Grayson introduced it for Dick (Gotham Knights #20-21, Nightwing #91), she never specified which, and based on the lines she wrote, her research into the language was questionable at best. Writers since have recognized Dick's Romani heritage, but have not otherwise suggested he retained much of the language to be considered fluent.
Cant is an even wider term than Romani and can be seen as more of jargon for a particular language than a language itself, sometimes even being called a "pseudo-language." The colloquial term for American circus cant is Carny, or "Carny speak" as Boston Brand puts it in Batman: The Brave and the Bold #14 when he and Nightwing encounter a kid who speaks it.
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So... this leaves us with 11 languages Dick has notable proficiency in: English, French, Spanish, Italian, Russian, German, Japanese, Mandarin, Cantonese, Farsi, and ASL. And ~3 languages he has unknown proficiency in: Tamaranean, Kikuyu, Romani, and Carny/Cant (if you want to count it).
Maybe memory-loss Dick was including either Tamaranean or Kikuyu in that count from Nightwing #54, or maybe he knows some other language we haven't seen yet. Given how close the family is to the Al Ghuls, I personally think it would be cool if one of them was Arabic.
But anyway, hope you enjoyed this post! A lot I've seen covering this topic are very surface-level and label some of his more iffy languages as "fluent," so I hope this cleared things up. I've read tons of Nightwing, and I swear there are more examples, but sifting through the 1,000+ comics I've read of him is a lot haha. If y'all know of some others, let me know!
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sungiescheotluv · 21 days ago
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champagne supernova ⭑.ᐟ park jisung
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pairing: park jisung x gender neutral reader
word count: 4.2k
tags/warnings: fluff, friends to lovers, emo(ish) jisung, non-idol au.
summary: making friends as an adult is difficult. luckily for you, the rock/alternative online community welcomes you with open arms, one person in particular catching your interest.
notes: hi thereee! 😁 back again with another jisung fic, one that i actually came up with myself lmao. since getting back into the dreamies, i've been a bit surprised by (but absolutely loving) jisung's taste in music. hence this silly fic, which i do hope you enjoy! thank you so much for all your recent support, it makes my heart smile whenever you like or comment on a post! anyways, happy reading! much loveeeee! <3
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The concept of internet safety is lost on you. How else could you explain sharing a hotel room with someone you’d never met before in real life? 
Perhaps, you should retrace your steps. See how you’ve managed to find yourself in such a dangerous position, the front door locked and your body pinned to the bed.
Making friends as an adult is difficult. On par with counting every grain of rice in a field, you’d say.
You underestimated how easy maintaining friendship was when younger, third places like school, daycares, extra-curricular activities demanding your presence, inadvertently strengthening your social life. Not that you were the most social, you had a hard time approaching people actually, but maybe that was a part of your charm. Bringing you out of your shell, like all your friends did before your bond was cemented in tree trunks or sandy beaches. University is the last place you take this ease for granted, exposed to all different kinds of people and relationships, some platonic and not-so much. Either way, despite the barge of assignments and countless nights out, you’d make it into adulthood relatively unscathed.
Adulthood, however, doesn’t turn out as you expect. You’d been sold a dream, one eight-year old you envisioned dabbling with the stars accompanied by a lavish life and all the ice-cream you could get your hands on. Unfortunately, no star would be rubbing shoulders with you anytime soon and any that would, you’d have to pay a large sum of money to even see. A large sum you did not have. So, yeah. Just that, toxic work culture, endless bills and a whole host of other obligations linger above your head like a grey cloud.
What helps is finding the small joys in life. Slow mornings when the city is asleep, the scent of coffee at the crack of dawn, the sunshine against your skin, friends who despite their busy schedules carve out time to see you. All pieces of your life that make it worth living. Music is in there too, the art of melodies and lyrics strung together having the strange ability to carry you throughout even your worst days.
Your moods refuse to stick to a certain genre and in the midst of dark afternoons and frost covered roads, you find yourself gravitating towards alternative music. Slow, steady and aching. Like how your life moves with the severe lack of sun. It’s not a genre your circle of friends dabble in as much as you do. It’s to be expected, anyone who deviates from a standard of ‘normalcy’ was outcasted, one too many examples found in your high school days where kids got called weird and satanic for wearing a Green Day t-shirt to school. The thought makes you laugh now, but back then, when all that matters is fitting in, it was sad and suffocating. Seeing a part of yourself denied before your very eyes. Sometimes you’d hang out with those kids, bond over your collection of CDs and even go to a few gigs together. However, when Monday came around and they’d approach you and your friends, raving about the concert - you froze. Confronted into either owning yourself and being outcasted like the rest of the emo kids or ignoring them, deny yourself for the sake of social standing. 
You pretend like they’ve grown two heads, feigned confusion knitting your eyebrows together while your friends laugh and hurl insults at someone who you considered a friend - a better one than the ones at your side. And yet, you let the laughter continue, a coward with its tail between its legs as you depart, the taste of iron on your tongue.
Maybe this is payback for those poor decisions. A dead-end job, a successful but shitting ex and enough inner turmoil to make a therapist clutch their pearls. 
You abandon those friends when you get to university, getting better ones that wouldn’t make someone feel small due to their own insecurities. You make amends with the emo kids, your apology marking the true end of your friendship. You search online spaces for like-minded people, showing up as yourself and being embraced as. Everyone in the Reddit community is unbelievably sweet, sharing their music recommendations, concert wishlists and pictures of their cats. Some members, including yourself, form a closer bond, taking your conversation to a Discord server that becomes your escape in a way. A channel for heartfelt discussion that extends past your love for music. You’re not as active due to work obligations, but whenever you pop up, one member in particular always greets you with a warmth like no other. 
Linkin.parkjisung is his user, his icon the rock and roll hand sign over his face. Likes Blur, Green Day, Oasis and of course, Linkin Park. He’s like you, dips in and out, types a few responses before he’s gone again. It’s a scenario where other members grow closer, and your anxiety around speaking in the group begins. They’re already close, it seems almost futile to interrupt, right? 
What if you’re ignored? What if you’ve missed your window of opportunity? 
It’s a line of thinking that crosses your mind when you send in an apology for being inactive, moments later your phone pinging with a notification.
Linkin.parkjisung: no need to apologize! life gets busy for everyone, myself included. hope you’re doing ok (˶˃ ᵕ ˂˶) .ᐟ.ᐟ
Other group members echo his message, sending in their own real-life obligations that the group ends up bonding over, complaining of rising car insurance and overly demanding bosses. 
It’s the start of it all, really. That one message, a hand extended to yours that breaks you out of your shell and kick starts your friendship with Jisung. From that day onwards, you move more freely throughout the server, making good friends with everyone but better friends with Jisung. Somewhere down the line, you end up privately messaging each other. What starts out as simply giving each other music recommendations (since he apparently always loves the songs/artists you send into the server) becomes sneaking into the bathroom during a busy family reunion to call Jisung about how your grandmother wore a catsuit to impress her ex, your grandfather. You grow that close, no details spared on life events. How else is there space for secrecy when you’re video calling drunk, watching festival performances of Fontaines D.C.?
In any case, you’re close. You text everyday and call every week like clockwork, namely because you live some hours away from each other. During your calls, he’s shrouded in a low darkness, self conscious of the way he looks, he says. You’re unconvinced, slivers of his features in photos he sends you with his roommates’ three cats or on call saying otherwise. Regardless, you let it slide because Jisung becomes more than his face - he becomes a source of comfort, someone who makes you laugh as much as brings you calm, someone you slowly can’t imagine your days without. In hindsight, this is where your romantic feelings develop. And with convenient timing too because one of the bands you recommended to Jisung, Wunderhorse are on tour, set to perform in a city two hours from the both of you.
“Tickets are going onsale at 10 am on Thursday,” Jisung murmurs, the clicks of his cursor coming through your laptop speaker. “Remember to set your alarm.”
“Will do. Lemme set a remin-” opening up your calendar, you see an unwelcome surprise. “Fuck.”
“What’s up?” Jisung’s voice echoes with sincere concern.
“I forgot I have a shift that day,” you groan, already knowing by the time your lunch break came, the event would be sold out. “We’re understaffed as is, so there’s no way I can get someone to cover for me.”
A deep hum vibrates from Jisung’s chest, a few more clicks of his cursor sounding before he asks in a small voice. “Well, I could just get the tickets for us both.”
“You would?”
“Yeah, I’m meant to be working from home that day anyways. And not to flex, but my internet’s pretty decent.”
You laugh. “Is that for your job or your crippling gaming addiction?”
“A bit of both,” he chuckles back, the sound blooming a warmth of happiness in your chest. “Working in CompSci has its perks.”
“So, I’m finding out,” you smile, an underlying layer of discomfort shifting you against your desk chair. “Are you sure, though?”
“Of course. I’d hate if you lost out on this knowing I could’ve done something to help,” Jisung explains. “You were the one to introduce me to them anyways. Plus we’d have a better chance of sticking together in the pit if we get them together, right?”
You swallow a lump in your throat, something taking flight in your airy chest. “Yeah, you’re right. Just send me your bank details so I can transfer you the day of.”
“Coming right up!” he jokes, and you laugh, however lame he claims himself to be.
On Thursday, he sends you a photo of his solid black high-tech set-up, a PC he’s constructed himself with more monitors than you can count. The side of his face is included in the picture, silky black hair, a brown eye and a beauty mark on his cheekbone you dream of kissing later that night. You find out he secures the tickets on your lunch break, your debt towards him being booking the hotel you’d be staying at. Due to the limited funds you’re working with, you end up getting a shared room, an option that gives him pause before he agrees in a tremored voice. You’re a bit apprehensive yourself, but you booked for two beds, so it should be fine. If worst comes to worst, and something happens between you two – like him turning out to be a sexist neckbeard loser he couldn’t take no for an answer - you’d sleep in your car (or kick him out, actually). At any rate, you had options (and a friend tracking your live location).
In no time, weeks fly by and Wunderhorse drops their latest album. It’s the best thing you’ve experienced since sliced bread, an opinion Jisung shares as you two listen to it over call late one Friday night, speaking about your favourite songs amongst other things. You don’t know how it starts, perhaps it’s a lyric that sticks out to him that he mentions or something else entirely, but suddenly, you’re reminded of high school you. How deeply you wanted to be accepted by others, and how that satisfaction depended on the person you got it from. That you preferred conformity instead of individuality, because being seen with popular shallow kids meant something to you.
“I wasn’t a good person in high school,” you find yourself admitting, your body hollowed out with guilt. Regret like ash on your tongue. “I hurt people because I valued other people’s opinions over my own. I know I was young, but-”
“You said it yourself: you were young,” Jisung comments, the serious intent in his voice catching you off guard. “The fact you recognise your behaviour and feel remorse for it shows how much you’ve grown. I mean, high school can be very unforgiving because nobody really knows who they are or what the fuck they’re doing, so it’s only reasonably to make choices you may regret. What’s important, I think, is how you’ve chosen to move forward,”
“You said it yourself, you’ve apologised to those you hurt. Not many, if any person in your position, would do the same, which shows how much you genuinely care to make things right,” you sniff, vision blurring with tears of relief and sadness. “So, if you ask me, I think you’re being a bit hard on yourself. It’s all a learning curve, you were doing what was best to protect yourself then. And now, you’re a better and kinder person because of it.”
Another time you should’ve known you’d fallen for him. Yet, you remain none the wiser. All the way until concert day, getting off work early that Friday afternoon and making the journey down to the bright city lights of Seoul. Everything twinkles and dazzles, a 180 from your modest living in your hometown. You suppose your excitement for the concert has some role in this too, but considering the lack of vibrancy in your life, you allow yourself to sink your teeth into this. Feel the goosebumps against your skin, the lightness in your limbs and the uptake in your heartbeat.
You check into the hotel first since Jisung has a last-minute team meeting at work, setting yourself up on your side of the cosy room of wooden and white hues. As you slip on your Hello Kitty headband to do skincare, a knock rasps against the door, audible above the sound of your music.
With furrowed eyebrows, you approach the door, revealing a sight that stops your heart in its tracks.
On the other side of the door is who you should’ve expected: Jisung. What you don’t expect, however, is his sharp features, black smooth hair with matching formal clothing to contrast so beautifully with his porcelain skin. The dark, ocean blue contacts he wears with a pretty pink lip tint. Not to mention that beauty mark you’ve been thirsting over for the past few months? Yeah, that’s all in eye-view now, close enough to touch and it’s this fact that sends your brain into overdrive.
While you malfunction, Jisung dips his head, a large fist curled to his lips to hide his sheepish smile. Chuckles in a bit of an awkward and embarrassed way. 
Oh my god?!
“Nice to finally meet you,” he greets, black leather overnight bag clutched to his side. A fluffy blue and pink keychain of Little Twin Stars hangs off the zip, a cute juxtaposition to his intimidating outfit. And height. God, he really wasn’t lying when he said he was nearly 6 ft. 
“I texted you I’d arrived, but you hadn’t read them,”
A forceful blink out of your trance brings you back to reality, one where you’re not openly drooling over how handsome your internet best friend is. “Yeah, sorry. I was busy getting ready.”
“I figured so,” his eyes scan your clothes - your ripped baggy jeans, leather platform shoes amongst what you have on - and his lips curve, admiration in his eyes. “You look great.”
If there weren’t societal ideals of an inappropriate reaction to that compliment, you would’ve tattooed it to your forehead, or on your lower back. Maybe ripped off your shirt and kissed him before combusting because what do you mean, this very handsome man, thinks you look great?!
“Thank you,” you blush, your body running hot like a furnace. Even so, you decide to take advantage of the situation, leaning in for an embrace that he reciprocates as you mumble into his shoulder. “Nice to finally meet you too.”
The rest of the afternoon blurs, the few moments of scattered glances and awkward silence incomparable with the ease of conversation that flows between you once his favourite song, Poppy, comes on. Catching up to speed with each other’s day as you two get ready, it’s not lost on you how domestic the scene is - how familiar, or right it feels. Jisung, in all aspects of the word, is endearing - flustered by the compliments you send his way, brightening up at the new additions to the setlist and best of you, timid with pink cheeks when he hands over a ‘first meeting’ gift - an assortment of snacks, a Hello Kitty plushie and a card that makes you coo. It takes everything in you not to sink your teeth into him, overwhelmed by the sweetness that laces his actions and words, riding the high he and the music gives you as you make your way to the venue after you’re both finished.
Long lines snake around the arena, grey clouds permeating the area as rainfall clatters to the pavement. Jisung, ever so prepared, brings along an umbrella that you share, squeezing underneath so much you feel the warmth of Jisung through his bare, very defined bicep. How someone looks so good in a silver sequin top under a tattered sleeveless black vest is beyond you. Then again, him being single is beyond your comprehension too. Considering his calm and thoughtful demeanour, coupled with his good looks, you would’ve expected people lining up by the thousands to plead their case. However, whenever you two talked about this, he’d simply say his go-to phrase and change the topic, his phrase being:
“I’ve got my eye on someone. Just working up the courage to ask them out.”
Whoever managed to catch his eye, you’d thought to be lucky. Maybe they’d saved a small village in their past life because as people push when the doors open, Jisung shields you from any damage, reminding you how good of a romantic partner he could be. Especially so when you’re inside and he snaps all your photos, accompanying you to the bar and merch table where you get matching t-shirts before he keeps them with him so you’re free throughout the concert. Dimmed red lights and chatter fill the spacious hall, a flood of warm bodies surrounding you as you peer at the stage, the band all set up and ready to go come showtime. You sing along to the host of songs the venue plays beforehand, enough nudges in the shoulder to get Jisung to sing along and of course - of course - he has a beautiful voice too. At this point, you were convinced he either had a missing toe or had weird opinions about the order of cereal because the more you spent time with him, the more he shines in your eyes.
Eventually, the chatter dies down and all lights go off, screams rising through the crowd as Wunderhorse comes onto the stage. Buzzing at a frequency unheard of, you bounce off the balls of your feet, hand holding Jisung as you exclaim, “It’s them! It’s really them!”
Missing how flushed Jisung becomes at the contact, you sing with all your heart - offkey and all - to their opening song, Midas. The energy is through the roof, a dizzying world of flashing lights and music that retches the lyrics straight out of you. In a moment’s chance, Jisung and you turn to each other mid-song, smiles bright as the stage lights outline your damp faces, chest heaving with a mouthful of lyrics in their wake. It’s the happiest you’ve been, holding his hand like this, and as the night winds to simmer, you sway to slow songs and thank your lucky stars for finding your way back to this.
After the show, you two chatter with other adoring fans before trekking to your nearby hotel, stomachs growling for food. Jisung finds a great Chinese place that delivers until 2 am, a gesture you simper at, unaware he’d even remembered you’d liked the cuisine. At this point, you’re drained in the best possible way, a dull ache in your feet but riding a high of something you’ll remember forever. 
Now, you’re all up to speed. Great. Let’s get back to your current dilemma.
Somehow, someway, your unlaced and stubborn platform shoes cause a stumble, one that Jisung tries to save you from but ends up caught in the mix. How, you might ask? Well, you’re not entirely sure but what you definitely know is that you’ve fallen on one of the beds, Jisung’s body caging yours as he braces his own fall. Face-to-face. With you.
Ok.
You’re close enough to share a breath, within reach to see his long lashes and shaky pupils that dart from your eyes to your lips, back to your eyes again. Suddenly, the room temperature dials to an unprecedented heat, walls closing in on you two as you lie in waiting. Waiting for the other to make their move. To lean in or pull away, heads or tails on a coin.
His phone rings, cutting through the tension-filled air with a knife. The moment, gone. 
“You okay?” he rasps, a knit in his eyebrows as if he’s holding himself back. You blink wordlessly, your answer in an absent nod. “I’ll, uhm…get the food.”
It’s not a suggestion, nothing that you can object to, particularly when he’s long gone and you’re clutching at your chest, months of infatuation knocking the breath out of you.
When Jisung returns minutes later, you’ve turned the TV on, preparing to fill the silence if need be. It proves necessary, only groans of pleasure and compliments to the chef shared between you two as you eat your weight in noodles. Not much is said when you’re getting ready for bed either, brushing your teeth together as if you're a couple and settling into separate beds, all the lights turned off.
Still reeling for the fall, and convinced his shallow breaths allude to his slumber, you’re startled by the call of your name, head turning towards Jisung beside you.
“Yes?”
“You sure you’re ok?” he asks before clearing his throat. “That was…some fall.”
You can say that again.
“I’m ok,” you lie. You’re on high alert, frazzled at every end with a heart you’ve just realised longs for the man not even two metres away from you. “Are you?”
Silence. The only feedback you hear is the crinkle of his duvet as he shuffles in his bed.
“Ask me another question.”
You turn to him, shrouded in darkness. “Like what?”
He doesn’t speak again, lets the silence devour the space between you before he says. “Ask me about the person I’m interested in.”
Water that rivals the arctic pours down your back, a harsh call to reality as you remember. Right, he has someone he’s interested in. Someone who he’ll devout his time to, listen to their music recommendations and hold their hands at concerts. And you? Well, you’ll still be friends, just not as close. Maybe not even friends at all.
The thought closes an iron fist around your heart.
“Why haven’t you asked them out?” is what you manage, because it’s on your mind - what time and place he’ll find himself in when he confesses his feelings.
“Because I’m scared,” he admits, small and in a whisper. “Considering we met online, it’s kind of hard to gauge their interest or read any signs. You don’t give me much to work with,”
You still. “I don’t?’
“I mean, I haven’t been too obvious, but I’m crazy about you,” he confesses. “I love the light in your eyes and the kindness in your heart. You’re so deeply human and live life like it’s your first and last. There’s no one like you and I think the idea of knowing how special you are triggered my fear of rejection. Because what would my life be without watching festival performances drunk with you? What would it be if you didn’t laugh at my lame jokes and didn’t command my every thought?”
Jisung shuffles again, a flicker of dim light in between you two at a lamp source as he stares over at you, wholehearted and vulnerable. “It’d be an empty one - not worth living.”
Slowly, your body brings you upwards, the two of you hanging off the edges of your bed. So close if you’d reach out, your hands would touch. 
“When?” you croak, unable to meet his eyes. “When did you…start feeling this way?”
His eyes lower, a slight curve to the corner of his lips. “Around November?”
Electricity zaps your back straight. Five months ago? “When we joined the server?”
“Shortly after that,” he admits, a coy grin breaking out against his flushed features. “I was having a really hard day and you’d recommend a song in the chat, Favourite by Fontaines DC, and said how nostalgic and hopeful it felt to you. I gave it a listen and…it was like a battery in my back. I cried, but I also smiled too because I understood what you meant by it all,”
He threads his fingers together, peering up with shining eyes as he adds, “it felt like a peak into your soul, and mine too….I think that’s where it started.”
Your hand finally reaches out, overlaying his as tears fill your sight. “You know you’re my favourite, right?”
“No one stood a chance after that drunk video of you singing along to Champagne Supernova,” you share a laugh, reminiscing of the video he accidentally sent into the server one December night. A die-hard Oasis fan till the end. “I mean it. There’s no one I’d want to spend my days with, listen to music with and discover all there is to life. No one but you.”
His bottom lip gives a wobble, hands unearthing from yours as his thumb grazes your knuckles, bringing the hand up in a searing kiss. One he looks you right in the eyes for as he says, “Can we push the beds together please?”
You bark out an unexpected laugh, fondness shaping your smile as you speak with all of your heart. “I would love nothing more.”
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theinfinitedivides · 3 months ago
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wi papa look a thing there for me. awa.
prefacing this with a PSA that i'm going to try and keep short but basically regardless of anything i say here let me make it known that i do believe he should apologize. whether or not he's still actively saying that word in 2024 it is something he's used in the past even if he isn't performing said play anymore/saying things like that so flippantly. granted if he does apologize there's always going to be a section of fandom that's like 'he only apologized bc he got caught' yes?????????? that's what always happens????????? lbr you're not going to get on IG and announce you killed your ex two decades ago and you'll be turning yourself in when there's an entire true crime community in the depths of the internet who will dig up the cold case + the suspiciously convenient alibi anyway without you lifting a finger. politicians who get called out for blackface in college do not go around telling people they did blackface in college. celebrities who were homophobic on this hellsite in high school back in the early 10s before they realized they were gay are not going to let you know what their handle was. this is how the world works.
that being said i must confess i caught wind of the stirrings of this a bit early bc during the clusterfuck that was the Jam vs Zamasian RPF poll (i did not go in the notes. rancid ass shit) someone had taken a screenshot of a reblog made as a 'gotcha' to Zamasian voters by implying that they were anti-Black for voting for a ship featuring an actor that said the n-word in a play he hasn't performed for several decades since, with a short taped example that the general public was not going to know how to find unless they were on a mission. i poked around, saw a couple hints here and there that implied that the clip actually existed, marked that down for future ref and went about my business. disappointing? sure. run of the mill especially among people his age in the industry from that time period who are perceived to benefit from white privilege? absolutely. the former bird identified app dragging all of this back into the light (including the interview with Chris Rock. which i have not seen though there's no way it was within the last few years for AMC to still hire Eric if they had seen it. correct me if i'm wrong pls) is unexpected but tracks for the fandom on there.
generally i don't believe in cancelling someone for things they said or did more than ten years ago if they are no longer the same person they were back then. i don't believe Jacob or Assad or any one of the staff of color who may have been working behind the scenes would have agreed to continue interacting with Eric if he had the same attitude as he did when he first wrote and performed the play. i don't believe his Black comedian niece would continue to talk about him and share photos with him if he was calling her or the Black side of her family the n-word. i am willing to give the 'Eric Bogosian n-word' reply tweet he reportedly made before deleting it shortly after the brief benefit of the doubt bc it was 1. supposedly under someone else's tweet talking about the play incident and 2. i cannot count how many times i have accidently commented/almost posted something on here or YouTube or Reddit or ao3 bc i was on mobile and once the keyboard's open the app/browser flips the fuck out and puts the search bar and the comment box too close together. now if his ass shows up and shows out and stands ten toes down while he's currently on time-out or doesn't address any of this we're dealing with a different story. if more examples of him acting like this come out i'll drop him faster than you can call the election it will be that serious.
anyway for now i'm choosing to keep an eye on this while acknowledging that us Black folks do have the right to be upset and pissed as fuck. we deal with enough racism/microaggressions in fandom spaces as it is we definitely don't need new ones, and we don't need them from the past career choice of the main cast of a show a lot of us enjoy. amen
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wisteria-lodge · 1 month ago
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About the gender in hp thing: I know JKR wrote the books wanting the patriarchy to have minimal impact on the world but even through a couple of the metas you wrote you can see that that’s not the case. In your character crying post there’s a clear implication that showing that kind of emotion is a weakness but also that it is not masculine. Equating strength with masculinity is foundational for cultures with strong patriarchies, and this idea infests every other aspect of their lives. Idk because of that and many other reasons I have a very hard time of writing the wizarding world as anything other than a patriarchy
This is a watsonian analysis vs doylist analysis issue.
I 100% do think that JKR went out of her way to really, really downplay the importance of gender in her worldbuilding - and this contributes a lot to the specific feel of the world. You could genderflip, idk. Neville. Snape. Draco. Hermione. McGonagall. and almost no plot elements or character dynamics would change. (Maybe James would bully Severus slightly differently? Idk. He honestly might not.)
Compare HP to something like His Dark Materials, another British fantasy series released at the same time, marketed to the same demographic... in which gender politics are REALLY important. Lyra conforming or not conforming to specific gender norms hugely impacts the way a lot of other characters treat her. So much of Mrs. Coulter's character has to do with how she's navigated the back ways and side avenues into power, because the patriarchy that runs *that* world is extremely explicit and plot relevant, and there's a lot she just can't do.
Now is JKR *good* at writing a gender-blind world? Not really no. So she's stripped out the importance of gender in a fairly surface way, while leaving evidence of the foundations intact. Everyone's a het couple, women take the husband's last name, Molly and Petunia are at home while their husbands work and there's no inverse of that situation, Fleur's father walks her down the aisle at her wedding, it's important that Hermione be able to tame her hair when she wants to, but for Harry it doesn't matter...
There is ALSO the narrative voice poking through and putting its own spin on everything. This is where we start getting judgment (for example) directed both at girls who are too feminine, and at girls who aren't feminine enough. Or sexual assault not really "sticking" if it's directed at boys. We don't have a character talking, in-universe, about how it's wrong for a woman not to want children. We just have a book where the only women who don't have kids (or take care of kids) are villains. Same thing with masculinity = strength = no crying. That's something the narrative framing / bias of the author brings to the table, but it's kept out of the mechanics of the magical world. I guess you could say Harry and Draco equate crying/fainting with weakness (but not explicitly anti-masculinity)... but then Lupin goes out of his way to separate 'fainting' from 'weakness' anyway.
Interestingly, gender is much more baked into the muggle worldbuilding. (Part of why I think leaving that aspect out of the wizarding world was a deliberate choice.) Smeltings is an all-boys school, so is St Brutus.' Dudley teases Harry about his "boyfriend" Cedric, Vernon sizes up Arthur and Mad-Eye by how masculine they are. At the beginning of Book 4, Dudley's diet is this very gendered conflict between Vernon and Petunia, where Vernon doesn't want a "little nancy boy for a son" - and that is one of the only truly gendered insults in the whole series. "Crybaby" almost counts... but the Slytherins tease Hermione for crying too, so idk. They tend to go for pretty gender-neutral insults, like "poor" "unimportant parents" "looks like a chipmunk" ... etc.
Like... I'm trying to imagine a scene were Lucius lays into Draco for not being masculine enough, and I can't. I think that in a canon-compliant fic, a scene like that would feel odd. The conflict would need to be framed more like a "you disgrace the name of Malfoy with your weakness" or "never tell anyone outside the family what you're thinking" or "your believe yourself to be more intelligent than you truly are." Not "you need to man up."
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baeddel · 6 months ago
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on the racist riots in Belfast
i made a post in 2021 titled "dispatch on the unrest in Belfast" (click) trying to provide some local-knowledge context for the sectarian riots in town. i have no such special knowledge to offer this time. it has been, to be honest, shocking to me how many people came to them and how well organized they were. we have seen an increasing prevalence of anti-immigrant racism in the north in recent years; graffiti saying "locals only" (simple meaning: "whites only") on council houses going to market has been reported on since 2014 (click, 2018 click, 2023 click), for example. and in 2022 the PSNI released a report stating that hate crimes of every kind, including racist hate crimes, had reached the highest of any year since they began counting in 2004/5 (click). according to the BBC as of 2014 "on average a racially motivated offence takes place at least once a day" in Belfast (click) and it has only risen since that. but it was obviously not organized at this scale before. my girlfriend remarked that this was the first time Northern Ireland has had a race riot and i think, assuming we treat sectarian riots as something else, that may be true? (the UK-wide 1919 race riots did not seem to affect Ireland from what i could find and anyway were a bit before partition; otherwise they are quite similar to what is happening today).
perhaps no further context is really possible to give; they are race riots and they are happening because of racism. nevertheless i will try and write down some things i've thought about it.
in the 2021 post i talked about the nature of the disorder, where if you looked at the footage mostly people stood on the pavement and watched while the professionals—loyalist paramilitaries—handled the direct action (hijacking and burning busses and such). that is because these demonstrations were organized by the paramilitaries and everyone must obey them. that is not the case here; the crowds attack people of colour and immigrants, their homes or businesses owned by them, wherever they can find them. if they were kicked out of one area they went somewhere else and did it there; or else they did it where they lived as on Sandy Row. so it seems to be genuinely spontaneous and not directed from above.
the paramilitaries claim they did not organize it (the Belfast Telegraph quote what they call a 'senior loyalist' saying "[w]e didn’t start this, we aren’t behind it" click—what a demonstrative article, by the way, the police asking the paramilitaries for help with population control!). they say that about everything, but i think i believe them this time for that reason. it doesn't look paramilitary. i suppose whoever organized it must be taking orders from England. however, we are aware of at least some involvement by paramilitaries. the rightists who travelled up from Ireland were identified by PSNI and Gardaí to be fraternizing with UDA men (click). blueshirts associating with loyalists is not really surprising but i am not sure it has happened before. PSNI also claim there is a "paramilitary element" within the racist riots but are reluctant to say they're behind them (click).
i have talked before about how loyalism has felt a bit of a transition from an armed struggle into something that looks like a popular movement, with demonstrations and direct action becoming the main source of spectacle. it's possible there is a gradual transition towards this point, where paramilitary hierarchy becomes secondary to a spontaneously organized reactionary movement.
it also fits into a pattern that i have talked about before (click, also here), which is that democracy in the north has undergone dramatic changes recently. whereas in the past the national conversation dominated politics, today ordinary issues of civil society are decisive. the DUP lost their monopoly on unionist voters because of how they handled COVID, the border, the cost of living and so forth—problems a normal political party is expected to solve, not a party holding down a sovereignty under siege as they were supposed to be—and that's why SF got the majority. immigration is one such 'normal' political issue, and racist violence breaks out in Belfast in a way that doesn't differ substantially to how it breaks out at the same time in a normal country like England.
speaking of the fracturing of the DUP, i felt that it was significant that we could name, as a precipitating event, the fracturing of the right wing parties in general. in the north of Ireland the DUP lost much of its support, but no single party could replace it; several unionist parties now leech its vote, while moderate unionists vote for Alliance. and in the recent election the Tories lost to Labour, but they also lost many seats to Reform. between SF and Labour we are in an era where for the first time in a long time the UK is governed by center left parties, meanwhile it is unclear what opposition has the mandate of the right-wing voter. this means that for a right wing person electoral party politics looks like an ambiguous, distant and unrewarding terrain of struggle. perhaps that is a background condition as to why racist propagandists have been able to mobilize so many people into joining these events.
something else that struck me as possibly a precipitating event is that for the better part of a year we've had extremely active and persistent organizing around Palestine in the UK, in terms of demonstrations, direct action and even in electoral politics (with several independent candidates who care about Gaza taking seats from Labour in the last election). thus, right-wing racists have seen news about pro-Palestine organizing almost every day for a long time. we know that here in the north when Palestinian flags are flown it isn't long before Israel flags are flown in response. i think it's possible to see the specifically anti-Islamic character of the riots as a kind of counter-revolution or reaction to Palestine.
those were the thoughts i had to share. on Friday 9th (today as i write this) there is a racist demonstration planned, as well as a counter-protest. the counter-protest is backed by NIPSA (a big NI union) as well as the Belfast City Council (! click), so perhaps it will be big. it starts at 4:30pm. stay safe.
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birdiepfft · 2 months ago
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ramblings about transformations & alt forms in TFO
i might make a series out of general analysis about TFO because i've watched this so many times with different lenses i have a lot to say. i ESPECIALLY would want to do a leitmotif/sound design analysis, if i have the time.
here's some ramblings from twitter that were disjointed by the word count but streamlined here for archival purposes.
ALT FORMS + VEHICLES
D-16/Megatron gets bulkier and bigger and a literal weapon of mass destruction - he becomes a tank because he becomes a war machine.
Optimus is a truck with a backpart allowing others to ride him because he values cooperation and comraderie in his fighting style. A truck is reliable, bulky, and becomes a foundational vehicle for transport.
Elita values agility and maneuverability above all else. This has shone in both her vehicle form but also throughout the movie in the way that she moves. She utilises the environment to her advantage to get out of the way in the trash train for example, and easily swings and jumps her way through the boxes.
Bee has an innocent fantasy tied to his transformations. He's not just any car -- he's a RACECAR. He has fancy wheels, and a cool visor and windshield. All of his subsequent transformations makes him look like a superhero, protective armour and weapons that are tied to fantasy and romanticised ideas of combat, than Megatron's pragmatic, or even BRUTAL approach to violence.
This is further compounded in megop's FINAL TRANSFORMATIONS.
D-16 makes himself PHYSICALLY bigger. to the point where he lifts Sentinel -- who is supposed to be twice his size cogless -- easily and bisects him. Megatron perpetuates the cycle of becoming an overbearing dictator by becoming larger, becoming stronger like Sentinel so he can stand AT ODDS with Sentinel. When he transforms and takes Megatronus' cog you can see it VISIBLY being covered by a larger two-piece plate as he transforms.
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Orion on the other hand asides from being slightly taller, isn't all that much different from his cogless self. As Optimus, his chest-plate is made of glass, transparent and showing his heart of gold, the matrix, his emotions being worn on his sleeve.
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In terms of CINEMATOGRAPHY...
Orion squats down when talking to his fellow miners, and sees them eye to eye. Megatron on the other hand stands above, and most shots when he becomes Megatron he LOOKS DOWN or the camera is LOOKING UP at him. This further shows the disparaty between their characters. Orion, then Optimus remaining down to earth whilst D16 fully becomes what he despises.
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Also another small detail that I really like is that in addition to going with the legacy design of the tank alt-form for Meg is that none of the miners become flying vehicles. Orion uses a booster to jump off a building because he's used to using jetpacks when he returns to Iacon. Megatron leaves Iacon city as a tank, whilst the High Guard follow him as planes.
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This further emphasises the humble backgrounds they're from and how they struggle to adjust and grow up in the cruel world they're forced to change.
Anyways yeah thanks for reading. If there's lots of love on this post I might make more bc this took forever to format ngl my brain is very scattered
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mecachrome · 11 months ago
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landoscar ao3 stats — 2023 overview
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notes
retrieved ~sometime in march 2024
methodology: scraped metadata for every fic in the landoscar tag and...... that's it. however one important constraint is that all temporal data is date updated (not posted), so the above timeline isn't exactly a true representation of fic growth but rather how many fics were last-updated at that time. of course this is still its own reflection of fandom health in a way since dead fandoms don't update old fic but well... it's just not quite the same!
this is just info about general trends, fic content, tags etc... so nothing about kudos/comments or any authors specifically
i decided to focus solely on fics last-updated in 2023 (unless otherwise mentioned) because i wanted a tidy set that i can maybe compare & contrast in a year's time, because i expect a lot of details to look different then (tho as stated above this set isn't exactly static... 🤷‍���️)
ngl i had to re-scrape a bunch of times because i forgot about it for like 3 weeks and then there were 100 new fics 😭 so if there are some minor discrepancies across the post it's because of that halfskh.
also i wanted to include more global comparisons (aka how 814 stack up against the f1 rpf tag in general), but this is also considerably difficult in some contexts since i can't exactly scrape 31,000+ fics can i... or i didn't even want to entertain the thought of trying to do so!!!
why did i do this? who knows.
anyway here's some viz T__T
ship growth
as evidenced in the opening graph, landoscar have been a very fast-growing ship over the past year — although interestingly enough they didn't really start growing substantially until july / the ~better half~ of the 2023 season. here are two views showing their "growth" (by date updated) alongside two other ships on the fringes of the f1 rpf top 10 (sebchal & galex):
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landoscar are very much on-track to surpass them and officially enter the top 10 soon, likely before mid-april ❗️ :o
ship characteristics
onto the ship content — another thing i was mildly curious about was how landoscar differs in certain areas from other f1 ships, or the f1 rpf "global" average you could say. for example, here's a breakdown of rating popularity in their ao3 tag:
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seeing as explicit is their most common rating, and that i don't necessarily expect this to be true for all ships/fandoms, i compared these percentages with the general f1 rpf tag to see whether some ratings are more commonly represented in 814 fic than average, which produced interesting results:
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do lando ships simply skew more HornyTM in general? is it oscar? a secret third thing??? who knows... actually i think it would be fun to do more analysis in this direction but that can wait for another time!!!
similarly i also wanted to see which ships are the most "public" on ao3, as in have the highest share of fic that isn't user-locked... i will refrain from peppering in my feelings about the 4th wall too heavy-handedly but i was curious to see whether some sort of perhaps... er, generational gap (?) of sorts between ships that are more public vs. not could be identified. however i don't pretend to have any takeaways from this LOL i conclude absolutely nothing. (for ref landoscar is currently 72% public, vs. a global avg of 63%)
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note that this graph is current stats, not filtered for 2023
looking at relationship tags, i also wanted to know whether landoscar suffer noticeably from Second-Ship Syndrome, so i tallied the first-tagged ship of every fic to find out. i know this doesn't necessarily mean that it's always the "main" ship but it's a good enough approximation. the results were quite positive!
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filtered to top ships with count of >1 only
i then also calculated the number of ships tagged for each fic to discern the profile of multi-shipping in 814 ficdom; i did have to do a little bit of string standardization (all instances of implied / background / hinted collapsed to hinted for simplicity's sake + removal of other redundancies), but otherwise i left everything mostly untouched.
as you can see, landoscar also have a fairly promising amount of OTP: TRUE fic:
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by the time you get to the fics with 10+ ships tagged, landoscar are less likely to be the primary ship, which makes sense just on a basic statistical level... this is also a very small sample size though
i also lazily tallied the 10 most common ships that weren't NOR/PIA or NOR & PIA to diff their shares of the 814 tag vs. of the general f1 rpf tag, to see which other pairings are more represented in the 814 tag than on average (because lestappen are the most popular by pure count but this is also true of fandom in general, so it would be a misrepresentation to say that their popularity is out of the ordinary):
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maxiel's gap isn't really that surprising since i think that, generationally, in terms of when both pairings were teammates there is quite a gap; with carlando—actually let me tally this again but including all instances of "implied" and "past" as being part of the same ship, since that's how ao3 tag-wrangles as well:
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Aha ! obviously as a direct ship there is competition between 814 and other lando or oscar ships, but this difference is somewhat less pronounced once we include all formats. tbh none of this really means anything but i thought i'd add it anyway... (it's also very possible that there are several errors in this, in which case my b 😔)
before we move on to additional tags, there are a few more basic characteristics of 814 fic we can calculate. i realize i never offered an overview of Super Basic Stats, so here are a few:
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plus, looking at word counts, here is a distribution of those in 2023-updated fic, which shows that a majority of 814 fics were under the 5k mark:
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85% of landoscar fics were under 10k & nearly 97% under 25k
i don't really have any reason to believe that landoscar's wc stats differ significantly from average ? so this is kind of just Data To Have Data, and it most likely reflects normal ao3 trends in general... but i thought i'd include it anyway because i already made it lol. similarly, here are word count distributions but stratified by rating:
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& same info but heat map view:
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i feel like this is also probably something you'd find across fandom in general — that gen fic is likely to have a higher share of under 1k works, since Building Up to sexual content often takes... Literal & Metaphorical Foreplay ! and the longer a fic is the more opportunities an author has to include a sex scene or other explicit content (ofc, not necessarily just porn but also graphic violence & so on). but i thought this was fun to visualize haha
additional tags & aus?
back in my old f1 rpf stats post, i made a table comparing fluff/angst "ratios" (not exactly a direct ratio because of how tag wrangling works, but an approximation) of the most popular f1 ships, and now that landoscar are somewhat popular i thought i'd first do an update:
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also current data, not 2023 to make things easier
just like before, simi are one of the most fluffy ships and brocedes are by far the most angsty, but it's interesting to see 814 also extremely high up on the charts, with far and away the lowest % of angst. will be exciting 2 see how that holds or changes as the seasons progress !
finally, i also wanted to do a bit of au/additional tag analysis because you can kind of see this when you use additional filters on ao3 but the previews are limited and get bogged down by the prevalence of *checks notes* Fluff, Angst, PWP, Anal Sex and what have you. which are nice stats to have and all but what of the rest !
disclaimer that the set for these tables is a biiiit outdated because by the time i'd wrangled everything i was like I Am Not Changing It Again. unfortunately i clean my data with shoddy queries and regex functions in googsheetz...
there were 48 tags with at least 10 instances from 2023 fics, shown below, with ones that are (some ~vaguely) nsfw in red just to kind of get a rough sense of which tags get commonly used in M/E fic:
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getting a bit too much into small sample size / specific fic territory so if you're an author i sincerely apologize for that... do not mean 2 put u on blast... TT__TT but i also tried to tally the most popular aus people write for 814, which is a bit dubious because people tag in really different ways and i had to accommodate for a lot of string formats but ... it's close enough ! (?)
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i feel like this is very little interesting info but idk what else to add so i will stop here for now... well!!! if you made it to the end i hope u learned something or even vaguely enjoyed reading T__T and most of all thank you :')
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communistkenobi · 4 months ago
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I love finding new communists blogs because you immediately have to scroll through all the posts to see if you wanna follow them or block them lmao. Anyway from what I understand you work in western academia to some degree and as a student taking some classes in the social sciences it’s such a pain in the ass trying to even bring up a Marxist perspective. How do you deal with how much pushback socialism has in academia?
I’m doing a PhD in sociology ! And please feel free to block me, we are all annoying etc 
I would say that resistance to socialist ideas is a major source of frustration for me in academia - a learning curve for me has been gearing my writing & research to work around that type of institutional hostility. It depends on the discipline as well. Given that Marx is such a titanic figure in sociology I find it easier to engage with his work openly (although you will be mocked for it lol - it’s viewed as a dead-end project in the West since the USSR collapsed), whereas more history- or politics-based courses I’ve taken have been extremely hostile to even tepid Marxist analysis. I have friends to vent to and have found other people in my discipline who are like-minded, which has helped. You will need to do a lot of tactical retreats - I’ve found that tying your analysis to state policy helps a lot, it helps you get grants, and academics trade in policy-talk across disciplines so it will prepare you for that if you want to stay in academia.
I have also been making peace with the fact that academia is not really the place to “do” socialism - it is a deeply political job, and my ideological commitments motivate me to do work and research that I hope are beneficial to the world, but I think the authority and privileges afforded to academics, not academia itself, is the better avenue to conduct political activity - participating in student & left-wing actions, giving money and resources to activist groups, using your prestigious position to publicly speak on issues, sign important documents for vulnerable people (profs are counted as authorities to sign off on name change documents for trans people in Canada for example, as well as visa and citizenship proof I believe?), things like that. There was that Canadian doctor, Dr. Yipeng Ge, who was suspended from his university position for speaking out against Israel and went to Palestine on a medical mission, Engels used his family’s money to fund Marx & socialist actions, Lenin went to law school, etc (i am NOT remotely comparing myself to any of them to be clear lol, just demonstrating that there is historical precedent for this way of thinking). I’ve done a decent amount of union + community work and the reoccurring lesson I keep learning is that there are many little, vacant positions of power sprinkled throughout the world that will help you organize and agitate above and beyond your individual capabilities. And the right wing knows this! They take over local school board committees and town halls and run for office in their local neighbourhoods all the time, often unopposed, and use that to exert terrible political influence.
I try very much to resist the “one of the good ones” mindset re: my own career in academia and is one I struggle with pretty often. being pragmatic about what academic research actually does in the world is still something I’m grappling with. Academia has provided me with an incredibly prestigious education and a lot of social capital that I hope to use for some amount of good. I’m also betting on what is essentially a lottery ticket, given how rare tenure-track university positions are, so maybe all of this will be irrelevant anyway lol. I’m not sure if that’s helpful but it’s not a settled issue for me either, so if this reads as vague or wishy-washy that’s why!
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causenessus · 11 months ago
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Loving You. | Haikyuu
inc. akaashi, bokuto, oikawa, iwaizumi, atsumu
written in 2nd pov (female reader implied)
song recc: help they all have a song AND/or a quote anyway hatachi no koi by lamp <3
word count: 1884 words
summary: "they love you. how do they show it?"
hello hyperspecific examples? hopefully they're fun to read and make sense!! shoutout to the boy whose bokuto's is based off of <3 also first time writing for atsumu so hopefully i did ok!!!!!
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they love you. how do they show it?
hello hyperspecific examples?
akaashi
“have you eaten? (i love you). did you get enough sleep last night? (i love you). how do you feel today? (i love you). did you have a nice day? (i love you). will you come on a walk with me? (i love you). here’s some fruit i cut up for you. (i love you) (i love you) (i love you).” "you're my everything"
although he’s quiet i just think he’s so expressive
like he has no trouble saying “i love you” but also says it in so many other ways than just that
he cares so much about you you’re not even able to doubt it for one second. it’s like every question is just his way of saying “i love you”
“did you eat today? do you want something to eat?” “how was your sleep? did you get enough sleep?” all his way of saying i love you
he’s always randomly coming into the room you’re currently in, gently grabbing both sides of your head and just kissing you all over, no words, just adoration <3
again I don’t think he’d have any trouble saying that he love you but it just feels so much more intimate, easier, and meaningful for him to find ways to show/say it instead
he’s such a big fan of the three taps to say i love you (link to an image post about the original person who did this)
he’s always holding your hand in public, giving it three squeezes, he’ll be playing with your fingers when you guys are sitting together and suddenly he’s giving your skin three taps. he’ll kiss your forehead three times, he’s always telling you that he loves you <3
he just loves to be around you and he’s always looking out for you
if you guys have a class together and you unexpectedly don’t show up to class, he’s texting you immediately to make sure everything’s okay
and he’s always keeping you company while you’re doing things, from homework to cooking to just reading
if you need help or will let him help with anything, he’s more than happy to but he also just loves chilling
from the beginning of your relationship and even before when you guys were just friends, hangouts often went on way longer than they were supposed to and you often stay over at each others’ houses because neither of you can bear to leave the presence of the other <3
bokuto
“love is not an everlasting performance in which you attempt to retain the attention of your significant other but rather a release of control and putting faith into them and trusting them to choose to stay with you no matter what you have to offer.  to love and be loved is to rest.”
he trusts you so much
like yes this precious baby has definitely put his entire trust into a lot of people but you’re so so much more to him and it’s different <3
he feels so safe with you and he know he can trust you with literally anything, he does not hesitate to share or tell you anything
he’s following you around all the time like a lost puppy
guaranteed there’s been at least one time where he had to navigate an arena away from home without you and akaashi
he did not show up to warm ups
someone had to come find him huddled in a corner, alone and lost
that random fact about how you feel sleepy around the people you trust?
he can be so energetic with you but other times he can’t even keep his eyes open around you
he’s always falling asleep, his head lulling to the side and resting on your shoulder on train rides back home
sometimes he’ll be telling you stories and suddenly letting out the biggest yawn ever
he'll forget that he's talking because suddenly all he wants to do is spend his time curled up with you <3
he loves to lean against you or be in contact with you in someway, whether that be holding your hand (or just a finger <3) or a hand on your thigh, it makes him feel so sleepy but so safe
murmurs so many “I love you”s before falling asleep
because he trusts you he’s also so good at listening to you too
from the silliest of things to actual requests <3
this is about to get so hyperspecific bear w me pls
you’d just finished redesigning a profile for a social media account and in a passing thought, as you guys were laying with each other in bed, you happen to say, “you should change your profile picture at some point, kou. you've had it for years.”
you didn’t mean it anyway bad, just something you suggested since you had just reorganized your own profile but you still loved his current profile picture <3
but the next time you happened to see his account, you noticed it was a mirror pic from before you two had dressed up to go out a few months ago
“when did you change your profile picture, love? it’s adorable,” you smiled as you kissed his head while he was laying on you
“like 10 minutes after you told me to, i just had to find the right photo,” he mumbled, his voice muffled from your shirt that he had buried his face into
other times it’s things like helping around the house, asking him to wash the dishes while you’re cooking for example
he’s so willing to help but in the beginning, he was lost
he was so ready to wash them but darling could not find the soap
but he loves you so much he’s always working so hard to do what you ask of him so he’ll make sure he learns more about chores to help out more and ofc there’s always more to learn so he’ll always be following your lead <3
oikawa
“when you like the spotlight as much as i do, it’s quite an adjustment to realize that the real reason you might be here is to shine it on someone else.” "she looks just like a dream / the prettiest girl i've ever seen."
man has been living with a spotlight shining on him his whole life
but once he met you, he completely fell in love and he moves the spotlight to be on you <3
literally just completely worships you must i say more
he does not let insecurities slide he’s your #1 hypeman and will fight anyone who disagrees
people around you both have noticed that since you guys started dating, you’ve grown more confident as a result of his love <33333
it doesn’t have to be big changes, literally just things like you’re able to talk louder, voice opinions, or try new things because he’s always there to encourage you along the way
take it you’re a little shy and don’t usually talk very loud but you have to if you’re going to get everyone’s attention in a setting such as trying to manage seijoh’s volleyball team (good luck with that 💔)
you raised your voice and it worked so that you could quiet the boys down in order to explain a change in plans for practice
afterwards, tooru’s coming up to you with a big smile on his face as he rests his forehead against yours
“i don’t think i’ve ever heard you yell, princess,” he says, looking into your eyes but you can’t help but take what he says in a bad way, looking away
“i didn’t mean to yell at you guys, i just didn’t know what else to do,” you mumble back with a frown
he kisses it away with a small laugh, “no, don’t feel bad, pretty. we were all surprised but so proud of you. you never would have done that at the start of the school year.”
he’s so happy whenever you try something new and he’s always there to tell you how well you’re doing even if you don’t feel like it
if you show that you love him by supporting him in his passions and all that he does, he shows his love by supporting you 1000% back
iwaizumi
“there’s nothing softer and more gentle than loving someone with your whole heart and never once holding back when it comes to them.” "think i'm gonna love you 'til i'm dead / i can't wait to buy you things / a brand new diamond ring / this is more than just a fling"
man loves so hard
i cannot see him in a short-term or commitment-free relationship
if he loves someone, he loves them wholly and completely. he’s all in, giving you everything
even before you guys started dating he was always checking in, making sure you were doing okay and offering hugs if you ever needed them
you cannot tell me that he doesn’t give the best hugs ever <33
now that you are dating though it’s just an excuse to love you more and show it in so many ways <3
as i say every single time, i just know he loves buying you gifts
you’re always on his mind, in every situation, whether he’s walking around and sees something in the window of a store that he knows you would like, or when he’s going to go pick something up to eat, he’ll always buy you something as well <3
he’ll really do anything for you, too. ask and it’s almost guaranteed
“iwa, can i draw on u”
“anything you want, princess”
“can we go get ice cream?” (it’s midnight)
“yea, are you ready to go now, love?”
all he needs in return is your love
adores getting to take naps with you or just laying in bed with you and in public, he always has an arm around your waist or should, keeping you close
with him it’s a complete all-all 100% relationship from both sides, that's what love is to him
everything is shared between you guys from money to items to secrets, you guys have complete trust in each other there’s not even a question about it he’s so good at communicating and keeping everything clear
everything he has is yours if you’ll be his <3
atsumu
“the one that loves, does he come back? the one that loves never leaves, my dear.”
he just completely softens around you
in fact i could see him getting worse around other people because you’re just the only one that matters to him
you know those videos about gym bros with girlfriends who act all misogynistic and stinky at the gym so that girls don’t approach them? that’s him. (i tried so hard to find a video as an example but i could not pls tell me u know what i’m talking about)
if any girl other than you tries to approach him literally anywhere they’re about to be absolutely obliterated when he flat out ignores him. or, if they don’t get the hint and he finally acknowledges them, he gives them the dirtiest, coldest look known to man, his nose wrinkling as he turns to them
“huh? yer talking to me? why? piss off.”
everyone knows that if they have to give him bad news, it’s best to do it when you’re in his general proximity or he’s just talked to you because that’s when he’ll receive it best
it’s nearly impossible to anger him when you’re around, and even if he gets upset, he won’t blow up, he’s just too enamored by you <3
loves to hold your hand in his lap or have a hand on your thigh and he’s content with life
his voice always lowers and softens when he’s around you, and he gives you the sweetest heart eyes
he’s always looking at you and he’ll tease you a lot just because he adores your reactions but they’re all just playful jokes
“ya know, if you ever wanted to cheer for me when everyone goes silent during games, I’d let ya,” he told you once while he was keeping you company before a game on a bench
“what? I could never do that,” your face heated at the thought, “it’d just be me and everyone would look at me. someone would probably even get mad.”
he chuckled, shaking his head as he brought your knuckles to his lips, “that’s the point. you’d sound so cute, and they’d know yer mine.” 
if you ever had a problem with how he treats other people, he’d try to work on it if you talk to him about it
no promises, but he’ll do his best for his princess <3
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companion-of-the-dragonmark · 4 months ago
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When Was the First Kingdom of the Wilderwest Built? (HTTYD Books)
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Hello, my fellow Dragonmarkers! It's been awhile! As promised, here's the article concerning the plausible timeline of the Kingdom of the Wilderwest. This article was actually a very old one of mine that I had written during this month in 2018. Why didn't I post it on here? Because I wasn't on Tumblr until 2020. And by then, I had forgotten to post this on here. Whoops. Teehee. 😜
When did Hiccup the First end the First Human-Dragon War and built the First Kingdom of the Wilderwest?
Many fans just go with what Wodensfang says in Book 11, supporting the 1000-Year Dynasty mentioned in Book 11 rather than the 500-700-Year Dynasty suggested in Book 9. In fact, it's everywhere in the HTTYD Wiki. I guess it's because fans view Book 11 to be more accurate because it's a later book? I don't know; maybe I'm thinking too hard about this.
But I want to talk through this and thoroughly go through the pros and cons of both sides of the argument and do this right. I'd love to know what you guys think about this.
Anyway, on to the topic!  
Possible Contradiction?:
In the First Book — the Book that we're all familiar with — in Chapter 6, Page 68, says that:
"The Dragon (speaking of the Green Death) had crawled down into the depths of the ocean and had gone into a Sleep Coma. Dragons can stay in this suspended state for eternity, half-dead, half-alive, buried under fathom after fathom of icy-cold seawater. Not a muscle of this particular Dragon had moved for six or seven centuries."
Wodensfang's account of Hiccup the First in Book 9 "How to Steal a Dragon's Sword", on Chapter 12, Page 203, seems to probably confirm this when he says: "Five or six centuries ago, when I was young, it was a very dark age, and the dragons and humans were at war."
He goes on further explanation in Page 208 concerning the Green Death: "...Merciless flew to the north, and to the Open Sea. He lived so long a loner that perhaps over the centuries he forgot his youth as leader of a dragon army and became quite an ordinary killer. Rumor was that several hundred years later, he was known only as the Green Death, one of the many monsters that terrorize the Deep Sea."
So you're probably saying, "Great! There it is! There's your answer! It was 600-700 years ago! Problem solved, right?"
Wrong.
In Book 11 "How to Betray a Dragon's Hero", on Chapter 6, Page 98, Wodensfang tells the story of how the Dragonmark came to be, as well as a more detailed history of the Kingdom of the Wilderwest and the story of Grimbeard the Ghastly as a boy, and how he changed the Mark. 
He says at the beginning of the story: "Once upon a time, Hiccup, a thousand or so years ago, when I was young and about the size of a Saber-Toothed Driver Dragon, I met your ancestor, Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the First, and I gave him the Dragon Jewel and trusted him with the Jewel's Secret."
In Page 100, Wodensfang repeats this by saying: "For over a thousand years, it seemed like I had made the right decision to entrust the Secret of the Dragon Jewel to the humans."
I know right? I'm as confused as you are! Didn't he say in Book 9 that it was "five or six centuries ago"? Maybe even SEVEN centuries ago? Why the change? Did he suddenly get the Dragon equivalent of memory loss due to old age? Does he not know how to count?
Here's the confusing thing: if he was rounding, this might explain it. But the thing is that you can do it with small numbers, but as the number gets bigger, you can't round up in great jumps.
(Warning: Math Ahead!)
For example, say that the number is 8, you round it up to 10 (in certain circumstances) because 8 is closer to 10 than 5. However, if it's 6, then you have to round down to 5 because 6 is closer to 5. The only time that it doesn't is when you're rounding up in percentages (55.678594375 would be 56, for example).
You can't round up to 1000 years from 600, or even 700. That's too high of a jump. Especially when you're telling a historical account. For one thing, it's inaccurate, and for another, it's lazy. And it'll spread lots of confusion.
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A Roman Piece to a Nordic Puzzle | The Hint's in the Roman Numerals: 
So then, which is it? Was the Kingdom of the Wilderwest built 600-700 years ago or 1000-odd years ago? 
First off, allow me to redirect your attention once more to the references concerning the Green Death (also known as Merciless):
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The Green Death Takes His Tea by Crownflame on DeviantArt
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"The Dragon (speaking of the Green Death) had crawled down into the depths of the ocean and had gone into a Sleep Coma. Dragons can stay in this suspended state for eternity, half-dead, half-alive, buried under fathom after fathom of icy-cold seawater. Not a muscle of this particular Dragon had moved for six or seven centuries." 
And this one:
  ". . .Merciless flew to the north, and to the Open Sea. He lived so long a loner that perhaps over the centuries he forgot his youth as leader of a dragon army and became quite an ordinary killer. Rumor was that several hundred years later, he was known only as the Green Death, one of the many monsters that terrorize the Deep Sea." 
According to these two quotes concerning the Dragon Merciless, it would appear that the events were about roughly 600 years ago. The problem is that the first quote says he had been in a Sleep Coma for six or seven centuries. I don't know about you, but that doesn't seem like a lot of time to me for him to have forgotten his past and about his nemesis Hiccup. It sounds like in the latter quote, Merciless lived and journeyed alone for a long time — about 100-200 years or more — before he fell into a Sleep Coma.
What might help support this is the mention of what he had eaten in Book 1, Page 129: "He was awake now, and he had coughed up the last thing he had eaten, the Eagle Standard of the Eighth Legion, with its pathetic ribbons still flying bravely."
Now, yes, the HTTYD books are exaggeratory and any historical references are "purely coincidental," and that the Roman Dragonrustlers were about during Hiccup the Third's time (but after Book 3 was said to have fled back to Rome — which is inaccurate because Hiccup's time was during the Viking Age, over 300 years after the fall of the Roman Empire. However, I have a theory that'll explain that in the future). 
But what if we DID get historical here? According to history, the only 8th Legion in Roman history was the Legio VIII Augusta, one of the oldest Roman legions in Rome's history (along with the Legio VI Feratta, Legio VII Claudia, and the (in)famous Legio IX Hispana). They were stationed in Gaul (modern France) near the modern-day Strasbourg area (called Argentoratum in Roman times). It was founded in 65 BC by Julius Caesar during the Gaul Wars. It continued service presumedly until either before or until the Fall of Rome (400-500 AD). 
Of course, since it continued service until that time period, then it's impossible for the Green Death to have eaten the Legion, right?
As Old Wrinkly used to say: "It's not im-POSSIBLE, only im-PROBABLE. The only thing that limits us are the limits to our imaginations." 
So, taking this sagely advice, let's think about this carefully.
According to Roman history, the Eighth Legion was disbanded during the first of Rome's Civil Wars (called Caesar's Civil War and the conflict was between Caesar and Scipio) soon after the Battle and Siege of Thapsus (modern-day Tunisia) in 46 BC for unknown reasons. It was reconstituted in 44 BC by Caesar's adopted son Augustus for Caesar's veterans who had loyally served him and helped him defeat Mark Antony and gain power as Rome's first Emperor.
So basically, there's a two-year gap between the disbandment and the reinstation of the Eighth Legion, which means that Merciless could've easily have eaten the Legion during that time and nobody would've been the wiser, and when Augustus reinstated the Legion two years later, he filled the ranks with other veterans who had served Caesar and Augustus.
What do you think? Plausible?
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Possible Connection to Dragon-Aging and Dates in the Book of Dragons:
Now, in Book 1, in the back of the How to Train Your Dragon book that Hiccup reads (similar to the Book of Dragons in the film) in Chapter 4 on Page 53-58, it says that the last stamped due-date was on "16 May 866 AD". The first and second due-dates stamped on there before that were "10 June 789 AD" and "9 April 835 AD".
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However, there's no mention of when that book was borrowed, or when it was returned, or the gap between the date and when Gobber the Belch had burgled it from the Meathead "Public" Library. The Hooligans seemed to have had the book for a while. So the current date of the time of Hiccup's first memoir could be anywhere from 866-900 AD — if not later! 
Suffering Scallops, it could even be in the 1000s AD!!! In Book 7, Hiccup writes in his epilogue that: "Now I am an old, old man, and the world that I created has no need for dragons. They have retreated from the civilization that I brought, along with the wolves, and the Berserks, and the monsters of my childhood."
In 1015 AD, Berserkers were outlawed, and the practice of "going berserk" as a profession and the rituals involving their cults were forbidden until by the turn of the 12th century, Berserkers had all but disappeared from human history. The end of the Viking Age was considered to be between 1066-1100 AD, so, scallops, Hiccup could very well have lived during this time.
(This could explain the crossbows in the TV series, as they were beginning to show up around this time, as well as Hiccup's quote in the first film: "300 years and I'm the first Viking who wouldn't kill a dragon!") 
And, in Book 12, Hiccup also explains in his epilogue that Sea-Dragons like Toothless can live for thousands of years, so maybe 1000-year period might be correct? There's no mention about the other sea dragons, apparently, so I guess they don't live nearly as long?
The problem is the period of growth in the Sea-Dragons. Wodensfang was probably of-age by the time he meets Hiccup the First, and he was "the size of a Saber-Toothed Driver Dragon" then. Then, as the decades and centuries went by and the Kingdom prospered, he grew to be "as large as a mountain". Then he says that hundreds of years ago, he began to "shrink in old age", as Sea-Dragons are small in young and old ages, but in adult stages they're colossal, until he shrunk to the "size of a large Viking hunting dog (probably a Norwegian Elkhound, which lived during this time and was used mainly as a guard and hunting dog)" during the time of Grimbeard the Ghastly. By Hiccup the Third's time a hundred years later, he shrunk to the size of Toothless.
Furious was still considered a baby during Hiccup the Second's time, but grew to be the size of a small elephant. Then 100 years later, he became the size of a mountain, when it doesn't seem that Wodensfang grew that big that quickly (though, to be fair, the Berserks had been feeding him well with human sacrifices for the past 100 years, among other foods, so he probably grew to be that big because of it.) He must've had an early growth spurt. lol 😂
That being said, the reason Furious and Wodensfang have different growing speeds may be likely due to Furious having been fed well since his hatchling days. Whereas it's hinted by Wodensfang himself that he's had a difficult life in his younger days, which is one of the reasons he joins Merciless' rebellion against the Vikings. So the struggle for food could've stunted his growth until he met Hiccup the First later on, at which point he grew faster as more food was available.
Meanwhile, there's Toothless, who's a baby, and has been the size of Wodensfang since the first book, and, according to Hiccup in his epilogue in Book 12, hasn't really grown up at all despite it being 62 years since the events of Book 12 (which if Hiccup was 10-11 when he got Toothless in Book 1, this would make Toothless 65-66 years old by Hiccup's death) and is still able to sleep on his chest. 
He must be a late bloomer. lol 😂
Then there's the Green Death — or Merciless — to consider. While he was Furious's size during Hiccup the First's time, and was considered to be a young dragon, then several centuries later, if not more, when he meets Hiccup the Third, he's still the same size! Do Sleep Comas delay aging and growth or something?
So basically we have FOUR Sea-Dragons who grow and age at various speeds! So I don't think we can glean anything from this.
So . . . 1000 years or 600-700 years? Honestly, I seem to get more confused the further I try to explain it! I hope you're having better luck keeping up than I am at the moment! lol 😂
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Time For a Little More Math! (cue the groans!):
Okay, I'm going to do a little more math. To be honest, graphs, charts, and basic math is the only math I love. If you don't like it, then skip if you'd like, though you'll miss out on the cool part. 😉🧐
I've done the calculations and I'll do my best with it. If there are any mistakes, please let me know and I'll correct them. 
I'll be using current time from 866-1100 AD and then add the date to when the Kingdom of the Wilderwest could've been established in Hiccup the First's time. 
I will be using the terms CTP (Current Time Period) and DFP (Dynasty Foundation Period) to avoid confusion.
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Whew! Okay! Now that THAT'S done and over with, let's get to the average ages of the Kings of the Wilderwest to further prove (hopefully) which date it might've been. 
I've organized it into different sections. Before Hiccup the Third, there were 12 Kings of the Wilderwest. So I'll divide the number of years that the Dynasty could've lasted to the number of Kings to get the average lifespan that each of the Kings have to be in order for this to become plausible.
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Now granted, some of these Kings could've died young (20s-30s), or very old, or in their middle-ages (pun not intended). This is the AVERAGE lifespan for each king -- not a literal statistic for each and every King. 
Unless, of course, if we were fanciful people, we might've theorized that there's some sort of magic spell in the Dragon Jewel that Wodensfang didn't mention that causes all of the Twelve Kings to die at the same age. 
In that case, if true, and if every King DOES INDEED die at the same age, then since Hiccup the Third dies at the age of 75/76, it would've been 900 years since the foundation of the Kingdom of the Wilderwest since every King would've died at the same age that Hiccup had died.
But we're not fanciful people . . . and that would be ridiculous. lol 😜
However, you're probably noticing that there are no 1000 Years among the statistics that I just showed above. That's because I had just remembered that the Kingdom of the Wilderwest collapsed a hundred years before Hiccup the Third's time. Meaning that if the Dynasty and Kingdom lasted for 1000 years, then only 900 years of that has passed as a kingdom.
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Conclusion:
So . . . WHEW! That took a long time to write (5-6 hours, though the time could've been cut in half had I not done the statistics, but then where'd be the fun in that? lol 😜)
I apologize if any of this went over your head or overwhelmed you with informational overload. If it did, then I sympathize because I'm feeling this as well — and I'm WRITING THIS! 
So my conclusion is that, basically speaking, regardless of the Kingdom being anywhere from 600-1000 years old, 100 of those years need to be subtracted since the Kingdom fell apart when Grimbeard dissolved it a hundred years prior to the current events of the Second Dragon War. So, realistically, the Kingdom — and the 12 Kings (including Grimbeard) — lasted around 500-900 years, and when Wodensfang tells Hiccup the Third about the history of the Wilderwest, he includes the 100 years into the timeframe when the Kingdom of the Wilderwest was first founded.
So I guess that, in the end, the actual date and timeline will be left up to the fans to headcanon for themselves.
If you could take anything from this, what would it be?
What current timeline do you think Hiccup the Third could be living in during the Viking Age? 900s? 1000s? 1100?
And how many years do you think that the Kingdom of the Wilderwest was established (including the 100-year gap)? 1000 years? 800? 700? 600? 
Please share your thoughts! I'd LOVE to hear from you!!! ^_^ 
Thank you SO MUCH for taking the time to read this and I am looking forward to reading any theories, corrections, suggestions, discussions, answers, and/or questions you may have. 
I hope this article finds you well, and I hope you have a splendid weekend! 
Long Live the Wilderwest!
— Companion of the Dragonmark
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pumpkinmetaphor · 8 months ago
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Ouran, Performance, Audience
Okay I said I was going to write this and I can't look at it anymore so posting. Anyway, performance in Ouran is interesting and we’ve all been chatting about it lately. Each character puts on an “act” for the guests, each character puts on another “act” for the people around them. It’s a testament to how well the characters are written that we can unravel these performances throughout the text. I still think there’s several levels of reading the characters and the text as well. 
Ouran is satire- hence why they’re essentially parodying these archetypes. But Ouran is also self-aware, self-referential, and meta. Characters break the fourth wall. They’re, at varying levels, aware of being in a story. We have characters who obviously break the fourth wall (Kyoya looking right into the camera in episode 1, for example. I would say Tamaki’s “homosexual supporting cast” speech, except it’s kind of an anomaly for him) and characters who are resistant to any sort of self-reflection that might lead them to any sort of conclusions like this (Hikaru.) I will at one point go through the entire manga again and count how many times each character narrates– which, to my recollection, is uncommon outside of Haruhi (MC obvs, and framed as talking to her mother) and Kaoru (framed as talking to himself/ the audience/ Hikaru-that-lives-in-his-brain) but I could be misremembering.
This is generally played for comedic effect. Tamaki breaks the fourth wall when it’s funny. Kyoya plays dumb about plot conventions (such as “we have birthdays here?” “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”) when it’s funny for him to do so. 
Anyway that’s just my setup. I want to discuss the Paris Arc, specifically whatever is going on with Kaoru. 
Read More because this is 2k words.
Kaoru is an interesting character because I think the performance is a little more pronounced. There’s reason to interpret he generally controls the scripts, his host club act is a bigger deviation from his natural personality, and fundamentally, as a person, Kaoru is less solid in his sense of identity. 
Which does kind of beg a question. The version of Kaoru the host club girls get is clearly fake. But the Kaoru most people get is some form of a mask. Kaoru reflects Hikaru– which is what Hikaru needs until Kaoru fears he doesn’t. Kaoru seems to take Haruhi’s assertion that he’s the “less evil one” to heart. I think neither Hikaru or Kaoru know what Haruhi is going to say is the difference between them in Episode/Chapter 5 because they themselves don’t know– aside from this very philosophical “well the one who is you is the one who is not me and the one who is not you is me etc.”
Anyway, we all kind of understand the general baseline– Hikaru is going to grow up, fall in love, and spread his wings– Kaoru is afraid this means Hikaru will leave him behind. This is the plot. 
But I think a lot of this comes down to “the thing they won’t be able to share,” which is presented to us in the form of that cookie. Haruhi notes that Kaoru will just give whatever it is to Hikaru. Hikaru ultimately snaps the cookie in half and forces Kaoru to take half of it anyway. This kind of embodies the fundamental difference between them, in my book. 
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(Ch. 45, various spliced together pages) Hikaru: It is literally not on Hikaru’s radar that there might ever be anything that he and Kaoru do not share. He does not conceive this on any level before the Paris Arc. Kaoru will literally always be here, he is a constant that Hikaru cannot conceive losing. Hikaru’s not afraid of Kaoru abandoning him– he may be, afraid something will happen to Kaoru that will take him away, but he’s not afraid of Kaoru choosing to leave. Why would he? Kaoru is the one person who cannot betray him. 
Kaoru: It is a given that Hikaru will one day leave. It is simply the only way. Hikaru will grow up and, for various reasons, Kaoru will not grow with him. And Hikaru will choose to leave– this will not be a betrayal, it’s just how life works when you’re not the main character in your story. Your carriage turns back into a grubby ole pumpkin and you’re left all alone. 
After the cookie scene, Kaoru tells Hani that he has feelings for Haruhi. This is, in my opinion, when Kaoru takes the reins of the narrative. Of the carriage, so to speak. The carriage in the anime exists on the condition that no one acknowledges that they’re in a love story and “breaks” the found family. Kaoru saying he’s in love with Haruhi steers the narrative on the course to the inevitable. 
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Which is great!
Except is Kaoru in love with Haruhi? 
My hypothesis: it literally doesn’t matter. Kaoru’s feelings for Haruhi do not drive the narrative. Kaoru talking about it does. He could be lying. He could be mistaken. He could be genuinely in love with her. It could be an idle crush. It doesn’t matter. It’s the performance of this love for the appropriate audience (aka: Hani, Hikaru etc.) that matters.
I think the base reading of this arc is that the cookie is Haruhi. Haruhi is the one thing they can’t share, right? They can’t like, keep eating biscuits out of her mouth and licking her face if Hikaru wants her to be his girlfriend and Kaoru wants her too. While I don’t think it’s incorrect to read this as a concern Kaoru has, I don’t think it gets to the heart of the issue. 
So, performance!
Kaoru puts on his little act for Hikaru throughout the Paris Arc. Generally tormenting him, ostracising him. In a way giving him a taste of what Kaoru goes through in a zillion Hika/Haru fanfictions or Kaoru’s own nightmares. This culminates in the date, where Kaoru basically brings Haruhi on the date he asked her on first (before giving it to Hikaru) and hitting every single mark that Hikaru missed. Not that anyone is enjoying themselves regardless to be honest. 
And of course, at the end, he kisses her and Hikaru sees and runs off upset. 
Except we, the audience, know Kaoru kisses Haruhi on the cheek. It’s a clear enough stage kiss from the art. Just close enough for us to understand that, from Hikaru’s perspective, Kaoru kissed her on the mouth. We’re bystanders, watching this plot unfold. Hikaru is Kaoru’s intended audience– that’s who he’s performing for. 
So what’s the difference then between this scene.
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And this scene?
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Well, first: what else can be the one thing Hikaru and Kaoru can’t share? If you go one level further, I think you come to the conclusion that Hikaru is the one thing they can’t share. After all, Hikaru cannot keep giving half of himself, half of his time, energy, love, self etc. to Kaoru all the time, and grow up. They suffer a classic case of enmeshment. Kaoru determines that Hikaru needs to be shoved out of the nest– and that the only way to do that is to stab him in the back. 
I don’t think Kaoru is trying to make Hikaru hate him. I do think what he’s trying to do is make Hikaru realise that he’s a person? Who is capable of betraying him, just like any other person. As long as Hikaru believes that Kaoru is “the only person he can trust,” he’s never going to grow up. By knocking himself off that pedestal in Hikaru’s eyes, Hikaru is forced to see him differently and Kaoru is prepared to accept however Hikaru might feel about him in the aftermath (though assuming he’ll drastically distance himself). 
(Side note. I think Hikaru and Kaoru internalise their maid-related-trauma slightly differently. While Kaoru’s fear is abandonment, Hikaru’s fear is betrayal. They just manifest similarly because there’s a lot of crossover. This is sooo long already, I’m not getting into it unless someone asks lmao.)
Loop back to the image again then. What’s the difference here? Well, it’s still a stage kiss! They both are. But, with one fundamental difference. 
Image one, Hikaru is Kaoru’s audience. He is performing to trick Hikaru (and possibly anyone else, like Hani and Mori, watching). But reality is clear to us, the reader.
Image two, you are Kaoru’s audience. He is performing to trick you. (but reality is clear to Hikaru, the participant)
Like, that’s pretty in your face huh? Faces obscured in a way that you don’t infer it as a cheek kiss as easily as you do with Kaoru and Haruhi. It’s also on the left page of the physical edition, meaning you have to skip to the next page to see the aftermath:
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Kaoru’s not just tricking the audience. He’s queerbaiting the audience. Typical.
Firstly, I do think one can be led to the conclusion that if the one thing they can’t share is Hikaru, not Haruhi, that means Kaoru is not in love with Haruhi but is in love with Hikaru. In fact, I think that’s kind of the point with these panels. It’s framed as a bait-switch, which only works if the audience misinterprets the kiss. My ultimate conclusion therefore is that there is no textual romantic incest occuring. It is enmeshment at a bare minimum though. But that's another topic, another day, for somebody else.
Secondly, I think this is because the audience is, regardless, on the wrong track. Or at least not the full track. We have access to the narrative when other characters don’t, but we’re still reading the story Kaoru is telling. We’re still the audience to his performance of the story. It’s easier for Kaoru to tell a story that’s all about his brother– he’s been doing it his whole life. He’s not the main character, after all. So he’s telling us a story where the one thing they cannot share is Hikaru, telling all the other characters a story where the one thing they can’t share is Haruhi. 
So the one thing they can’t share is something more nebulous. It’s the identity. 
Which feels like a contradiction in a way, because the identity is Hikaru, isn't it?
They can’t be one double act, split down the middle. They can’t be one seed sprouting two leaves. They can’t be two halves of one cookie, or two halves of one soul. And the problem is, Kaoru views everything as something Hikaru has split down the middle and shared with him– and now he has to give it all back. 
I don’t really think Hikaru views “their room” as being “his room, that I share with Kaoru.” But I think Kaoru does. I think Kaoru views everything as something Hikaru has shared with him, right down to his own personality, his own face. Hikaru cannot leave, cannot grow up, unless Kaoru stops pretending to be him and gives him the half of his identity back to make one whole, true Hikaru. 
Only problem is, Kaoru has to cut that tricky spare leaf off. After all, when he gives Hikaru back the identity, Kaoru won’t have one. Kaoru is defined as being “the one who is not Hikaru.” My brother is Hikaru. The one who is not my brother is me. And how do you define that? When your brother is no longer there, who are you? 
That’s why it’s important that Hikaru dyes his hair. Because I don’t think him dyeing his hair matters if the issue is Haruhi (Haruhi can tell them apart anyway). I don’t think it matters if the issue is Hikaru (this would not, in isolation, fix Kaoru's thought process). 
It is however enough for Hikaru to be able to illustrate to Kaoru that their identity is inherently interwoven, not necessarily shared. It doesn’t matter if Kaoru is the same as Hikaru or not– because Kaoru is who he is. That may have been affected by the fact that they’re twins, but his identity is not negated by it. Kaoru's identity is not inherently a performance just because it reflects Hikaru, and he doesn't lose it when he ceases to reflect Hikaru.
(breathes)
CAVEAT AS ALWAYS: I am reading the English translation. While it is the official Viz Media translation, something is always changed in translation, localisation, and interpretation. With the assumption that everyone here is reading the manga in English (sweeping assumption, sorry) this is therefore a reading of the text inherently coloured by the site of circulation (English translation, volume compiled) and the site of audiencing: aka the fact that I am an English-speaking, European, media studies/animation academic, speaking on an largely American blogging platform to the like, twelve Kaoru stans that follow me. It also means your interpretation may be very different to mine! Anyway If you read this far, congrats! You deserve a cookie– whatever that might or might not signify.
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sleepwithgiggli · 6 months ago
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What Are Post-Hypnotic Suggestions?
There's an idea that a hypnotist can put you in a trance, then give you a suggestion to cluck like a chicken, forget a number when counting your fingers, or orgasm when they say the word.
These are things that can and do happen, but such suggestions are not as mysterious or magical as they seem.
What is a Suggestion?
Imagine you have a friend over. You are eating together and they say "pass the salt". You then realise you have passed them the salt without thinking about it.
Or you are watching TV and your dad says, "Give me the remote," and you think, "Not this time! I'm going to change the channel dammit" and after a little internal struggle, you reluctantly pass them the remote.
In both of these cases, and countless others, you responded to a suggestion.
You might reject this idea - "These aren't suggestions, I did what I wanted to do!" There are at least two misunderstandings in this statement. First, the easy one:
Whenever you respond to a suggestion, you are doing what you want to do. When a hypnotist gives you the suggestion to cluck like a chicken, at that moment you wanted to please them or the audience, and accepted the suggestion.
This opens the question of what does you mean in the statement, "what you wanted to do". It's really not as straightfoward as it appears, but just accept it for now. (That might be a suggestion.)
Authority and Suggestions
Secondly, a suggestion is not some magical command (well, at least it doesn't have to be). It can be something extremely mundane. There's a statement: "Hypnosis cannot make you do anything that you would not already do through persuasion."
Remember that statement, and think about what it means. It appears to be talking about hypnosis, but it is also talking about persuasion and everything associated with it, and also of free will.
When Suggestions Don't Work
You can refuse a suggestion. Many people think post-hypnotic suggestions don't work on them because it doesn't feel like that are being forced to do something. They think the suggestion hasn't worked, so they unconsciously refuse it, and it doesn't work. This is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Suggestions can be that fragile.
Suggestions can look magical (having a trigger to orgasm on command can feel pretty magical!) but they really aren't - they are just the normal functioning of the brain.
Here's another slightly esoteric example. Imagine you are in a BDSM relationship and are out to lunch with your dominant. While eating, they tell you, "Go to the restroom, take off your panties, and when you return, hand them over to me, my pet".
You might decide, "I'm not doing that, that's kind of sexual and we agreed not to do anythign sexual."
Or you might find yourself doing it, and feeling embarrassed about it, but you have agreed to obey, and feel kinda compelled to do it.
Or you might do it because you have an exhibitionist streak, and you really didn't need the dominant to instruct you - you love it anyway.
Now imagine that dominant was also a hypnotist and earlier gave you the post-hypnotic suggestion, "When I give you a command ending with the word pet, you will be unable to resist. You will obey."
With all these in mind, which of the above responses was an appropriate response to this post-hypnotic suggestion: 1, 2, or 3 ?
The correct answer is all of them.
Take #2 for example. You might respond because the post-hypnotic suggestion is that strong, or you might respond because you have accepted the dominant's authority over you and don't want to displease them - their authority compels you.
But also look at #1: refusing a suggestion is a perfectly valid response to a suggestion. We might sometimes wish otherwise, but hypnosis is not mind-control.
And for #3, the dominant's suggestion might just give you permission to do what you wanted to do anyway. Perhaps you felt inhibitions were stopping you, but now you are unleashed.
Also, imagine: if you do as commanded, how do you know you were not following a suggestion?
The Limits of a Suggestion
Whenever you accept a suggestion, you are accepting the authority of someone else in a context where it's appropriate to accept that suggestion.
Look again at the moment where you are enjoying a meal with a friend and they ask you to pass the salt. In that context, you might pass them the salt without thinking about it. Because that's a situation where you are already conditioned to do that kind of thing, so you don't think about it.
In another situation, you might look at them weirdly and say, "What?"
Your mind is full of suggestions that you just aren't aware of, that are triggered under certain situations and in certain context. You can always refuse them, but you may feel it's wrong to do so without really understanding why (that example of giving the remote to a parent who is overbearing about the TV remote highlights this sense of wrongness perfectly).
When a hypnotist gives you a hypnotic suggestion, all they are doing is adding to the suggestions you already have in your mind. The trance creates a context for you to accept such suggestions, so you do - if you are so inclined.
Lots of things can interfere with this process. First, you have to believe that it's possible. And you also need to trust the hypnotist. (This might exist in different degrees: you might trust a hypnotist to give you suggestions regrding what you wear or whether you do acceptable things in front of a live audience, but you might not trust them - or yourself - to do "naughty" things with you in private).
Final Thoughts (For Now)
There's a lot more that can be said about suggestions, like how and why reinforcement is sometimes necessary, and when it isn't, and what shape it takes.
But this post is already long enough for now. The main point is, suggestions are not as strange as you might think. They are a natural part of life, and hypnosis is simply hijacking a very normal behaviour.
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agrlsname · 2 months ago
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Thank you @therealsaintscully for the tag! I'm soon about to post what might be my very last fic, so it's quite fitting to look back on my journey now.
How many works do you have on ao3?
38 – all Johnlock, except for one GO fic. On New Year's Eve I will post number 39!
What’s your total word count?
371,360 (will soon top it off with another 221 words ;))
What are your top 5 fics by kudos?
What Friends Do (by FAR), Who I Really Am (personal fave), The General Idea, Coldness/Heat, Tomorrow's Song
Do you respond to comments? Why/why not?
At first I responded to every single one! And I still try to respond to every single person. But now, I sometimes only respond to the last one if it's a reader who's commented on every chapter and I get all the comments at once. I like staying connected to the readers, that's one of the most fun parts about fandom!
What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending?
It has to be This Is Your Song. I mean, there's another one within a series that end in an angsty cliffhanger, but MCD surely has to take the prize?
What's the fic you've written with the happiest ending?
Oh my, nearly all of them have happy endings – so what would count as happier than happy..? Maybe it's actually the one that isn't posted yet – stay tuned for the resolution of the New Year's Kiss series!
Do you write crossovers?
Nope. I've written a fusion though (Johnlock and Moulin Rouge!).
Have you ever received hate on a fic?
Yup. Some people get really angry at John in What Friends Do and they take it out on me. It's interesting because many MANY others adore the story with all their hearts! I even wrote a sequel from John's POV just to try to get people to understand, but the haters didn't understand anyway.
Do you write smut? If so, what kind?
Even though at the beginning I said I'd never, half of my works are now rated E or M. What kind? Um, is "emotional, gay sex" a genre?
Have you ever had a fic stolen?
I hope not!
Have you ever had a fic translated?
Many of them, into five different languages! Coolest thing ever.
Have you ever co-written a fic before?
No, I think I'm too pedantic for that. I've loved working with my beta on some poem translations, though, that The Sky is Full of Fiddles is based on.
What's your all-time favourite ship?
38 fics – you all know it's Johnlock, right? There are others that I love, but nothing can ever compare.
What's a WIP that you want to finish but don't think you ever will?
I don't have WIPs! I'm too much of a control freak and perfectionist when it comes to writing – I want to be able to change the beginning when I'm writing the ending. I don't even have unpublished WIPs – I hate the idea of leaving works unfinished. If I was still in those first years of writing frenzy, when I was single and didn't have a child, I'd have expanded on This Time – but as it is, I knew that I wouldn't have the time to do it justice. So I purposely ended on a cliffhanger that would still allow it to stand on its own the way it is.
What are your writing strengths?
Emotions, according to my beta! If you ask me, I'd say describing things – often emotions, I suppose – in new, poetic ways that play on different senses and therefore make them immediate. It's something I love reading myself, anyway, so it's something I've been practicing for... well, decades now. I'd like to think I've gotten at least somewhat good at it.
What are your writing weaknesses?
I'm weirdly bad at coming up with the small details that aren't important, but needed. A recent example is I needed a character to text another with an invented problem to try to get him to come over. It wasn't at all important what the problem was, but it also couldn't be just anything; it had to be in line with his character. I could not for the life of me come up with this problem myself – eventually my husband did it for me. So those kinds of details in my stories are rarely from my own brain!
What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?
Hmm, well, I've tried not to do that. As a reader I find it annoying to have to look things up, or scroll down to the notes. I have three fics in which characters aren't English; in This Is Your Song I added a couple of "Bonjour"s for flavour, which is about as far as my own French knowledge reaches... In the Fiddles series they're Swedes and speak my mother tongue, but I've written everything in English except for the words that English doesn't have (like for example "polska", a kind of dance), and at the very end, some song lyrics that are then translated into English in the end notes that come immediately after. I did want to add that song for flavour, but I didn't want it to be annoying.
What was the first fandom you wrote for?
Johnlock! I started in the aftermath of season 4 back in January 2017 and then couldn't stop.
What's a fandom/ship you haven't written for yet but want to?
I'm wondering whether I will come back to fic writing at a later point, but for another fandom. I've long wanted to write more for GO, although I already have written one fic. It would probably be a lot of fun to write for OFMD too. Doctor Who maybe? I don't know, it intimidates me to write for a new fandom where I don't yet know the characters as well as I know Sherlock and John.
What's your favourite fic you've written?
This question is too cruel! There are so many of them that I love. Maybe I have to say The Sky is Full of Fiddles, after all – it holds such a special place in my heart for many reasons that go beyond the story itself (although that's true for several fics). Other faves are Your Daughter, The Zebra Sheets and of course Who I Really Am, which I'm liking enough to turn it into a novel I'm now trying to get published. See, I couldn't pick one!!
I'm on Tumblr way too sporadically to have any idea of who's already done this and who hasn't, so I don't dare tag anyone... Feel free to take it and tag me if you feel like it!
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ironyscleverer · 3 months ago
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Doctor Who as a Post-Colonial Metaphor
Recently I've been thinking a lot about how beautifully Doctor Who reflects the state of post-colonial British identity, and tumblr seems like the appropriate place to share my ramblings. So let’s see if I can explain in a way that makes sense.
I must start by putting on my obnoxious little film degree hat and reminding everyone that sci-fi is one of those genres that is highly political (as most things are, but scifi even moreso). It turns out it's pretty easy to get a sense of people's fears and anxieties by asking them to envision the future, and that's what sci-fi media does; it uses contemporary cultural standards and ideas to create a vision of what futuristic/advanced science and technology might look like, and how people might respond to it. In doing so, it ends up taking the social and political temperature of the time and place in which it's created.
As such, it's very, very common for scholars to analyze sci-fi media through this lens; even Frankenstein, arguably the first science fiction novel ever written, is often interpreted as reflecting cultural fears regarding swiftly advancing science and technology during the early stages of the industrial revolution. The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951) is another great, very blatant example of how sci-fi and politics can interact. In this movie, a Jesus-like alien ascends to Earth during the Cold War to warn the human race about their imminent nuclear annihilation. It seems corny to us now, but it's actually a great movie and I would highly reccomend it. It's rumored that the US Department of Defense read the script and Did Not Like It because the themes were too anti-war.
In other words, despite often being viewed as too “pop,” too goofy, and too unserious to have any deep meaning, pretty much any scifi story can be analyzed within an inch of its life using a meta social/political lens. It's not the only way to interpret sci-fi, but it's by far the most common. One must simply ask, “what does this vision of science, technology, and/or the future say about us as we are now?”
But anyway. Doctor Who. Disclaimer: I haven't watched the classic series so I'll focus on 2005 onward (still post-colonial so it still holds up, lol). If you've seen Classic and you'd like to chip in, please do.
Genre-wise, Doctor Who is more-or-less a space-western, a subgenre of sci-fi that incorporates Western elements—exploring new frontiers, engaging with unfamiliar civilizations, rogue figures, etc. Star Trek is the peak example of this, but there are many, many others.
Of course, the Western genre is dripping with colonialism due to its historical setting of the American West, and the racist depictions of Indigenous peoples. Space-westerns, consequently, also tend to address colonial topics. Sometimes space westerns are just as racist as normal westerns, but sometimes they use the genre reflexively, to question colonial ideals. A more progressive space-western might be more willing to “humanize” the alien cultures they meet, asking questions like, "how does one ethically engage with foreign societies?" or "When is it appropriate to intervene in a conflict?" etc.
Althought these kinds of questions come up regularly in Doctor Who, especially regarding its anti-war messaging (Time War etc.). These themes become doubly interesting when you use them to inform your interpretation of The Doctor, both as a character and as a symbol.
Consider this: The Doctor is the embodiment of an ancient and immensely powerful being with a bloody history. Their kill-count is quite literally somewhere in the quadrillions. Although they are a self-proclaimed pacifist, they are still constantly a perpetrator of death and destruction throughout the series. The Doctor, despite repeatedly and loudly choosing peace, can never seem to keep their hands clean of chaos and suffering. Doctor Who is about an entity that destroys everything they touch, sometimes on purpose, sometimes not. As an allegory for grappling with the legacy of British imperialism, I'd say it's pretty on the nose.
In this sense, not only is Doctor Who a show about colonialism, it is also a show about identity in the wake of colonialism. It's even in the name: "Doctor Who?" Who is the Doctor? What is their responsibility to the universe? What does it mean to be ancient and powerful and drenched in the blood of millions? How do they move on, become better, without falling into the same traps? What does it mean to be British?
These questions come up over and over throughout the new series, from the destruction of Gallifrey, to the Timelord Victorious, to A Good Man Goes to War, the Flux (arguably), and many, many other smaller plotlines I could mention. Even in the latest series with Ncuti Gatwa, the focus on adoption and family is in a similar vein—where does the Doctor come from? What does it even mean to be “from” a place? How much do your origins truly contribute to who you are and who you become?
How the companions fall within this framework is also interesting; if the Doctor is a stand-in for the nation as an entity, then the Doctor's companion, the everyday British person, is the stand-in for the populace. The companions are ever-changing, ever-evolving, constantly renegotiating their relationship with the Doctor. The companion's ultimate challenge is to find how they fit into the narrative of the Doctor's life, and try their best to come out the other end with a happy ending (ha).
Of course, Doctor Who is owned by the BBC, meaning it is quite literally nationally subsudized TV. As a result, althought the show is actually VERY critical in some places, the Doctor is usually ultimately sympathetic; their good intentions tend to forgive a lot of the problems they've caused. The companion is usually charmed by the Doctors' seemingly endless tragedy of a life. This is a country's state-owned media company working with it's own self-image--it's inherently a work of self-reflection, and perhaps of self-obsession, too.
It would be easy to be cynical about Doctor Who as a product of the BBC, which is state-funded (but notably not owned or directly controlled by the government!). However, I tend to think that just writing it off as propaganda because of this is doing the show a disservice. Yes, there is an inherent privilege and self-centeredness to endlessly forgiving the Doctor, but that's also kind of the whole point; it's a show about coming to terms with one's horrible past. It's a show about learning to formulate a new sense of self. To demand that Doctor Who to be less self-obsessed, to not be about British identity when it is in fact a British show for Brits about Brits, is just a bit unrealistic.
Instead, I choose to believe that Doctor Who can and does use its privilege for good more often than not. The creators tend to be very progressive (as sci-fi so often is) and they can get away with a lot of very progressive messages in the guise of a silly sci-fi show for families. Most recently, I would point to s14e3: Boom, s14e5: Dot and Bubble as examples of thinly veiled rants about the evils of capitalism, war, racism, social media, etc. To ignore or dismiss Doctor Who because it has some form of institutional backing would be doing the actual stories and writers a disservice.
Finally, let me leave you with one last point; One consistancy throughout the new series that I find very charming is the positive effect the companions always have on the Doctor. Companions come and go, which is sad, but they're each special in their own little way, and they each change the Doctor, wearing them down a little at a time. The Doctor is consistently at their worst when they are alone, removed from the people that make them want to be better.
Very often the companion's parting message for the Doctor is "don't be alone.” This can be extrapolated to mean: don't forget we exist. Don't forget to be kind. Even if you can't help your legacy, even if you can't wash the blood off your hands, you can always keep striving to be better. Keep someone around to remind you to be better. And the Doctor, more often than not, does. Because ultimately it is the companions, us the people, that make the Doctor who they are.
It’s this special brand of relentless optimism, this indomitable belief in the goodness of people and the power of that goodness that always brings me back to Doctor Who, one way or another, despite all its flaws.
Edit 11/29: corrected some info about the BBC per the comments!
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