#but as an Ashton fan I wanted more of how they're feeling than the usual 'Imogen Laudna and Orym are sad' stuff

[danwhobrowses]

So after four months, Bell's Hells are off the moon

0.5/5 Stars - Some of the locals were nice but activities were shit and needs new management.

But what's this? Aabria with a steel chair!? She's probably cackling looking at the socials right now

[th3houseofleaves]

misc. scenarios / scenes i have on the brain

for various ocs but mostly dove i think.

jason and dove at some underground punk show and dove is dragging him into the moshpit because they are having the time of their life and they want to feel all that energy and they want him with them for it. with him beside him it's the safest they've probably ever been when moshing because he's Tall and Big and he's keeping a close watch on them and as much as he can they've each got a hand on each other or they're pressed close to each other. they're staying as close as possible and dove is all lit up and yelling so they can be heard over the music and the crowd and they're telling him this is the best night ever.

the first time jason actually holds sparrow because sparrow seeks him out when he wanted to be picked up. he's kind of shocked but that's only after he picks him up without thinking much about it, like it's natural. sparrow pats his face and tells him thank you like jason did more than just pick him up because sparrow is already so much like dove. and when dove sees it? they've gotta take a minute to process bc they're so full of love in that moment they can't think of anything else. before he has any idea what's happening jason has both baeks holding onto him because dove comes up and hugs him nd they're just pleased as hell n sparrow is snuggled between the both of them. meanwhile jason is still kind of processing.

the day that dove accidentally revealed they were a meta / speedster to helena. and how they tried to recover and walk that back. bonus if they try talking about how it happened (they do not remember) because they'd try and use what they do remember + whatever pops into their head to come up with a rather ridiculous story behind it.

new oc ashton graves and the first time she used magic + found out about zatanna. & if she knew about it (bc idk how common knowledge it is) her being a bop fan. i think she'd think they were cool as hell too

even newer oc kit warren being the most annoying person alive /lh. basically him using his powers to annoy like. dick or. oliver queen. bc i decided that kit wakes up each day and chooses violence (making his existence everyone's, but specifically oliver's, problem). he's genuinely not that bad but he does enjoy messing around.

a grown up aeron vasilyev interacting with both their moms. (bio mom and the mom who would've raised them) that's pretty much it

evan faulkner trying to duck out at a function he's supposed to be throwing but people keep finding him. if he wasn't literally the host, nearing 30, and allegedly a people person (he doesn't know who started that rumor), he would find somewhere to hide, including under a table like he's six and hiding from his mom during a different event bc he's so bored. afterwards he tries to convince his assistant person (? it's complicated) that they shouldn't throw parties or anything like that ever again. they tell him no. he tries to quit. they tell him no.

logan toussaint and aeron and milan forcing (/lh) everyone to have a self care & family day at aeron's house. sam's doing lesson plans with a face mask on and his hair pushed back with a headband that logan bought for him specifically (it's bright green!). milan is sitting and painting noah's nails, noah has no idea what colors he chose either. milan is keeping that secret. thea, who also has a face mask, messing with aeron's hair while they ramble about whatever comes to mind. her hair is also done up in some legit french braids bc aeron? knows how for some reason.

the moment when levi faust realises all the ways their brother cares about them. like figuring out it's rory who cuts out or obscures nutrition labels or repackages food so there's no labels except for what the food is and the ingredients. or them realizing that if rory hands them that's usually in a wrapper (like candy) that he'll usually have it open already when he's passing it to them & he manages to take the wrapper before they look at it as they can actually enjoy their treat. or how rory will save their paper and put their laptop + phone on the charger and straighten things up when he finds them asleep in their homework.

also rory asking levi for help with his french homework bc he only knows so much and levi looking at him and saying that as much as it hurts them to say it, they have no idea how to rlly read in french or explain it. it's just their first language and they can speak it but they didn't learn more than that? bc all their school stuff was done in english and they only learned french at all bc that's all their dad would use around them and that's how they learned how to talk n stuff. but it was never a formal education. both of them stare at his homework confused. levi can help with very basic stuff. they hate that

[edge-oftheworld]

hey girl i saw your friends of friends post - do you think there's a chance maybe they're just being supportive of Palestine performatively now that everyone is on their ass about not speaking out sooner? i know you said 'they're on 5sos time' but isnt that kind of just excusing their poor effort up until now? it's taken so long for them to do anything supportive, Palestine's literally almost gone

:,(

love u just wanted to see your perspective!

hey anon! thanks for this lovely ask. i can't guess what's in their heads and i'm hesitant to either 1) assume the worst when there can be a million reasons someone doesn't get to something straight away, and I don't usually think well thought-through activism comes out best when it's immediately reactive, or 2) say that there's no possible way this is the case when we don't have evidence for that either. it could be the case!

however from what I've seen the kinds of things people have been on their asses about recently have been other things--like crushing watermelons or cancelling sierra or crystal or 'where is calum is he okay' or critiquing having any association with all time low or being mean about other things i don't really want to bring up on here. Like I guess that might've been there but I've honestly not seen a lot of it; I've been here for about a year now and the 5sos fandom still baffles me--like I realise it's probably just a small minority who are mean and kinda petty, but honestly I've not seen a heap of organised activism within the fandom and it has disappointed me a little--like yeah from their perspective they might be reading the comments on it and feeling the pressure from those, but honestly it's been so mixed up with stuff i can't imagine they want to read that I'm not sure that's the message the fandom is sending at all. I hope for the fandom's sake I'm wrong and it's just the negativity bias speaking.

I do also want to gently possibly push back on the idea that they haven't done anything supportive until now; yes they didn't involve friends of friends (i'm not sure why) or really outright say it (which I've got more opinions on, a mix of positive and negative in terms of why i think they chose to do it that way) but they did release an entire tour movie on youtube for us for free, and tell us to donate to help (in ashton's words) 'the children in gaza' with links in the caption--it's a more aussie style of activism for sure when it's less putting yourself on a platform (even if you already have it) to speak about something to try and get people to act, and more use the resources you have to make a practical difference, without being demanding of people or stressing them out with urgency. to me that was something that meant more than performative statements, but not everyone in the fandom agrees on that. all i'll say to it is 1) it was out of the blue and felt like they had kinda just discussed it and been like 'yeah we need to' the minute the tour movie was ready 2) it was back in december and 3) i think they underestimated how broke their fans are and also overestimated how many people would see the 'humanitarian aid' links below a video in the christmas break. i've rattled on about it, i'll always defend that particular action but everyone knows that, the decision to focus on the children and the downstream aid rather than the genocide itself was an interesting one (bound to appeal to the skeptics and more practical but in some ways a copout), but i'm also putting it here because it surprises me how many fans genuinely have no idea all of this happened because literally no one talked about it. I don't know if it's because we have an idea as a society how activism should be like or people genuinely don't know how to address more serious topics (again, no one seems to be talking about the friends of friends thing they're kicking off now either). brandy's been sharing information etc on palestine and evidence of the genocide since october, and michael wore that jumper thing that I forget the name of in what might have been cultural solidarity or a coincidence back on october 13th i think. again, it's not the same. brandy isn't actually in 5sos. decide what to make of these things for yourself.

i'll also add that in general from what i've seen, 5sos are usually not super swayed by fan pressure and more likely to get pissed off by it and become more unhinged as a result or turn it into a joke later (like with the soon saga). not to say that they don't feel it, I think they do, but are more determined to not let it take away from their authenticity than be led by it iykwim? having said that this is something i relate to a lot due to my neurodivergence so i could be very biased on this. I could be projecting. so i'm not sure!! i'm not sure what goes on in their heads. i'm not sure why this didn't come sooner, we can probably all agree it should've. but i do also want to say that i know it's not ideal but sometimes doing a good thing for less than pure reasons is still a good thing. it's just the timing that's obviously the pressing factor here, people are dying, and it's kinda insensitive to be talking about how disabling things like executive function and anxiety can be in activism--but this is another topic and aspect of it I think that not mentioning can sometimes cause an excess of blame to be placed on people who are doing good things that aren't good enough to fix what bad people are doing, rather than the bad people themselves. I know it's not that simple, I know there are systemic parts of complicity we can't really wash our hands of that easily but my point is things like neurodivergence and anxiety are by definition disabling and activism is not a sphere they don't touch. and i can't go and list headcanoned diagnoses for a band I listen to but I also can't in good conscience ignore that this could likely be a factor.

overall i feel like this is a mess of a post because i don't really know yet where the line is between holding people accountable (what even is enough in activism?) and letting them process the trauma we're watching unfold and turn that into action at their own pace. but i do want to say thank you so so much for engaging with what's been a topic that I don't think we're talking about enough but i do care about too. and if you've read this far down such a long post thank you as well, i really appreciate it!

[burr-ell]

Honestly, imodna would be a good ship if the shippers/stans weren’t so damn insufferable. I also hate how they act like they are already canon and you can’t ship Imogen or Laudna with anyone else in the group. People got so mad when the conversation in the dust storm happened with Ashton and Laudna because people thought they were flirting. Or when on the first episode of 4 sided dive Marisha asked Robbie if Dorian’s crush was on Imogen, people got so mad at that! I also hate that they call them lesbians when THEY HAVE BOTH EXPRESSED HAVING FEELINGS FOR BOYS! Why can’t they be bi? Or Pan? I also hate how people read into Laura’s micro expressions/ movements, like last episode with the whole leaning shit “oh what was that lean Laura?!! Imogen wanted to kiss Laudna because look at Laura’s lean!” I dread the day that Imogen or Laudna fall in love with someone that’s not each other(especially if that person is a man.) because Marisha and Laura will harassed and hated because they didn’t give the people what they wanted.

oof. that's some frustration you really needed to vent, nonnie, and honestly i get it. full disclosure—my mutuals who are into imo/dna are all lovely, and none of them engage in this behavior. if imo/dna becomes canon, i'll be happy for (and potentially even happy with) fans like that. but enough shippers are doing things like this that it's becoming more and more of a source of frustration and friction as the campaign goes on.

i think a lot of fandom—in general, not just cr—still doesn't want to acknowledge that at the end of the day, they are looking at things like shippers, with a particular kind of confirmation bias. it doesn't make them necessarily wrong or right, but as easy as it can be to get swept up in it, i think it's important to take a step back every once in awhile and re-evaluate.

now admittedly, generally speaking, it takes a lot for me to get really invested in a ship; i usually only have one or two per fandom, even fandoms with tons of characters. i'm generally pretty passive about most ships if it's not the otp; like, vax/leth and pike/lan, for example, didn't need to be romantic endgame for me to enjoy CR1 (and honestly might have been more interesting to me if they hadn't), but perc/ahlia absolutely made the show for me and i honestly think them being together actively strengthens the narrative as a whole.

i say all that to say that for the most part, i very much consider myself to be along for the ride with respect to most relationships in most fandoms. if such-and-such pairing happens, great; if they don't, okay. and with CR in particular, it's such a long-form medium that i know going in that any romance is going to take a while, and most of them probably won't just reach out and grab me.

and as such, it absolutely baffles me to have seen shippers insisting, from the moment the characters first appeared in episode 1, that not only are imogen and laudna canon endgame, they're basically already together and just haven't admitted it yet. i feel this way about dor/ym and callow/moore as well—i saw a post making the rounds that claimed that all three of those ships are "not canon YET but let's be real" and like...why would you set yourself up for disappointment like that? because yeah! all three of those ships could be endgame! but they could also not be endgame. we're less than 40 episodes into a campaign that'll probably run well into the 100s.

i also fully agree with you re: the microexpressions and the cherrypicking, and i feel like a microcosm of this issue can be found in a conversation imogen has with orym early on—shippers latched onto the fact that imogen compares laudna's thoughts to music, something that finally brought her peace after the chaos of the world around her, and completely ignored the part immediately after where imogen says that the rest of the party also feels like that to her. i didn't even know that imogen said that about the whole party until i watched the episode, and to me it's an example of how shippers tend to warp canon interactions to suit a particular narrative in such a way that they become almost entirely divorced from their context.

and from the outside looking in, what confuses me about this sort of thing is like...didn't y'all already go through this? because if my understanding is correct, c2 ship discourse was full to the brim with beau/jes and wido/jest fans dissecting "laura's microexpressions" to prove that jester was for sure in love with our fave, really you guys we swear...and then not only was that not true, but jester also didn't even know about beau or caleb's feelings to acknowledge them at all, and from the actual words that came out of laura's mouth in various OOC moments like on TM, laura just...really really wanted to romance her husband's character in her dnd game and like, that's it. there was never going to be another romantic option for jester as long as fjord was on the table, and that was something that shippers always should have been taking into account.

laudna and imogen are canonically deeply important to each other. they love and appreciate each other very much. that love and appreciation could turn into a lovely romance with a great dynamic, and i certainly don't blame people for being invested in it. but it also could not be romantic endgame, and they remain friends or even get with other people. and as you said, fandom can and will turn nasty about their ships being sunk; we've already seen it happen. there's a certain smug, entitled undercurrent from that particular corner that i have very little patience with, and while i think there's something to be said for deciding to enjoy things in spite of the fandom and just be a cranky old curmudgeon shooing the wank out with a broom, i also understand the response of just "...aight, imma head out".

[feywild-trickster]

Brief thoughts on c3e1 and the new folks........

Overall: Eh, it was okay. CR has a winning formula with their style of actual play, they're almost always a joy to watch onscreen and that was no different last night, but I came away feeling more like I was watching a oneshot or another ep of ExU rather than the new Critical Role campaign proper. Not super into the new cast and very disappointed that literally half the table is reused people we've seen before -- I enjoyed ExU's cast but that was sold as a separate thing and seeing them here is jarring, especially absent the rest of the Crown Keepers. Between reused characters, all the new permanent changes to the format, not even being 100% certain who in this cast is going to stay or later go at this point... It just kinda feels weird :/ But I'm excited for the Marquet setting and it took me a really long time to warm up to the c2 cast too, and it's early days yet. So I'm willing to have my mind changed, and fortunately for me, I'm more a fan of the cast themselves than any particular characters they've played anyhow. Taking a wait and see approach overall.

Imogen: She seems sweet, I love her character design, I'm very partial to purple hair lmao. Other than that I don't find her that interesting so far but Laura is a good RPer so she'll probably be fun to watch. Maybe she'll be able to join Orym in stewarding the group's brain cell lol.

Laudna: Marisha's doing an accent??????? She sounds amazing and I love the performance. Laudna certainly has a lot of intriguing stuff going on, I enjoy a character with mysteries to dig into. She doesn't inspire me fannishly but I'll look forward to finding out what her deal is. I'm ngl I'm super disappointed that all three of our girls this time are really femme though.

Ashton: Kintsugi earth genasi is an absolutely inspired concept that I hope Taliesin patted himself on the back for a lot because he Earned It. That said, aggressive punk with anger/authority issues is a trope I find super super annoying and he's already rubbing me the wrong way constantly :/ I hate that I'm just not into the only human-adjacent nonbinary character on the main cast, it really sucks. It's also driving me crazy how much the colors of his costume intensely do not match his green and purple and gold body even slightly lmao, it's really unpleasant to look at.

FCG: This is now an FCG hate blog, lol not really but holy shit I hate this character so much, Mr. Riegel I'm literally already tired of your joke character after less than 1 episode idk how I'm going to endure a whole campaign of them. Liam why would you do this to us 😩 a lot of people seem to love them a lot so lmao I'm anticipating for me this is going to be a Caduceus situation where my resentment of the character increases due to never being able to get away from posts about him. I don't want any more robots on my fantasy show, if I wanted robots I'd go watch an actual play of a sci-fi tabletop game instead...

Orym: Best boy from ExU returns, which is cool since I super wanted to know more about him in ExU, but wow does it suck they decided to actively make ExU a worse show by not going into half the cast's backgrounds and leaving it literally an incomplete story to accommodate bringing these cast members into c3. If that was the whole purpose of ExU why not just announce that instead of being coy like this??? The way ExU ended left a really bad taste in my mouth and honestly dampened my interest in seeing more of these characters. That said though, my love for Orym at least somewhat remains and Liam is usually the cast member whose character taste matches my own the most, I look forward to seeing where he takes Orym in the future. Also, if our speculation about his OOC origins during ExU turn out correct, cool to have the first gay male character on the main cast.

Dorian: Other best boy from ExU and a surprise appearance by Robbie! All three of the ExU folks I thought meshed with the CR style amazingly and it's fun to get to see him again. Very curious what dirt FCG apparently seems to have on him. And I wonder when we finally get to learn his real name... 👀

Fearne: I overall don't like Ashley's RP, which I know is ironic because I love Yasha so much lmao. But I feel like Fearne is, of everyone Ashley's played on stream, the character that seems to most match with her personal style and comes most naturally to her, it's fun to see her RP with such confidence. She's really good at invoking the fey vibe, both the sweetness and comedy and the undertone of menace. That said, Fearne's general behavior hammers my secondhand embarrassment squick absolutely like crazy lmao and it's going to be rough to have to watch that for an extended period, I find her frequently almost painful to watch tbh. I'm excited that a fey in the main cast means we'll be seeing Feywild stuff though!!! Maybe even my eladrin warlock's old patron Lady Elmenore 👀

Bertrand: Sorry man I didn't care about you in the oneshots and I still don't lmao, too obnoxious for me. It heavily seems like he's here as a guest though -- I just hope this doesn't herald something weird like Travis finishing his appearance and then bowing out of the cast, please bring a second character when you're done being an NPC Travis don't go away :(