#bc that would help the villain's evil plan

[thebestusernamepossible]

I’m sorry but there is just no way in my mind Carol is going to be an ‘evil bad mother’/‘irredeemable’ villain. Her most obvious motivation is literally saving/helping/finding her missing daughter. She keeps Santa’s around her house, decorates in Christmas decor. She had Noelle’s art preserved forever so it would never disappear (and while it made Noelle cry and was not the best thing to do, it definitely shows a level of care, even if misguided).

Also??? As far as we know homophobia isn’t a thing in Deltarune/Undertale? At least not for monsters. Like it’s a queernorm setting, the Susie thing isn’t homophobia. It’s 1.) Her rebellious daughter going missing could NOT have helped her controlling nature. The child that disobeyed disappears and left a hole in her life? Yeah. That’s not going to be good for that. 2.) Susie was trying to get the guitar code, you know the one Carol definitely knows about? The one Kris called her so she could stop Susie from getting (probably called her. Etheir that or Kris called someone, who then got Carol). 3.) if Carol is getting informed by Kris or is more ‘in the know’ she should be aware that Susie is going against the narrative of the prophecy at every turn, and therefore is probably threatening her sense of control over the situation. The control she had over whatever plan it is to bring back Dess/help Dess/wgatever. 4.) She probably wants her remaining kid away from the prophecy if possible. I mean why else would she conscript Kris and not Noelle. Doesn’t want her remaining kid in danger. ESPECIALLY with the ch4 reveal the prospect is going to end in some kind of tragedy or whatever Susie saw.

None of that is RIGHT to do. But from a character perspective it is more interesting and nuanced than cartoon evil.

While her funding Asgore almost definitely has alterior motives (the high chance he’s in on her plan considering all the secret Asgore dialogue and they both have hidden ‘plan’ boards that are definitely for Dess) she IS helping him. And I will never excuse whatever the fuck she’s doing with Kris, but it’s definitely grief motivated??? Like I doubt she’s just doing that(tm). Like I don’t think it’s a misdirection and she’s a ‘good guy’ but she’s definitely going to be nuanced!!

AGAIN TO BE CLEAR (bc this is the pissing on the poor reading site): I’m not saying she’s GOOD just that she will be nuanced and not a ‘homophobic controlling abusive bitch’ character. (Also if it was a man displaying these traits why do I feel I’d see less of that characterization….) .

But Also she’s a silly guy who chopped a breif case in half with a katana and wears a cunty blue lip. I like her <3

[rainy-weather-supremacy]

My thoughts/ideas on a TMA musical

(If anyone wants to help me with this it would be apprechiated 😭😭)

(Under the cut because it's kinda long)

Act I: Introduction, Prentiss & Shenanigans A

Act II: Shenanigans B; Unknowing & Shenanigans C

Act III: Door and Eyepocalypse

TMA important plot points

Act I

Jon hates Martin

Bicon Tim!! 💖💜💙

Prentiss

Michael (Sasha & Helen)

Not!Sasha

Rip Gertrude

Paranoia

Homophobic vase

Table

Leitner

Wanted :(

Georgie & Admiral

Jude

Mike & Daisy

Elias is evil???? 😱😱😱

Act II

Kidnapping

Helen

Jon & Tim trauma 😃👍🏽

Unknowing

Rip Daisy

Zzzzz

Melanie 🔪

Non-Human

Bone 🦴

Oh hey Daisy! :D

🔪👁 Melanie uhoh

Lukas & lonely

Jmart (Cows)

Akt III

Eyepocalypse

Kicking the asses of various Avatars

Martin 😶‍🌫️😭

Rip Daisy 2 electrical boogaloo

Salesa

Tower

Annabelle (But musical plot)

Rip boys 😭🥲😔🫡

Stuff

Peter only shows up at the end when he has to, other than that he is either not there or poorly hidden. He doesnt want people to see him.

Annabelles plan is for a musical instead

Jon feeds on the applause after a number

Not!Sasha always loudly declares to the audience that she is Sasha and that the other actor is…. Taking a break. :)

Jon and Tim sing about their childhood trauma (Daisy: I killed a man when I was eleven. Jon and Tim: 😟 [End song]) 

Unknowing is Nikolas villain song

Worm song

Statements are short songs Jon/Statement givers burst out into

Elias interruping Jon‘s song abt how he is finally happy (😭) and forcing him to sing a duet with him in mag 160

Annabelles evil song sounds like she's a grade 2 teacher and explaining why pandas are bears or whatever. Yeah that but she keeps starting out easy and then gets too complicated quickly so she has to start again

Distortion pops out of random doors that led to entirely different places just before and after

Helen slams the door into Michaels face when she enters and he dies(™️)

The 'crawls and chokes and blinds and falls' part is a rap

Helen falls through the trap door floor when she dies (maybe?)

Toothrotting Jmart fluff. I can do what I wnat tbis is my musical

Sad ending

One or more person sees the audience (Elias; Anabelle; Jon (as the pupil); Not!Sasha; Helen; More?)

While Jon is in a coma, calm music plays. There is screaming in the background and Melanie running around with knifes, first being chased by something and then chasing something. Both she and the thing leave through Helens door, who waves to the audience and then closes the door in a cool way

Mag 100 is a short comedic intermission you only understand 1/5 of

Every time Jon enters the stage after leaving, he is in slightly worse condition

I open the door immediately before the 2. pause bc big applause (When he says it the doors open for the break?)

Paranoid Jon song: I see you

End of S4 song: I see you (Reprise) [I know who you are / I'll find you out] vs [I know who you are / I'll find you and I'll get you out]

All the fears have a specific instrument assigned to them

Before the first pause, Elias is alone on stage for a moment, turns to the audience and bows. With the applause, a eye appears on/over him by projector

Spotlight as a symbolisation of the eye, something that might be seen as a blessing but becomes a curse if unwanted. It turns on during statements etc and in the tunnels, it's a flashlight instead because they are illuminating themselfes. You walk and the light that shows where you are follows. Running from the spotlight.

Beginning, to audience: You are an eye. Watching over the people if the world for ages yet, there are a few people that stand out to you. Here's one that will become important to you soon. (Cue curtain open to reveal Jon at his desk going 'one, two, one, two, test, test'.)

Ending, to audience: You are an eye. You have watched this world for a long time, but now, it's time to go… somewhere else. (Before bows)

S4 Lonely song called 'no one but you' where Perter is like 'you have no one but you' and Martin agrees and sings along but when Peter is gone he thinks of Jon and sings it in a way that 'you' is Jon like "I have no one but you".

The people who get smited (smitten?) see the audience and are horrified

When people get smitten, a bright spotlight focuses on them and a soft green one on Jon

Akt I

Beginning, first statement (Maybe it's only kind of a rhyme, not a full-on song yet)

More statements & Introduction to the Archival assistants (Martin is introduced first so that he's absent for the rest of the song) (I'm so smart) (Here we can probably also establish that Jon hates him and that Tim is bi?) (Also Melanie shows up for the first time)

-> What about combining those first two points and making like. An archiving song 🤔

Martin storms in with the worms in a jar (That in one scene, cut to a person going "youre saying that… [plot]?")

Sasha meets Michael and Jon first Helen, then Michael as well (A kind of spiral song)

Attack von Prentiss (Worm song)

Sasha gets killed & replaced (Maybe do something meta with the actors here, or just someone that looks completely different shows up wearing a 'the real sasha james' shirt?)

Martin finds Gertrude's corpse, notices the alarm is over and Jane is defeated. Does kind of a weak 'oh… I- I guess it's over' and stumbles away

They meet back up in bandages, not!Sasha is like "YES IT'S ME! SASHA!!!"

Jon's talking to the tape recorder like 'Idk I feel like somethings's wrong' and stalks on the archival assistants who are just like. Drinking tea. Talking. Doing work (or not). Meanwhile Sasha is in the background doing the most obvious and sus shit which he always just barely misses

Jon concludes that someone wants to kill him and sings abt it (I see you)

The song has an interruption with the others coming in for the intervention (And he only gets more paranoid after)

1 or 2 more statements are being read out during the song (or just the title/s said?)

He realizes that it's not Sasha by listening to a tape. In it, on the other side of the stage, Sasha and Tim are talking.  Not!Sasha tries to use her body to stop the audience from seeing this, but fails bc thats not really possible (walks around back and forth waving her arms so she doesn't acually block it for someone the whole time y'know?)

He says a final time "I see you" and the song ends

Jon destroy the table, Not!Sasha and Michael show up

Leitner uses the book to conjure up magical spirits (stage crew) and move the set so u cant see Not!Sasha anymore, which makes her mad but oh well

He starts to explain but mid-song Jon 'goes outside' and Elias comes in, finishes the song in an EVIL (😨) way and turns to the audience, puts a finger to his lips and leaves

Jon comes back and is like 'o shit' and runs away off-stage

Daisy and Basira come by to interrogate everyone (Show here Jon is wanted by police)

He stays at Georgies, who is cool, and pets the admiral

Jon sings a statement abt how Jude is dangerous and decides to pay her a visit. What could go wrong?? He leaves.

Melanie gets hired (Mention that she got shot by a ghost)

Jon's back from Jude and he has a burnt hand but is also on his way to Mike Crew- Surely he cant fuck this one up!

He visits Mike, fucks it up

Daisy kills Mike (rip) and wants to kill Jon but Basira is like wtf and stops her murder song before she can (Something like Get away with this?)

They all confront Elias an he is actually…. E V I L ?!???!!?? 😱😨🤯

Akt II

(First MAG 100?)

For the kidnapping, probably start with him kidnapped and then Michael shows up and is like "Wow Archivist u fucked up I cant believe EVIL SKIN STEALING DOLLS KIDNAPPED YOU AND WANT TO [plot]"

Helen shows up and slams Michaels door in his face and is like 'cmon lets go'

We need to stop the unknowing guys

Tim confronts Jon (Do not ask me what this means all I know is that here we establish they have beef)

Jon & Tim trauma song

They somehow find dynamite. Maybe one more short statement here as well?

They go to the wax museum and there is talking

Nikola villain song (aka unknowing) that ends with Tim being smug and also exploding. During the song there is a brief segment to what each of the characters is going through

The Martin also has to be somewhere here 🔥📃

Jon is in a coma and the Melanie/Weird stuff chase scene

Oliver comes by and he wakes up

They still dont like him

Oh so Martin is working for Mr. Evil man and also Tim and Daisy are dead?!

Statements

(Idk what happens here? Stuff ig???)

Melanie operation (Gone wrong‼️)

Jon realizes he's not really human anymore, which he kind of knew but still he comes to the conclusion that it sucks and therefore so does he (bestie please)

The coffin is delivered

He goes straight into Helens hallways and comes back out with a rib. While he's gone, Martin passes by briefly and we see how lonely he is.

Jon goes into the coffin and finds Daisy which is a song for sure

They come back out and Basira and Daisy are like 🫂

The Dark??

Jon finds out how to leave

Lets gouge our eyes out scene

Melanie gets her eyes' ass and goes away to kiss Georgie (Shes just like "guess ill go get rid of my eyes & kiss my girlfriend byyyeee")

Statement that is interrupted/just after it the hunters come and Jon is like "oh no the hunters from my trip to america" basira/daisy: "when were you in amerika???" Jon: "That time I came home and you said I smelled like guns. Anyways panik."

Daisy goes wolf mode very dramatically after Jon runs off stage to find martin

Elias and Peter (who we finally really ses) reveal the evil plan to Martin who is like "how about no" and then tries to stab Peter (or something like that idk) but there is fog and he is gone

Jon storms in like "MAHTIN!"

The lonely scene with the song

They are in a nice house and it's cool and fluffy

Martin leaves for milk and cows

Jon sings abt how he's finally happy and Elias gets his smug bastard ass in there and forces him to dance along and sing a duet and to fucking rap oh my god this is a crime (After all this time)

It ends with "I- OPEN- THE- DOOR!" as all the door out of the room open

Akt III

Jon goes into a song about the safehouse but Tim and Sasha sing a duet in the background 

They decide to leave

Helen shows up like the bothersome creature (/aff) she is

They meet the Not!Them

Smiting song, which is mostly action-packed but there's four parts and the third is MAG 165 (Not!Them - Jude - Lonely house - Jared)

Hunt song starting with Trevor and ending with Daisys death

Uptown house (Either off-stage or Salesa starts trying to sing a song but they faint and he complains when the lights go out)

Martin sings a duet with himself 

Jon kills real estate agent, which starts off as a statement but that one woman derails it

Short song abt the Eye & London

Song abt and/or by WTG about their cult where they 1) love each other and 2) deny being prophets whil the cultists sing a chorus about how great the prophets are

Jmart visit Jonah & Jon sings about how he could make things better in his place and gets more & more enthusiastic until Martin interrupts him and they fight (through song?), ending with Martin storming away

Jon sings abt how he knows what's best / Annabelle sings to Martin that she can show him what's best

Jon notices that Martin is gone and goes after him in a boat. (While he's rowing, Fight Song starts going "like a small boat… on the ocean….." and then Basira shows up and climbs in his boat and stops the song (shoots the speaker?) /hj)

Annabelle villain song in which she also explains the rift ("You've grabbed something/someone's attention" while looking directly at the audience. Jon, Martin & Basira follow her gaze but don't see anything) + for sure do the "You have no idea who's listening/watching, do you?"

They talk about what to do & vote that they'll follow Annabelles plan, much to Jons distress. (Make what they want to do very clear here)

Jon goes up, song where he gets his revenge (& ascends)

When he becomes the pupil and the song stops, Jon really looks around and sees the audience & goes kind of "What… Who- Who…? O-Oh. Oh." and stares at them before getting distracted by Martin arriving, who can't see them

Martin arrives and they talk and find what they have to do

Short but bitter-sweet last song together

Ending

Bows

[oflorelei]

My Problem is:

That it's a let down. Listen I am not mad or horrible dissapointed over that Radahn is there (although sigh i wished we would have gotten that Age of Abundance/Compassion man). I am not mad that he is apparently a puppets and that miquella is apparently the villain from the shadows. I'm mad that they hyped this DLC up so hard, using Miquella's character, which they know to be shrouded in mystery and HYPE, made it appear that we may have the chance to join him/get betrayed by him, made people belief he SPECIFALLY seeks out the tarnished or multiple tarnished at once (to help him?)- that he is the central figure of this DLC when he is not. And thats not an underestimation.

Miquella, most fearsome of the Empyreans, the 'father' of the Halligtree, beloved by near all, who "[...]wields love to shrive clean the hearts of men. (There is nothing more terrifying.)" - does not even have his own bossfight.

No, he is basically just a cape for a boss we already fought to a DLC that costs 40€. He is in the promotion arc, he is said to be a central figure, he is said to be the fearsome empyrean of all. One thing he isnt? Apparently worth the time of day.

I am ok with Miquella being turned into a villain, I am not ok with Miquella being turned into a joke.

There were so so many roads they could have taken with him, he was PROMISING in every regard.

Want to make him a Villain? Fine the reason can be:

=> Manipulation/Enchanting for people to love him (to ensure someone will always look out for him)

-not absolutely evil per say- and it makes sense that someone who is stuck in the body of a child might want to count on many people rather then one person to protect them = it is his weapon to wield affection

- still takes away free will, even consent to some degree

=> Formless mothers influence

- do i even need to explain this one lmao

- already thousands of theories before this DLC thought that miquella might have been negatively influenced by her- especially when so many things in this Game revolve around blood and the power of it

=> "for the greater good" ahh ending

- 'the means justify the end' mentality (maybe even allign with the manipulation and enchanting)

-would be a similar situation to ranni and could mirror it- not the best but also not horrible

=> St. Trina is Miquella's Radagon

- Miquella splitting slowly with the golden order & turning his back to the easier path & planning behind the shadows to change how Things have been? Yeah maybe St. Trina could have been to Miquella what Radagon was to Marika (a guard dog, keeping her checked (sry but i genuinely believe Radagon returned bc Marika started to stray)).

-could also have explored how marika had to deal with it & her relationship to her other self => player could maybe decide who they wished to serve

=> the curse drives mad

- being stuck in the body of a child when you are a grown adult mentally is pure eldritch horror imo, it is not only physically but chances are high it could cause deeper psychological issues

- when grief drove marika mad it can drive miquella mad to that despite everything he does, being so prodigal, does not help and helplessness of it all too

- bc no one can help and no one can understand him

- he is stuck in a body that is his, and yet its the body of a past him, something he should have outgrown, something that belongs to the past- and (IMO) he can not fight truly in his body, not even to defend himself- having to constantly rely on people for your protection when you are an incredible independent creature? Horrible

- while not the most climatic- would it be truly unthinkable that miquella maybe just..gave up? That it drove him mad with grief to realize he spends his life searching for a cure that might not even exist?

- again thats more then a 'what if' then realistic like the rest of the list but i just love the horror adult mind child body

Want to make him a good guy? Fine the reason can be:

=> He is described so. He knew that he would be the next god & took responsibility.

- Miquella created the Haligtree, feed by his OWN blood (which takes far longer and more energy then just using bodies) or all that are rejected by the golden order, he is compassionate & kind. He is protective and by gods above he does want to help, he does break away from the golden order when he realizes they are not what they seem

-With ranni not wanting to become the successor and Malenia cursed with the rot it only leaves Miquella open, he would have been aware of it

- He is already a 'big' brother, caring for malenia, caring for all who were considered Misfits such as the Albinauric & Misbegotten, providing a sanctuary and hope

- Miquella is described as kind, as compassionate someone who basically does wish to bring a change and is ready to self sacrifice for the better

There are many more but guys im so so tired and need to nap. In short: its incredible to me how you can make a Character that had potential for all possible sides (good, evil, inbetween) so bland, his arc and journey feel like white toastbread, his relationship to his beloved sister malenia seems fake, he doesnt appear to be an adult trapped in a body of a child but as simply put an idiot who is all about "me me me me" & then doesnt even get a bossfight.

Im not mad it was written, i am made there was zero thought or reasoning put behind it, when there were so so many options to make it good. Its sorta fascinating that somehow no one likes this ending, not the Radahn Fans, Nor the Miquella or Malenia Fans..idk man. Having feelings about this.

Also im really bummed we didnt get a cutscene were the tarnished touches Miquella's arm to travel like- man.

Also sorry for the grammar/spelling or maybe even logic errors i just needed to vent ngl

[yesimwriting]

I love the way you portray Armand!! Big kudos to you you absolutely nail the characterization. I have a question.

Will Armand ever change his approach/façade and become more gentle/openly caring towards reader, sometime someday in the future? Deep down he's a canon loverboy and if he becomes more loving/doting, will it happen when he separates from louis and officially is together/is at least trying to get with reader?

(I feel like sometime he WILL have to realize "oh shit maybe i should be nice if i actually want this persons affection")

I also have to praise you bc i noticed something random! I read somewhere that Anne Rice had planned for Armand to be the antihero/antagonist from the start, which is why he seems to be so... evil but then she confessed that Daniel and devils minion had changed her mind completely and boom! Armand villain no more. He's in love fr.

I can't help but notice the same theme going on in your bestie verse: hence the question.

(Side note: the audacity of this man to hate on readers favorite shows when this absolute NERD canonly likes the blade runner movies.

ps. expect more random armand facts)

Omg thank you so much!! Characterization is so important to me and Armand is so complex and I'm constantly worrying about making him seem like himself in terms of 'voice' if that makes sense.

That's such a good question and you bring up some really interesting points. I had no idea that Anne Rice chose to shift Armand away from being more of an antihero/antagonist because of Devil's Minion/his relationship with Daniel, from what I've read so far, that arc felt so natural I wouldn't have guessed that it wasn't pre-planned!

I just feel like Armand is so predisposed to allowing his affection to drown out all else. I think something that's a bit of driving force for him is a desire to feel like someone's first and only choice, so once he feels a deep enough connection to a potential love interest/partner to trust that they do love him to that extent, it makes sense for him to mellow out a little. A fully reciprocated attachment is one he doesn't have to 'manipulate' out of the person.

As far as bestie verse reader and how Armand might change his approach in the future, this is really making me want to write a more organized chapter series to better 'track' that development.

I haven't really been able to get into this yet, but Armand is doting on bestie in a hundred ways that she's unaware of. I just feel like when she's staying with Louis and Armand, or when they're staying with her, she's not doing a single thing.

She stumbles out of her heels after a night out and wakes up to them in her closet; she thinks about how nice a snack would be and less than ten minutes later, Armand's complaining about how she hasn't eaten enough today and bringing her something; she wakes up one day and realizes that she can't remember the last time she ran out of any hair or skin products...and now that she's thinking about, when was the last time she ran out of a paint color mid project?

However, as far as openly doting on reader, I can see Armand either convincing himself that his kindness his way of 'tricking' her into liking him, or it being a reaction to something she does that makes him feel more secure.

I think if bestie were to defend Armand during an argument with Louis or maybe sit with him while he's upset or doing his best to pretend he doesn't feel alone, he'd find it in him to care about her a little more openly.

I can also see him randomly worrying about losing bestie after reflecting on how close she is with Louis and coming to the sickening realization that if he wants her to want him...he's going to have to start being nice to her outside of his thoughts 💔

Not Blade Runner 😭 he's definitely just being a hater and complaining for the sake of it. I feel like he'd secretly become invested but pretend that it's a pain to watch them with her.

Also, yes, please feel free to send me all of the Armand facts you want :) Currently deeply fixated on analyzing him, which is why my response to this ask is so long (this is me apologizing for the slight rambling 😭)

[gold-rhine]

so. the new volcano world quest, the culmination of our pet suarian world quests in natlan. and why its fucking bad. spoilers, of course.

first of all, nothing fucking happens in this quest line. it starts with intriguing premise, but there is no actual story by the end of it. like first world quest in a chain is just to go to a temple bc not sus at all guy tells you to, do the puzzles, get some lore descriptions from the murals, thats it. then in the next world quest, you go to ruins, do some puzzles with random girl you just met, get long walls of text of lore descriptions for the victim of dragon eugenicist experiments, then you have to fight him to put him to peace or whatever, and he dies. thats it.

wait no, random girl is actually a ghost? and she disappears? it doesnt matter bc in the end turns out shes actually dragon eugenicist in disguise, but even before that reveal, i have no idea why was i supposed to care about her. she's just there to plot device you thru puzzles, you don't know who she is or whats her deal.

i know that there's lore about her in cinder city description and some weapons and whatever, which leads me to my first point. hidden lore given in random parts is not a story. its one of the possible ways to introduce worldbuilding to the player, and it should SERVICE the story. i think too many games trying to copy dark souls with this shit, and even dark souls rarely gets it good. in this natlan quest, there is no story to service with lore. its just random bits of info. compare and contrast to remuria, which also has a lot of associated lore in golden troupe and item descriptions, but when you get there, all characters and story stand on their own. you don't need to read these descriptions to know whats going on and care. reading additional lore gives more depth, but it does not try to pretend to be the main narrative.

next, the eugenics victim, och-kan, who we have to kill in the end. like. sad and bad for him, still not a story. nothing we do in that quest have anything to do with him, we just get lore descriptions outside of our current narrative (solving puzzles bc we think it will help our baby pokemon) and then we are told to kill him. again, compare and contrast with elynas' world quest. he also has a tragic backstory that we learn during the quest as lore drops, but we also have a primary story about melusine connecting with him as her father, about elynas choosing to protect melusines even if it costs his own chance at new life, we get to see that conflict of self-sacrifice and loneliness and interact with him in the context of that larger narrative. if instead we just learned his tragic backstory from walls of text, did some puzzles, and killed him, it would literally mean nothing. lore has to exist in the context of current narrative to have meaning.

now, to the last part. can you guess the plot? you do the puzzles with nothing else going on. and then you get to the ending "choice". yes, there are walls of text lore drops too, but like these transcripts of zoom meetings of dragon bureaucrats telling each other to get good do not actually contribute much, and i actually want to make another post on worldbuilding and exploration and have this one focused on a story.

so the ending is "plot twist" that the dragon eugenicist was actually like every single npc we met in this quest chain. which like. who cares, these npcs were plot devices players wasn't attached to anyway. i really doubt anyone's mind will be blown be the reveal. but thats small beans, the main part is that eugenicist evil plan.

which is too use the prev pyro sovereign's created mcguffin to turn everything in natlan into phlogiston. like. BEGGING hoyo to come up with the villain plan that is not merging everything into evangelion mush. like at least in previous quest chains there were a lot more going on on top of the merging into mush. in sumeru it was a story of my girl Jeht and her father, there was akademiya researcher learning to respect desert history, there was jebrael's history with other mercs, there was jeht's struggle to fit in and desert politics. in fontaine, each word quest had a complete narrative able to stand on its own, but all of them were interconnected and coiled together. in this natlan world quest, there is not even one story able to stand on its own!

and like lets look at why our villain wants to do the phlogiston mush. he thinks dragons are evolutionary dead end, so initially, he was into eugenics and wanted to create a human dragon hybrid. that shit failed, then he says he decided to wait and give humans time to prove themselves. but now he thinks they failed too and they will not be able to stop the abyss, and so to make sure abyss doesn't consume teyvat, he wants to turn teyvat into phlogiston mush.

which like. grandpa, what the fuck are you talking about. natlan JUST defeated the abyss and threw it out. hes like ugh i hoped humans would become ubermensch, but they still worships ~the archons~ like weaklings. like bro, our mary sue queen mavuika literally took no Ls. name one problem she didn't steamroll. she won the war, she threw abyss out, she actually beat up the heart of the abyss, she got out of ronova's death deal, she had capitano merge with night kingdom, making it immortal. if this is not a proof that humans can defeat abyss, i dont know what the fuck do you want.

so this creates a clear dissonance, bc this world quest has pre-existing end with the mush, but writers don't know how they can come up with any plausibly non-evil explanation for it. so they ignore actual state of the world - which is that natlan just kicked abyss out, - and use abyss as just an excuse for the mush even it it makes no sense.

now to the mush "choice." you, as a pokemon we've traveled with, need to choose to mush everything into phlogiston or not. and we get a hsr fake choice where if you pick to do the mush, game just resets you on the dialogue before it. so you HAVE to pick to not mush it to progress. and like who is this fucking for??? players who do want the choices in video games like myself will only get infuriated bc this is obviously bullshit and fake choice. ppl who do not want the choices will not even notice and click thru. so why is this here.

like fucking OBVIOUSLY they will not actually let you turn the world into evangelion mush. not even 5 years old will buy this as a real option. so if they really wanted to center this stupid quest around this fake pokemon choice, they could have at least faked it better. like. we have all these mini quests with our pokemon we get during exploration. they could have added little choices here. like. support your pokemon or not? help him make friends or not? obviously absolute majority of players would choose to be nice to a baby pokemon. but even so, if in the end the pokemon listed these actual choices the players made, players would feel like they actually did sometjing that mattered. and for the assholes who were mean to pokemon on purpose, they could have a boss battle with the pokemon. it doesnt show up outside of its own world quests, so it would affect literally nothing in global. and like it would still be bad quest line, don't get me wrong! but it would at least not be so egregious.

so what we have is a quest line with no plot and with a cliche fake choice at the end. this is rock bottom of quest design. also, someone please tell natlan team that character walking forward while repeating phrases about how they should give up show up in the air is not a groundbreaking character conflict they think it is, bc it was already bad for mavuika.

[missbrunettebarbie]

Omg that’s such a good point about moral passivity=death in asoiaf. I agree that’s what prevented GRRM from ever seeing Ned as the true hero/male lead of ASoiaf. I also think GRRM has a thing for underdogs and outcasts, of which Ned is neither. Dany on the other hand comes from nothing, has only viserys as family, is abused by him her whole life, and is sold into marriage. And yet still she is driven to help people and make the hard choices, at great cost to herself. On the other hand I think dany’s backround (especially compared to the Stark kids who grew up in wealth and comfort) was one of the things that biased them against her, because in their mind might makes right, and the status quo is good, and people on the bottom should stay on the bottom and shouldn’t rise up. That’s also why they demonized Dany, and made her the ultimate villain of the show, because they believe in the neoliberal notion that fighting back against evil makes you just as bad as the thing your fighting, and it’s better to do nothing in the face of deep societal injustice.

Agree with pretty much everything. I would go beyond this and say that passivity of any kind is an unforgivable flaw for GRRM. We see this with Doran Martell, who GRRM clearly likes ... but he can't get a win because he wasted too much time doing nothing .

And, like, Ned is very passive in general. We don't realize it because he is the main character of the first book, so we want to root for him. But the guy would gladly bury his head in the sand/run away to Winterfell if he could, the rest of Westeros be damned. I wondered for a long time how tf Ned and Robert managed to be such good friends, because they seem so different, but they really aren't. They both dislike facing reality, they both neglect their children* in some way or other and neither of them sees everything wrong with the status quo. (Like, Ned is pretty much making the same mistakes with Arya his father did with Lyanna! Yes, he hires a sword teacher for her, but it's Jon who gave Arya the sword that started everything, not Ned. And he clearly expects Arya to more or less grow out of her tomboy phase and 'do her duty'. He doesn't see anything wrong with the fact that she is barred from the Kingsguard, the Citadel or the position of High Septon for simply being a girl. Not to mention the way he seems to more or less regard Bran's life as being over once he can't walk anymore. Again, it's Jon who asks Tyrion to make a saddle for Bran to ride, it doesn't even occur to Ned that Bran might still be able to do normal activities if he has help.)

*There is no question that Robert neglected both his legal and his biological children. But Ned also kinda neglected his, especially the girls. Sansa and Arya are stuck in a very very toxic dynamic of golden child-black sheep, probably created by Septa Mordane and reinforced by Catelyn, but Ned only seems to realize this when he gets sole custody of the girls. Also, the fact that Ned didn't seem to have any plan for Robb and Jon beyond 'future Lord of WF and his right hand' is kinda another black mark against him. One could argue that if Ned had tried to look for a wife for Robb, there would have been no Frey engagement to break and no Red Wedding.

Anyway, yeah, passivity=death IMO.

As for D&D and Dany, I honestly don't think it's that deep. I think they more or less so the Targaryens as bad because Ned was part of a rebellion to despose them, and well, Ned=Good in their eyes. So Dany can't be good. It's also why I think Jon gets sent in exile bc well, Jon is also a Targaryen by birth. We only need the 'pure' Starks at the end of the day, for good to triumph over evil. D&D seem to have a veeeery simplistic worldview, I think even Disney's Descendants would seem too morally grey for them LOL.

So I think the show's downfall was the fact that it was made by two people who seem to want to do straightforward epic fantasy and could not, for the life of them, deal with nuance of any kind.

[inkedinshadows]

What do you think of the spring court destruction arc? I fully recognise Tamlin was abusive and a bad ruler and deserved Feyre's hatred but that wasn't about him, thousands of people suffered and it made the entire position of all the Courts weaker, made things easier for Hybern and for what? And yes maybe Tamlin was being dumb but he obviously was trying to be a double agent in that scenario and not trying to betray them all, something both Feyre and Rhysand had done. Obviously if he's dumb about it and can ruin things then stop him but it's weird to call him a traitor in that regard idk.

My opinion on this changed a lot after my second read of the series.

The first time I read the books, I was like "you go girl!!! Yess!!! He deserves it! Girlboss!! Girlpower! YAY FEYRE GO!" I loved that whole part, I hated Tamlin, Feyre could do no wrong in my eyes. How dare he try to get her back from the Night Court after he had locked her up and made her miserable? He absolutely deserved what he got.

But then I read the books again, knowing the full context and with a better understanding of the characters. And now I agree with you. It didn't make much sense.

I fully understand Feyre. She was mad and hurt and wanted to punish Tamlin for what he did to her (and her sisters bc if I'm not wrong she blames him for Elain and Nesta being kidnapped by Hybern).

But I also understand Tamlin. The Night Court had a horrible reputation and he didn't know why Rhys did the things he did while UTM. I, too, would probably believe Rhys was mind controlling Feyre. And I'll be honest, I can also understand why Tamlin locked Feyre in the manor. I'm not saying he was right and that it wasn't wrong and fucked up, but simply that I can see why he thought it would keep Feyre safe and why she'd need to be kept safe in the first place.

Destroying the Spring Court because of it was a dumb decision, and not only from a political point of view. Personal reasons are not enough to tear down a court, which is basically like a country on its own. The scene with the water wraith was also unnecessary because why use that to make Tamlin seem like a bad ruler? I don't remember right now how the scene goes and how exactly he behaves, but I don't see what's wrong with him making people pay taxes? It's how the world works. If he allows someone to skip one payment, then others will ask to skip it too and then nobody will pay them and how will he be able to sustain the court? Maybe he could have been less harsh on the wraiths and try to help them more, but blaming him for having a tithe makes no sense.

Also, from Tamlin's pov, as I said, he had every reason to believe Feyre was abducted by the Night Court and not there by her own choice. Allying with Hybern to try and get her back was extreme, but he probably thought she was being tortured. Like Rhysand said (in acofas i think, but idk), Tamlin loved Feyre so it's something everybody agrees on. He did what he thought was right to save her because he didn't have evidence of Feyre not needing saving from the Night Court (a written note and her summoning Illyrian wings is not enough evidence, not with the reputation the NC and the IC had).

I don't think Tamlin is a traitor. He never allied with Hybern because he thought they were right, but to use them. He'd planned on betraying them and be a double agent from the beginning, but ofc no one knew bc that's the whole point of a double agent (like Rhys with Amarantha, like you said). I also don't think he needs a redemption arc. He's not a villain and he's not evil. What he needs is a healing arc and understanding what he did wrong with Feyre.

So yes, I think the spring court destruction arc was a stupid political move and I don't understand how politically important people like the IC, including the HIGH LORD and even AMREN who's supposed to be the wisest there, didn't condemn Feyre's actions but praised them. I get that Rhys was biased, but he was not thinking as a High Lord in that moment. And her actions are what led to Hybern invading Prythian. Not to mention the innocent people of the spring court who had done nothing wrong and suddenly had to leave their homes bc of it.

[coffeegnomee]

um can i get an explanation of what pb&js plans were in S5 that didnt hold up (help)

Basically Minute, Jumper, Pentar, and Ashwag had a secret plan that they refused to reveal but would only say "trust the process" over and over and assured chat that it was going to be awesome.

They basically streamed 0% of the ideation process, 0% of the struggles, 0% of the surprise successes.

Then on the infamous day, Lifesteal Sunday (5/19/24), Ash went live to build a new pb&j base, so imagine, you're just watching the most normal boring chill base building stream.

Jumper goes live and starts talking to Mapicc about wanting him to ban her because she doesn't agree with her team killing people to make peace on the server, it's a tbh sus but also great moment of improv lore, interesting character development from Jumper. It was all just a lie though. So it wasn't even a real lore moment. (I'm not salty at all. nope)

She leads him around the server, and halfway through her sentence he pops like a grape. Killed (and banned bc it was hardcore mode) instantly by a claymore, a *special* arrow cannon. we already saw arrow canons this season. it was. omg it was so unoriginal and uninteresting and IMMEDIATE, no banter from Mapicc, no evil speech, no possibility of escape, just instant shotgun to the head.

Swap back to Ash stream and him and Minute are absolutely celebrating for a job well done, "thanks for watching the show". What show. You were building a base.

And that was the "trust the process" plan.

But it wasn't quite over. They got wemmbu on and for pt2 of their epic plan they do *something* and suddenly wemmbu isn't immortal anymore so they 4v1'ed him and he died almost instantly.

No explanation, no lead up, barely a villainous speech. While they were gloating and trying to figure out how to further chunk ban wemmbu to make sure he couldn't play anymore Ash finally explained that as a part of Minute's final Presidency Decree he added a mod to the server that meant they could manually turn of Wemmbu's immortality just like wemmbu could manually turn it on. So it was something completely behind the scenes to a degree unfathomable.

Basically, their plan worked flawlessly but it was the most unsatisfying thing to watch of all time. It was too secretive, they allowed for no error, they didn't give the opps a chance, they didn't do an ounce of real rp, and they killed ALL their opps in one fell swoop.

This all after about 2(?) months of doing NOTHING on the server, barely playing, not streaming, refusing to fight, waiting for the perfect moment to unleash a perfect plan.

Also as an additional aside, the Original Perfect Plan(TM) was creating a void trap in Jumper's base to trap Mapicc or Zam (yes. after she stopped them from opening the void). The mining out was streamed but how it would go down was also kept totally secret and then it just got dropped in favor of the claymore. Basically pb&j promised a lot but took their sweet time making it happen to the point where it was very unsatisfying and then they lacked the rp pizzazz and whimsy to make it interesting in other ways.

[showbellsandfauxwhistles]

I need to talk about Moana 2 for a second and then more specifically about my girl Matangi because she was by FARRRR my favorite character in this movie (I mean truly, it felt like fanservice to me specifically)

So we all agree that Moana 3 needs to delve into what her deal is exactly with Nalo, which will more than likely happen, and I just really hope they’ll make something interesting and maybe even morally grey out of it because I just think it would suit her to remain a bit of an unlikely protagonist/sketchy character in general

But what I might be more interested in seeing is her history with Maui, to me in the movie they read a lot like either ex-lovers or ex-partners in crime or something similar. I think it’s possible that a main objective for Moana 3 might be saving Matangi, next to of course some bigger conflict involving Nalo, with Moana reasoning that Matangi helped them and therefore should be saved and Maui complaining/questioning why Moana thinks that and revealing his history with her through dialogue and jokes (and hopefully flashbacks). That, or saving Matangi becomes more of a coincidental thing that happens slightly earlier on than the end of the movie and they can maybe reveal their history through dialogue between her and Maui instead while she helps them defeat Nalo.

I’m really interested in what their ultimate plan is for Matangi as a character, worst case scenario for me would be that they make her a sort of damsel in distress that Moana and Maui need to rescue in Moana 3 and maybe have a few scenes of her annoying Nalo or whoever while being held captive before getting her happy ending being freed by Moana and Maui. More interesting would be if they make her into a sort of anti-hero or secondary antagonist-turned-protagonist by having Nalo manipulate/force her into countering Moana and Maui without being able to sneakily help them like in Moana 2. Even better if she actually harms someone bc more angst, yay!

And then another arc I kind of see for her is a surprise villain arc after making us all believe she was a protagonist, where she doesn’t subscribe to Nalo’s agenda but has a secret evil agenda of her own and would leave Moana and Maui having to defeat her after defeating Nalo. However I doubt this one will happen because they marketed her as a villain already so it would be slightly too obvious and would take exquisite writing to pull off properly and really surprise people.

For me I guess I would just love to have her remain a protagonist but also a sketchy one who keeps us on our toes and does questionable things to where we all keep doubting whether she’s actually a protagonist until the end and then have her happy ending. Either way I’m really excited to see what Disney does with her character when Moana 3 is released in… a few decades. If they screw her up I will never forgive them.

ETA: what I’m also really interested in is how she got her demigod status! What she meant with “you and I have that in common, the human who’s got all of the gods talking” and what not

[ilikevillains]

i hope there's someone that despises Daniel as much as me

I hate Daniel so much. die die die die die die die die die die die die die die die die die die die die die die die, I hope you gets run over by a bus, I hope a bunch of werewolves jump you, I hope you die a slow and painful death where the pain is just all the pain all the characters felt from the aphverse combined, your voice is annoying as hell, it pisses me off whenever I hear and I have to skip it, your character is only known as the "cUtE aNd pReCiOuS cINaMoNrOlL tHaT nEeDs pRoTiCtIoN-! >.<" you're a grown ass adult with no signs of a type of illness that makes you like this, a tiny little twink that needs their weakling ass friends to help them, GROW UP, you couldn't fight in high school at the ripe age of 17 and a fucking 15-16 year old omega almost beat you, but your big strong daddies blaze and Aaron came over to help and made a plan, instead of teaching you how to be a normal werwolf and fight like a real man, they protect you like a puppy that was just born, "aW iM sO pRoUd oF dAniEl fOr sTaNdInG uP fOr hImSelf! 🥰🤩🥰😇🥳😉😎", " AAAH dAnIeLs vOiCe iS So cUtE iTs gOnNa kIlL mE oNe DaY🥺😫😖🥴😘😚😍" "wHy wOulD eIn dO tHaT tO mY pReCiOuS wItTlE dAnIeL 😭😢😡🤬😤👿👺👹" is the only types of comments I see whenever Daniel is in a video, I'm convinced people that favorite Daniel and comment this type of shit have a fetish for guys like him, "you're only saying that bc ein is your favorite character!-...! ୧( ಠ Д ಠ )୨!!" I hate ein, I actually replay his death over and over again because it makes me genuinely happy to see an evil character get what they deserve,he's just a well written character, unfortunately that won't happen to Daniel the sweet little cINaMoNrOlL who can't howl like a normal werewolf, he deserves to be omega bc he IS actually weak and helpless and pathetic, unlike Dottie and Rylan who at least can put up a fight for a few minutes, he can't even pick up boxes of BREAD. BREAD, he's the definition of pathetic I hate him with all my heart, he became the alpha unfairly, by just being thrown on Top of ein, and when ein used fear instead fairness it's suddenly wrong, "o-oh! B-but Ein-! " yes ein is a villain that wants to hurt people, that's a villain, Daniel is just a random character that came out of nowhere for no good reason AT ALL, he had no purpose just there for support nothing important, could've used aphmau's normal friends for that, he's useless and unimportant, he is like a child to me not a man in his early 30's, the only time I actually liked him was never, I hate him I hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate him, die over and over again idc if you're a fan favorite, you're just a dog, a big.fat.wet.smelly.weak.pathetic dog I hope your father left you and your mother is disappointed in you, bitchass, I hope you die and blaze comes back instead of you

(No hate towards Ross tho 👍)

[daydreaming-scheming-demon]

i know undertale is like, almost a decade old at this point, even older if you count the kickstarter’s age, but i still cant get over how flowey/asriel is literally such a cool fucking character. he’s like a player that plays a game too many times and stops being able to see the characters as people as their brain sees them acting the same and doing the same things on each replay and how he loses his sympathy bc of that. and this makes him come across as a typical pure evil antagonist at first, but then you learn his backstory, and it’s all just, aghhhhhhhh. and then you learn in the genocide route that he helped people at first, he used to be kind, but he got bored, and how that contrasts the player on the genocide route with flowey, the genocide route where the player is now in the role of the pure evil villain, just like flowey was.

and also i love how the guy is literally just an edgy kid. like, he comes across as an adult at first, but the guy’s just like one of those cynical little kids who only wants to see the worst in everything. and how that’s portrayed in the true pacifist route where he gives himself this edgy name and transformation sequence that feels like something a kid would come up with. tho the idea that he’s a kid does kinda come into question when you consider all the resets he’s been on, but even still he never got to grow up.

i wanna hug this lil dude so badly, even in flower form, he deserves a hug.

i fucking love this dude, he’s kinda like a pure evil antagonist, but actually has a backstory that makes you feel sorry for him and make his actions feel understandable, even if he can feel like some insane cartoon supervillain, his actions still feel reasonable with his backstory in mind. it’s like taking the idea of an unrealistically evil villain and asking yourself what couldve possibly made them that way

and his whole life as asriel with chara as a sibling. aghhhhhhhh, i love it.

and how in the beginning of the game he probably hasnt even realized his powers are missing yet, and that may just be a small thing but i find it a fun small recontextualization. that in this moment where you seem like you’re falling into his trap, he doesnt even realize that you have far more power over him than he thinks. and something i never even really thought about for a while is how he probably had a bit of a mental breakdown realizing his powers are missing sometime between your first and second time meeting him, and how he probably had to get himself all ready to talk with you again and come across as confident and threatening. like, there’s no way he just brushed off the fact that his powers are missing so easily, his plan to use you to retrieve the souls probably helped him feel better, but there’s no way this dude just brushed off losing the powers he’s been relying on for who knows how long so easily. he definitely got all angry and scared at his missing powers sometime between your first and second meeting, for at least a little while.

honestly, i feel like undertale didnt have enough of him. he deserved more screentime imo. which is why i was really happy to see his characterizationin done so well in undertale yellow, i fucking loved how that game built on his character. and his whole boss fight in that game somehow outdoing his boss fights in the original game. and how a lot of his attacks involve self harm in some way. and how he acts as the save points for the game so you get to hear a lot more from him throughout the game. i feel like undertale yellow gave me some characterization for him that i really fucking needed.

genuinely one of my favourite characters in all of fiction. would love to have a conversation with this lil guy.

[save-the-villainous-cat]

could u do a villain having a crush on hero, but not admitting it, and the other villains/henchmen teasing them for it bc they’re all “i am the epitome of darkness and all things evil” but when hero shows up they’re a blushing mess 😭 love ur writing <3

The henchman looked down at their victim. Slowly, they kicked them with their boot over, so that they were lying on their back. Blood was dripping down a wound on their forehead and their eyes seemed to be glassy already. What they hated the most about this job was the cleaning. A crime scene was truly hard to make look like before.

They wrinkled their nose.

“Looking pretty dead, if you ask me.” They turned towards their boss and tilted their head, hopefully signalling them that this meant they could wrap things up.

“We haven’t checked all of the perimeter,” the villain noted. The henchman knew quite well the villain wasn’t the best at concentrating on one thing. However, when it came to the hero, they were easily determined. They let their bloody knuckles crack, one after the other and the henchman wasn’t even sure why they had agreed to help the villain in the first place. This seemed a little too private. Even for them. “I’m curious about the basement.”

“Believe me, no one survived. And even if they did, they’re long gone. No one’s here anymore.” The henchman looked around and their eyes went over the warm bodies. They had to admit, these were quite drastic measures but the villain was…a special person.

“Hm.” Their boss was clearly not satisfied with that answer, so they started fidgeting. For as long as the henchman had known them, they weren’t one to be still. They walked up and down like a panther in a cage, searching through files and for cameras, taking in heavy breaths when they were frustrated, frowning when they got distracted. All of that was pretty much normal but the henchman also knew that they were nervous and moving more than usually.

It was an open secret now that people tried to assassinate the city’s saviour and the villain had tried everything in their power to prevent it.

It had been a long, incredibly and frustratingly long journey to watch the villain fall in love. They were stubborn and apparently not capable of allowing themselves to feel anything besides…rage. So, when the henchman had to watch them flirt with the hero awkwardly, they felt like a kid watching their parents.

Strangely sweet and totally embarrassing. God, what a mess.

So, it didn’t surprise the henchman that the villain tried to eliminate every possible threat.

“Your little hero will surely survive if one or two people attack them,” they said eventually. “They’re pretty tough.”

“This isn’t about the hero.” That made the henchman roll their eyes.

“No, you obviously just like killing random people.” The villain looked up from the papers they were looking through and frowned. It was like dealing with a teenager who was too embarrassed to ask out their crush and the henchman was so unbelievably sick of it.

“How about you look through this old bad boy—” they slapped the PC on the table next to them “—instead of being such a nuisance?”

The henchman grinned.

“I don’t think the hero likes people who insult their friends,” they said as they (reluctantly) sat down and turned on the computer. The desktop was illuminated by a strange blue light, dipping the already dark room into a weird atmosphere.

“Oh, what would you know about what they like…” The henchman could see the villain’s ears turn red and it would have been impressive what kind of power the hero had over them if it wasn’t so pathetic.

“Well, what would you know? You can’t even look them in the eyes when they talk to you.” That one team-up a few months ago had been really strange. An undeniable chemistry had been looming around the hero and the villain. Both got excited about the other’s tech, both technically read each other’s minds when they were creating plans and both were too oblivious to notice the people around them and their ugh-get-a-room-looks. Everyone on the team referred to it as The Incident. At least the villain had been in a good mood for the whole week after that.

“That’s, hey, that’s not true.”

“I don’t blame you. It’s like the whole city is thirsting after them. People definitely have too much time on their hands,” the henchman mumbled as they tried all kinds of password combinations to get into the computer. They looked over to the villain who seemed…determined? To be thinking a little too much?

“But the hero wouldn’t sleep with a fan…right?”

“If it’s too hot in summer, they probably will,” the henchman answered as the computer announced for the third time that their access got denied.

“Ah, forget it.” The villain showed absolutely no appreciation for their joke and somehow that was what did it for the henchman.

“Okay, listen.” The henchman pushed themselves away from the desk and rolled over to the villain with their chair. “You both are incredibly pathetic people and I truly believe that I will throw myself out of a window if I have to watch you flirt with them one more time.”

“…I’m not that bad, am I?”

The henchman sighed.

“They like you. They like you a lot. You obviously care for each other.”

“Debatable,” the villain said and the henchman wanted to pull out their hair.

“Okay,” the henchman said. “I’ll ask them out then.”

The look the villain gave them was indescribable.

[justatiredghost]

Traffic Lights Tag Game

rules: talk about something creative you're working on of any kind.🚦 green: what is it about, what excited you about it, what sparked the idea? orange: slow down and share something from it: a photo, a few words, some more background info etc. red: what is the roadblock currently? what is one thing that is a necessary evil in making it?

tagged by @princessraptor thank you so much!!

Green

I’m going with my ongoing series No Freedom from Knowing. It’s a Magnus Archives fantasy au where avatars are warlocks and the Fears are their patrons. John is kinda hiding out alone on the fringes of society, because most people are understandably terrified of magic and react badly when they find out he’s a warlock. 

Occasionally, because he’s the only one stupid enough to live in a monster-infested forest, he stumbles across injured victims of the Fears and tries to help them, which is how he meets Martin at the start of the story. 

While I wanted to put him through the horrors, I ended up wanting to focus more on John learning to trust people again and the ways connections can save us, which is how I took a 10 chapter fic and managed to get it up into the 30s lol. 

I first got this idea while relistening to s5 and at the very end, when Georgie mentions the mob justice people were enacting on avatars, I realized, if he knew Martin was safe, John probably wouldn’t fight back if they came to kill him. And that is an incredibly sad thought. He’s just so full of guilt, and if he isn’t actively protecting someone or trying to save the world, he’d probably just accept it. I don’t think he wants to hurt anyone, and honestly he’d probably see it as some sort of atonement.

So I wanted to do something with that, but ended up putting it in an au bc I wasn’t sure how to handle a post-canon world, especially if I wanted a happy ending. So yeah, John hasn’t ended the world, but he has hurt people and if the only other avatars/warlocks people know of are like Jane Prentiss, they are more likely to lash out first and ask questions later.

Orange

This was supposed to be a short exploration, but apparently I am enjoying writing John having one panic attack after another, but then getting to experience comfort and safety after. So, every time I think I’m done, I think of another scenario or scene I want to explore and it just keeps going lol. 

I am happier with the character arc I have now than when I’d originally planned to end it at ch10, so I might wrap it up for now and create a series if I do end up adding onto it. It makes sense to have Elias be the final villain. I do think it would be interesting to bring Peter Lucas in and explore stuff with Martin more, but I have no concrete ideas yet so we shall see. 

Also, I keep going back and thinking about Martin’s pov and writing little scenes for him which is fun to explore considering what an unreliable narrator John is. No idea if I’ll do anything with them though

Red

Ah action scenes, the bane of my existence lol. I’ve got at least two, maybe more, coming up, and I’m not entirely sure how to handle them yet. I find them very difficult and get impatient with them, so. I’m trying to make sure I’m actually having fun writing them and not just using them as a way to get from point A to point B. 

I also have a scene where a character confronts their abuser, and I want to make sure I handle it okay and also make it satisfying. Hopefully I can pull it all off lol. Endings are always stressful. 

[oh-no-its-bird]

reading ur fic one step three steps rn and I don't usually read oc-insert fics but ichigo is SUCH a menace I love her to death... and the idea of this feral, unchecked little kid being put in kakashi's care is so good. he's gonna suffer so much but it'll be good for him I think 👍 anyway I can't help but wonder how things would go down with the whole. obito thing. because I can't help making everything about my favorite insane guy. do you think they'd bond over their love for making kakashi suffer. do you think they'd bond over their shared affinity for chaos. I don't know I just!! think they have so much potential as a duo ANYWAY sorry for rambling have a nice day

DJFBDKDJDJS IM SO GLAD YOU LIKE HER???

I'm also kind of in the boat of not especially liking or reading oc centered fics, I think making Ichigo was a bit easier for me than it would have been otherwise bc I really went into it treating her like a plot divice. Still am tbh. I love Ichigo but the story isn't there for her, it's there bc of her. I needed someone to stir shit up and bring up some very specific topics and issues, so she became that. And I fell a little in love with her character along the way

Inevitable tbh, it's probably impossible to write a character that much without finding or molding them into something you can like writing

Kakashi absoloutley deserves to be harassed by tiny children, and now he can't escape bc Ichigo is in his fucking house!! She's gonna bring back more (even tinier) children to harass him, starting with Naruto. He will never know peace.

ITS FUNNY YOU MENTION OBITO BC I ACTUALLY HAVE ALREADY WRITTEN SOME STUFF FOR HIM IN THE FUTURE WHENEVER HES INTRODUCED!!

I have so many notes and plans laid out for One Step Three Steps u don't even know

Anyways spoilers for the eventually Obito introduction in the fic, take a snippet for his introduction (it's liable to change tho, we won't be seeing Obito for a while in the fic)

"I . . . am Madara Uchiha."

Ichigo opened her mouth. Closed it. Opened it again.

Finally, in her flattest voice, she went, "No you're not."

The imposter paused, then shook his head and gave a sinister chuckle. It was a decent enough imitation but she'd seen Hashirama give a better Madara impression.

While drunk.

"I understand it's hard for you to believe, but the stories of my death were greatly exaggerated."

Ichigo aimed her best impression of Ojisan's unimpressed face at him. Lip curled in distaste and head tilted to stare down at him like he was a bug.

He twitched. It was a pretty good impression. (Better than his Madara one, anyways)

"No, you're not."

"Yes, I am."

"No. You're really not."

"Yes, I really am."

They stared at eachother, locked in stalemate, till she smirked.

"Ok sure, you're Madara-sama. What's my name then?"

"Um."

"Come on, Dara-chan," she batted her eyes at him innocently. "I'm sure you can remember."

He seemed to regain control of myself, straightening up and giving another echo of what might have been Madara's laugh. If he was a crazy cave hermit who'd decided to inject a gallon of cringe fail evil villain juice into his laughter, anyways.

"Come now, Ichigo, I know it's hard to believe but it really is me."

"Ha!" She shoved her hand towards him, pointing triumphantly. "My real name is Hatake Miko! I gave them a fake when I got here, and if you were the real Madara-sama you'd know that!"

"O-of course, Miko-chan, I was just testing you. I had to be sure you were the real Miko I remembered, after all."

"No, I lied I really am Ichigo." She deadpanned, giving him a little peace sign.

He staggered under some invisible weight, making a noise like a popped balloon.

"I don't usually kill children, but . . ." He mumbled to himself, and she scoffed.

"You don't even have his hair." She squinted at him, feeling insulted om Madara's behalf. "You're pretending to be Madara with hair like that? Have some standards.

[mrgladstonegander]

MORE BOOTLEG DUCKTALES ‼️team science (oops! all identity issues!) edition

team magic here

archimedes gallas / gyro = more like other versions where he's nice but this man is carrying SOOOO much guilt. insane amounts. his entire character is focused on how much his self-worth is down the drain (also hes being haunted by the narrative (phoebe/della)). also he's half japanese. based off the onagadori

cherry pekin / huey = has a similar problem to archie where she has overwhelming feelings of needing to seem mature, and responsible, where she overworks herself

sydney eggtooth-diazi / fenton = REALLYY wants to seem like a Professional Normal Dude. repressing EVERY urge to wear silly ties. sees morality in a black and white sort of way and it WILL cause problems later. he puts archie on a pedestal and its super obvious and it just makes archie more mentally ill

salem milly / gandra = planning to really lean into how she joined fowl bc they were the only ones that supported her. mainly the contrast with how the Main Family supports each other with unconditional love, the love she has is purely conditional, and she's constantly convincing herself that she Wants to do bad things, and that she doesnt care about these people, because despite how she says she only listens to herself, shes stuck to FOUL, and thats her 'family'. based on mille fleur d'uccle

frankie loon / fethry = IT IS PART OF TEAM SCIENCE‼️ after getting back to mainland after being alone at sea for four years, he joins as a janitor. pulling back the marine biology in the sense that he is interested in EVERYTHING. man of a 10000 copies. winning the idgaf war (DOES care abt how his family is disinterested in his interests but its FINE because HE cares its fine its fine. he's accepted he'll be alone). its presence WILL send everyone else into a shock about their identity. hopefully it'll happen vice versa as well

widget-time-tech / widget / gizmoduck / lil bulb = theyre being consolidated and also theyre lil bug guys now!! i dont care if you hate bugs theyre cute as shit!! widget is Usually in the little ball, but also helps control the suit with sydney. it still has anger issues so it'll make things harder for sydney rather than just silly incompetence. and it was DEFINENTLY made to be a superhero ai. no other purposes. at all. certainly not messing with the fabric of time. just helping the ppl of the town :)

mad clucktor / mad clucktor = iwhile he IS a villain he isn't necessarily a bad person. hes a physical manifestation of the part of archie that WANTS to be alive! that KNOWS his worth! he doesn't have to work himself to death to make up for his guilt!

and he's the reason why toby is even active. why he's back

toby / boyd = cannot be normal abt this sorry

he was made to be archie's idea of the "perfect boy". the perfect kid. what he wants to be what he WISHED he would be growing up. hes happy, he can do everything right, he's intelligent, he's strong. his existence is free of human doubt and anxiety, he's the perfect boy and if he was in archie's place everything would be fine

but it isnt! he gets used! toby's used for evil through no fault of his own. but he becomes a symbol of things that are "wrong" about archie. toby didn't resent anyone or be upset with how people treat him. toby doesnt have his own needs. he can do whatever people need him to do. toby was his symbol of hope but becomes a symbol of how everything with him goes wrong. he becomes an unachievable goal that archie is trying to be to make up for the existence of toby!!

and so the only way for either of them to be "truly human" is when archie learns that he doesn't have to be perfect. he never had to be. even if he's made mistakes, he still deserves to LIVE!! he doesn't have to hide his pain and discomfort for anyone!! and its okay for toby to be toby!

[archesphyre]

So I got some more plot stuff figured out for Grimwell Lodge. Here are the updates:

Finally wrote a primary goal for the main characters

New plot conflict

More lore/interworkings of the universe

New primary villain

New character

Working on reference sheet for The Reappearing

Warning for spoilers:3

Reese is the main character, and his stepdad Sam was offered a ridiculous sum of money and ownership of a lodge from his childhood for retrieving some items left behind in the old town he used to go to in the summer when he was a kid, the town being named Grimwell. Grimwell Lodge is said lodge that they were given. The task seemed easy enough, so Reese joined Sam because Sam is a crazy old man and would probably die by trying to fistfight a bear. The two are forced to live in an old shack

It quickly becomes apparent to Reese that there's something wrong with the place, the first noticable thing being the massive bubble of fog and rain clouds constantly over the town. Sam is oblivious. After waking up in the middle of the night, Reese decides to go outside and take a breather, when he finds someone in a massive plague doctor outfit sitting on his porch reading a book he stole. They greet him as a neighbor does, and recedes back into the woods in the pouring rain. They also hand him a note they found on their doorstep. It reads "find the watchtower" and has a map.

As the sun begins to rise, Reese follows the map, finding the watchtower. Inside is a map of the town, marked with potential dangers and the sectors of the town, and a classified document. A note on the table reads "travel to each sector and locate the key that unlocks the corresponding artifact from the altar"

(they will then be given the classified document for the next section if they are proven trustworthy)

Aight I'm sick of typing this like I'm actually writing a draft let's get to the plot. So these keys connected to these artifacts are connected to an immortal creature in each sector of the town, each one based on the seven deadly sins. They used to live in a kinda heaven-like realm of other immortal, incredibly powerful creatures, but were banished for either being an outlaw or for being more powerful than the leaders (major spoilers here), the latter is what happened to The Reappearing. He's a reality shifting entity, but he was banished for being too powerful even tho he was pretty chill. His power was sucked into an orb by a curse, and he was banished to a realm of nothing. With the last bit of his power he made one more dimensional rift and ended up in Grimwell, but the other 5 entities followed him (only 5 at the time since The Prince was "born" later)

Over the years it became a ghost town, and all the artifacts containing the full power of the entities were locked away in a magical altar. They could only be unlocked with a key for each one, which somehow ended up in the possession of an evil government corporation lol, I haven't written that part yet. They had to leave the keys behind when they fled the town, so they sent some unsuspecting ppl in to get em. Reese has to go around and collect them from the high security vaults they were locked in around the town. Meanwhile, The Reappearing is trying to stop him bc he's trying to fight another entity, The Hollowed, who was once a leader of the heaven lands thing but was cast down to earth. It thinks it can return to its former state by regaining its power, and The Reappearing is trying to stop it. It plans to steal the keys from Reese and kill him, then absorb the power from the artifacts and return to "heaven" to try to rejoin the council. The Reappearing knows its offer will be rejected, which it probably won't take too well. He's by far the oldest of all of them but being immortal, he doesn't age, and he was there before the council. In a way he's trying to protect The Hollowed? Cuz like, he sees it as his kid kinda. He helped raise it when nobody else would, due to a prophecy or something that it was evil, which he didn't believe in. He wanted to help it reach its dream of being part of the council, and it did get to for a while, but the council rigged the jobs they gave it to always fail, bc they didn't want it as part of the council, and when it did fail it was banished, but the Reappearing tried to protect it maybe? And then got banished to what I'm deciding to call Nowhere with it. Before the spell could finish fully, he set himself free into Grimwell, and the space where they put the altar fucked up and ended up on a hill. The Hollowed decided to try to start its own army for revenge, bc it felt like The Reappearing had failed it, and wanted to steal his powers. Due to the power absorption, none of the entities are fully immortal now, they just no longer age, but can die if harmed. They are immune to poison tho.

WARNING, DISTURBING CONTENT

At the end, when Reese finds The Reappearing's document(which he had hidden), he assumes it's true when Reappearing asks him to marry him, bc it said "the Reappearing will trick you into getting in a relationship with him, and then will ask you to stay with him/marry him, then he tricks you into going back home with him where he kills you and lays eggs in you, and then leaves your body in the swamps to rot"

What was actually happening is that a person fell for him a good while back, and when he proposed to her she accepted, and so when he was trying to set up stuff and make her a ring and everything back at home, she got interrogated by the government guys and they told her that the Reappearing isn't to be trusted or smth and they told her some kind of conspiracy theory, and being kinda stupid she believed it, so when she went to his house she tried to shoot and kill him, but he took her down, which was the only time he's canonically physically harmed someone. He felt awful afterwards and buried the body, but swamps are mushy so the corpse floated back up again. And the egg thing was from... Before all the shit went down. Cough. They just found eggs in the corpse and assumed the worst.

Anyway, Reese also assumed the worst when Reappearing proposed to him since he read the document, and he now has everything he needed to leave Grimwell and get the money. Without his knowledge, after handing over the artifacts, the Hollowed stole them and absorbed the power. Reappearing didn't know bc he was under his bed crying:(

The Prince barges into the Lodge, having walked the whole way there from his sector, and he demands to know where the Reappearing is bc they need his help with the Hollowed. I don't have the rest written but ik I want Reappearing to try to calm down Hollowed and they have a sweet father and child moment but someone shoots at the Hollowed, angering it, and it thinks that The Reappearing had planned to shoot it. He tries to explain, but it's too late, and the Hollowed breaks the magical barrier keeping the entities in. I want the Hollowed to eventually realize that not the entire world is evil, and calm down, and then rethink everything, then return its powers back to the artifacts and to their respective entities, all but its own, maybe bc it doesn't have one? It tries to fight back, and ends up dealing the final blow to the big bad government guy, but unfortunately just before that it got impaled in the chest with a special spear type thing.

Here's the scene in my head since it's really vivid

(The Reappearing tries to help the Hollowed but not much can be done. It seems disappointed in itself. It says to him)

"I have failed..."

( But the Reappearing tries to reassure it and tells it)

"no, no, kid, you won. You did it. You saved us, you saved the day."

(The Hollowed tells him)

"but I did not join the council"

(and the Reappearing tells it)

"you did so much better than the council ever did. That council doesn't matter. You have.. our little council. You lead it. You made rules and organized an attack, just like a council leader does. And it worked. You know what? I think the council leader banished you because you're so much better of a council leader than them."

"truly?"

"of course. They made a mistake, not letting you in. I bet they were jealous of your leadership skills" the Reappearing is visibly trying not to cry as he sees his kid die:(

"heh heh.. I.. I have surpassed them"

"you did. I'm so proud of you"

(The Hollowed hesitates)

"and you will remember me?"

"as one of the greatest leaders of all time"

(the Hollowed takes its bag hat mask off, and hands it to the Reappearing)

"I love you, Dad"

(the Hollowed goes limp as it passes, and the Reappearing holds it close and whispers)

"I love you too, kiddo"

Sorry for making you cry. That's all I have. Ty for reading:3