#but it is interesting to see original pitches for things that make sense of stuff that's confusing in-game

[suranamellblackwood]

(from amirdrassil's datamine google doc) it's interesting to me that originally cyrian's mask is basically the phylactery of anaris. it makes sense, given that the explanation of it in-game (elven gods used masks like this to control their servants, except it doesn't actually control servants, it just lets them feel their master's emotions, except not all their emotions) does feel very reverse-engineered from "cyrian has a mask that is affecting him but not controlling him."

i do wonder why they changed it... maybe it was decided that it's not lore-compatible? it sounds actually pretty similar to the ancient elven spirit who is trapped in a phylactery in the brecilian ruins in da:o (and can teach the warden the arcane warrior specialization). however, notably that ancient elf is inside a phylactery, meaning it's probably blood magic (and not just an enchantment on an object).

if i really had to guess why they changed it, though, i would assume it's because they wanted anaris to be able to manifest in-person. if he's inside cyrian's mask, then a) we wouldn't get to see anaris walking around, and b) presumably the anaris boss fight would have to be against a possessed cyrian? unless the "ritual" was to create a new physical form for anaris, and not just to turn a bunch of veil jumpers into demons. maybe out of lyrium, since we discover in this game that's how the first elves created physical bodies for themselves? it would certainly have been a way to meld bellara's fixation on the fate of the titans with her personal quest.

[gingermintpepper]

Fate-Master I

I did say I would post more wips of my Zeus and Apollo writing so here's a bit from a series I've been writing concerning a young Apollo grappling with being the up and coming Moiragetes - Master of the Fates.

Do let me know if there's any interest for this sort of thing; I didn't originally intend to post this stuff anywhere, but I've just been so frustrated that I feel like it's necessary now 😂

Apollo marks time by etching notches into a clay tablet. He watches from the edge of the mountain’s summit, six of his crows perched three-by-three atop his shoulders and the seventh casting her gaze down onto the maidens all gathered to pick their flowers. He watches them laugh and joke and throw their petals all about, free and fragrant with an easy camaraderie spread thick between them all. He carves his first notch when Persephone lays eyes on the innocent narcissus; in his visions he could never make sense of time’s passing - he did not know how long she would remain swallowed, merely that it would be long enough for her to be missed, searched for, grieved and avenged.

 It will be worth it all in the end.  

Soon, all the world will delight in the birth of new Seasons, a new system of time to mark the stabilisation of this new era.  

He averts his eyes when the earth crumbles beneath Persephone’s feet. There is no way for him to deny it if he truly does bear witness to the act. Apollo cannot see the pitch-black rider on his earth-dark horses as he grabs the maiden. He cannot see those immortal steeds galloping down, down, infinitely down beneath the earth so their rider may delight in his prize. He does not know the sound of her screams as the ground eats her alive. Only the narcissus remains when he once more casts his gaze down, white and untouched. Innocent. Like Apollo. Neither of them have seen a single thing. 

(But oh, her screams are loud in his ear. Big, reedy yells, wet with phlegm. A fawn crying for her mother, the tittering of a sparrowling swallowed foot-first by the viper. They never seemed this loud in his dreams, like footnotes easily overlooked at the very bottom of the page. Apollo does not see her go, but he hears her. He hopes he is the only one who hears.) 

He calls for his darling crow to return to him, stepping light into the halls of Olympus. His day will continue on as normal but to visit his mother so he can request a particularly thick himation for the coming days. Lemnos clicks next to his ear and Apollo huffs, dismissing his crows in a scatter of bright white feathers and glittering metal. They will watch what he cannot. They will make sure the maiden remains buried deep beneath the earth. 

The subtle cold emanating from his father’s quarters curls about his calves - he did not realise he had already travelled the length of the halls. He does not knock before he enters; the women are all busy this time of day and shrewd Athena is still out dancing with his sister, it will just be Father in his room, bent over his table or pouring over one of his maps. 

“It is done.” 

And Father looks up from his writing, a knowing glint shining in wine-dark eyes. His face remains frightfully still, marble stiff and focused on Apollo with the full weight of his eagle sharp intent. “You did not see it?” 

Her scream is the same as the highest note on the aeolian scale. A wonderfully piercing ‘A’. It is similar to the sound that resonates in the sky’s centre, Apollo cannot stop hearing it in his ear. “I did not.” 

Father smiles then, like sunlight peeking through the rough edges of the storm, “Good. That’s good.” He puts his hand to his face, scratches his chin as he hums contemplative. “How much time do we have before… well, before.” 

Demeter’s wailing will be a much darker sound, phrygian and guttural, discordant. Apollo’s had the score written for months now. He thinks he will hang Persephone’s cry next to it. Maybe he will incorporate their melodies into the song he will play at her return. Maybe it is cruel of him to already be thinking such things. “I know not. Time has never been the clearest to me, even in my most vivid of visions.” 

“It is no matter,” Father leans forward, digs a bolt of bright red fabric out of his drawer. “Here,” When he catches it, Apollo feels a denseness in the fibres he has never known. They’re slick yet springy, far coarser than sheep’s wool but unlike any goatskin or leather he has ever handled. “For the cloak you will ask of your mother.”   

He is slowly becoming accustomed to his thoughts not being his own, to his father living so closely in his head. The woven string connecting them still bleeds dye if either of them pull too hard on the connection, but in these quiet moments, it is a comfort. A lifeline. 

“Chimera skin, so it will not burn when you wear it for your work.” Would Father be this calm if it was Artemis swallowed by the earth? Would Apollo? That watery scream is a persistent ringing, she is still screaming far beneath where none but the rider can hear her. (Apollo hears her. Even now, he can hear the heavy breath of the dark stallions, the ripping winds that sting at her ears. Persephone is a friend, can he really leave her to this fate -?) “Phoebus.” 

Father’s broad palm is warm on his shoulder. It pulls him gently from his spiralling thoughts. The heat is unexpected; even now, Apollo can feel his toes going stiff from the room’s chill. 

“I am well,” he hears himself say, distant like the clanging stallion hooves which carry the rider’s prize deeper beneath the earth. Father does not let him go when he tries to escape. He does not tighten his hold either. His hand merely remains on Apollo’s slim shoulder, a point to anchor him here and not there. Apollo focuses on the faint hum of his father’s power, the gentle whistle of his cloud-hairs as they flow about his head, the muffled shuffling of his crows’ feathers as they settle in the gables to await his return. He no longer hears her. Not her, not the dread chariot. He cannot hear a single thing. “I am well.” 

[decepti-thots]

for the headcanon ask: cassettes and boomboxes as family relations, and/or fanon mechpreg mechanic of your choice?

Pass on the mechpreg one.

Cassette/boombox headcanon: this is really dependent on continuity, actually! For something like cartoon G1 where you have these very humanlike dynamics going on for a lot of the cast and it's lighthearted, solid 🙂, I think it's very fun (albeit I would rather it not be taken too literally). I enjoy Rumble and Frenzy as Soundwave's shitty adult "sons" causing havoc a lot. That's great. Other continuities I'm a lot more neutral on it because it just doesn't fit so well- it makes like, zero sense in IDW1, for example, that's just people transplanting stuff to a setting that has zero accomodation for it at the expense of more interesting character dynamics. Or in Aligned stuff, where you certainly have some kind of implied symbiotic thing going on, but there's not really the right tone to try and pitch that as some loose "parent" or even "caretaker" vibe. But in G1 goofier stuff it's very enjoyable to me.

Mildly related tangent: the term 'carrier' for this cassette-tapedeck dynamic is often thought to be like trine, i.e. it has no canon usage and is pure fanon despite being so overwhelmingly widespread in certain circles people assume otherwise. But I recently realised that in fact, I know of one possible canon usage of a term like that, but I need to find out if the term is actually comparable in the original Japanese. The commonly used English translation for Glit's bio says:

"He does periodic check-ups on the internal functions of his carrier…" (Relating to Glit being a tape head cleaner!)

But I need to get someone who reads Japanese to take a look and see if this is actually a fair 1:1 translation, or if e.g. it's possible the fan translating this picked a pre-existing fanon term out of personal bias despite it not being the actual word. IDK. It would be interesting to know if this is a "very technically obscure canon" moment like seeker was.

[cursed-spectre]

Let's Make a Real Introduction Post

Hey there. I'm cursed-spectre, but you can call me Cursed for short. I'm a girl, and use she/her, though they/them doesn't bother me. I'm also cool with having things like dude, man, and bro be used as gender-neutral.

I'd say my biggest interests right now are gaming, Murder Drones (Who would've guessed), and 3D modelling. I also have been really enjoying roleplaying as well as a bit of writing as of late.

I'm a big fan of the RWBY fangame, JPDE - Sonata of Fire as well as the Devil May Cry franchise. I'm a huge fan of horror too.

This has turned into a roleplay blog now, because I have been having too much fun and gradually shifted to that direction. That said, comments on posts will still be me talking, and not an OC. Speaking of OCs...

SPECTRE

Spectre's the main OC used for this blog, and will use the basic font color.

While the image I used at the start is the form she commonly takes, Spectre's "true form" is essentially a black cloud. She is able to morph said form to take various others, but she remains pitch black with the exception of certain areas that glow white.

Some of her more common forms include the human one shown above, the same human form but with 4 reptilian wings and a reptilian tail coming out of her back, and a form mimicking the drones from Murder Drones.

External objects that aren't linked in any way to her can be interacted with, and won't become black, but they will not go along with her when she does something like entering a shadow. Perhaps there's a way to change that.

Oh yeah, she can enter shadows and move along them, so that's neat. Real Slasher villain energy. Well, if the slasher villain was a small girl in a trench coat and scarf.

Due to her strange nature, Spectre is unable to truly die. No matter the damage, she will eventually recover her form. She does still feel pain, however, and it hurts like a bitch. Please do not stab her for no reason.

Another quick tidbit. Whenever I say that Spectre makes "distorted noise" I mean something like this.

Ai

Ai is one of the two drones in this blog. She uses she/her and speaks in green text.

Cassidy

Cassidy is the other drone you'll see. She uses she/they, and will speak in red text.

Finally, have a bit of origin lore for Spectre.

General Stuff to Know

I am over 18, but that does not mean everything is fine. That said, I can't really list anything, so just use some common sense. If you're unsure about something, feel free to ask. If I deem something as not fine for me, I'll give a gentle notice.

Posts for me talking with use some variation with "cursed"

Posts featuring Spectre will have the #spectre answers tag.

Posts featuring Ai will have the #ai answers tag.

Posts featuring Cassidy will have the #cassidy answers tag.

Posts featuring art of Spectre will have the #spectre gallery tag.

Posts featuring stand-alone stories of Spectre will have the #tales of a spectre tag.

That's all for now.

[c3rnunnos]

Watched Transformers One yesterday with some friends. Had a really good time. Thoughts under the cut WITH SPOILERS. There are a ton of those in here. Please don't click the read more if you haven't watched the movie. I will not be held responsible if you click and then get mad.

Initial thoughts and some disclaimers

First of all, I watched it in Italian cause that's what I speak and that's the only language that was available in the cinema, and I have something to say about the voices. Elita's voice was pretty much perfect for her, a good match for the original, and the va was a big part of why I ended up liking her a lot. Bee's voice was very high and pitchy, but it made sense with how he moved and interacted with the world, and honestly I also tend to go really high pitched when talking about something enthusiastically so it was nice. Orion's voice was pretty good, not as deep as I was expecting it to be, but it fit rather well with the rest of the voice cast. D-16's voice... It was alright. It fit rather well in the first part of the movie, but when we got to the violent revolution part, ah... There wasn't enough of a shift to make me think "ah, yes, this is Megatron". He sounded like a guy being mad he was stuck in traffic. Though, there were certain scenes where the VA gave a brilliant performance.

Second thing, I watched it with a couple of friends, one of which only knows Transformers from my unhinged rants and one who came along to watch a movie he had no knowledge of high, and it was a fantastic experience. Friend A gave me some comments after the movie about Sentinel that I couldn't help but agree with, and Friend B locked in when watching the Iacon infrastructure and mining environments (as he is quite good at planning infrastructures, and was going insane over how weird it was). Bringing both of them with me was great, especially for certain specific scenes I'll get into later. I watched the movie while also watching for their reactions, and it was a very good time to see people I loved have fun like me - but as my attention was a bit split, I might be misremembering stuff.

Actual thoughts on the movie itself

Alright, so.

The entire thing with a working class that had their t-cogs removed was insanely interesting in my opinion. The fact that the propaganda and grueling work hours kept the masses low and entertained while bots with cogs enjoyed their races and lives was interesting. It felt like a facet of Functionism came through with that - and while the bots who could transform were (I believe) free to do whatever, the cogless were stuck working as part of a production machine for Sentinel. I loved seeing how the panem et circense wasn't enough for all of them - how Orion yet thirsted for knowledge and for a life he could live away from the mines.

Which, I enjoyed how D-16 was the one that acted as a buffer for Orion's bullshit (and I say this lovingly, I adored Orion in the movie), and how he was so... Complacent in the abuse he was undergoing. He loved Sentinel as a symbol, he was glad for his job, he didn't want to see that a society that treats people as objects to discard maybe wasn't good. He had a place to sleep, he had fuel, and he had Orion, and that was enough. Maybe that's why his speech hit different, when he got to the breaking point.

Thoughts on Orion later cause they tie into different stuff.

Elita was also very real - someone who desperately is trying to claw her way out of a horrible situation through hard work and discipline, who doesn't want to take any chances lest she falls down back into the pit she crawled out of. I liked how she was decisive and how she used her knowledge of train routes to do 9/11 on Sentinel's office. Go girl. Also I am weak for two wheelers and she was so fucking cool when she fought and transformed.

B-127. Ohhh Bee. He is my favorite ever, I have three figures of him plus the lego Bumblebee, and I love him dearly. I didn't know what to think of him when I saw the trailer, but then I saw the state he had been living in and yea, the isolation would drive someone insane to that point. I liked how he was ride or die for people he had just met. He was so lonely and needed to talk so much after forever spent in unknown levels. His excitement over being able to transform and simply help was amazing. He has knife hands! Good for him! A bit insane but good for him!

Also, as mentioned before, since I watched it in a different language everything had to be adapted, including the important speeches and the jokes. Unfortunately, there was no cool "DECEPTICONS RISE UP", and there was no cool "TRANSFORM AND ROLL OUT", but there was Bee exclaiming "Nice! I get to be a government employee!" which was fantastic to hear in Italian, especially with the view we tend to have of government employees. Overall, the jokes had to be rewritten or adapted carefully, but they still made me chortle more than a few times. A few even got my friends, which was great.

Now... Speaking a bit of the plot and environments... For they are tied by the narration.

The environments were... Insane??? Holy fucking shit? Cybertron was teeming with life, it was shifting and alive and colorful. The colors were bright and saturated, felt like a fever dream. The surface was a wide expanse of possibilities, the auroras were delicate dashes of color in the sunset, the rock surfaces transformed like Primus himself was quietly stirring. Cybertron is techno-organic in the way that you would define a rusted over and overgrown metal building techno-organic, and I would bet good money that the organic components of the surface were brought in by the Quintesson occupation.

Which, the Quintessons. Disgusting critters. Insects with hard carapaces, laser guns, and enough of a population to be a swarm. Their ships are the definition of megalophobia. Their relentless search for cybernetic lifeforms to shatter and take was terrifying. The moment they first appeared, the genre shifted to survival horror. And then, we learn why they're still here, through Alpha Trion's powers.

Sentinel. Sentinel Sentinel Sentinel. He's horrible. I need him carnally. He was a fake through and through, and yet he compelled me. Its difficult to find villains that are villains cause they suck nowadays, they always have to have a sad backstory. Sentinel was simply... Ambitious. Ambitious to the point of it being detrimental to himself, in the long run, and whole he created an incredible ruse and fooled an entire society for millenia, that ambition still got him killed in the end. Seeing the scene of his betrayal in the cave with Alpha Trion was amazing - watching him beg for more time with the Quintessons, hating them despite knowing he has dug his own grave was compelling. Seeing him crawl away from Megatron at the end was incredible. Seeing him die changed my brain chemistry (and look! His frame greyed out in the end! What a detail!). (Also, nice callback to Jazz's death in Transfomers 2007.)

And, D-16. Megatron. It was quite a tonal shift, to watch him rave about wanting to kill Sentinel to Orion, Elita and Bee in the cave. There was no music, only a droning sound. You could feel the rage in his words. You could see that he would go through with it, even if he had to destroy himself in the process. His shift from a cowering kissass to a mech with nothing to lose but his chains was a delight spiral into villainy. He took to the Elite Guard's way of the strong like a fish to water. He got a taste of power, and then he let himself be drowned in it - despite the efforts Orion put in trying to stay with him, trying to help.

And here we also go with the Orion thoughts. Orion himself was a favorite. He went from a bit annoying but fun and capable, someone who wanted desperately to be able to live a life that was more than the mines, that wanted his friends to be considered more than meets the eye, to someone who was almost desperately trying to keep D-16 together as everything they had worked towards spiraled out of control. The way he got more quiet (somber) and desperate as the movie went on was very, very good. Yes, he was big and bright and bold. Yes, he went back to the mines to get the help of his friends. Yes, he didn't want Dee to kill Sentinel because he didn't want him to fall to that level. Yes, I think Sentinel should've died too, but... Orion was trying to expose the mech. Public opinion would've scalped him anyways, after the stunt they managed to pull. And Megatron committed a crime a passion under the guise of revolution. He strayed from the path of revolution the moment he shot through Orion. Gosh.

When Megatron shot Orion, my god. I was jittery with excitement. My friends were horrified and stuck staring at the screen. And then, "I'm not saving you anymore", and letting him go, and just. Gosh. The betrayal was expected. It still hurt.

The fall into the center of Cybertron, the way that Megatron ended up killing Sentinel, the Matrix choosing and rebuilding Optimus, Megatron rallying the people to destroy. Optimus' return. Their fight. The banishment. This was such a bad breakup for them. God.

A couple of things I wish would've been different

I wish the runtime for the later part of the movie was longer. I would've loved for the Elite Guard (the soon to be Decepticons, really) to have had more of a role in the movie. I love Shockwave dearly, and Soundwave was quite cool, but I wish they had a more relevant part in D-16's fall towards being Megatron.

Starscream, gosh. Always trying to rule, isn't he? Bet he didn't expect a miner to be able to beat his ass. Bet he didn't expect to have his vocalizer crushed into malfunctioning. And yet, I wish he had a more relevant role. I wish we got to know the disgraced members of the Elite Guard.

I wish we got to know the miners, the Autobots, the poor unknowing slaves that Orion wanted more for. I wish Jazz got to stab someone. I am weak to murder psy op fiend Jazz.

Jazz was cute! He was really cute. I liked how he flicked his wings at the end. He was... also voiced by a youtuber I used to watch when I was 13 and that immediately made me want to commit a crime! Like I love that guy but that was NOT the voice to give the Jazzmech. They whitewashed my mans (joke)

Also, severe lack of every Autobot and Decepticon outside of group shots. But that's ok cause this is a movie that doesn't reach 2 hours and not a full series. But gosh what I wouldn't give for a full animated series in this setting.

And that's a wrap!

I've spat all my thoughts on here. Might add more later. My brain is fused. I hope I didn't make many grammar mistakes and typos. Have a good day.

[the-sky-queen]

Introducing! Prince Udando of Tharos!

Character Notes:

14 years old.

Crown Prince of Tharos, a planet dominated by rules, traditions, and symbolic meaning. Udando finds all of it suffocating and wants nothing more than to escape.

His mother, Queen Erikonia, is unyielding and cruel. She constantly pushes Udando to be the best and punishes him when falls short. Udando's late father was similarly critical, constantly disappointed in his son and only interested in people that could be of use to him.

Udando is snarky and rebellious, but he knows there's only so far he can push before he puts his life in his mother's uncaring hands. He stays within the most important boundaries even though it makes his skin crawl.

Despite his distaste for Tharos' very nature, it's all Udando knows. When confronted by objects or gestures with no specific special meaning, he has difficulty wrapping his head around the concept.

Tends to be rude and dismissive. He also struggles with social cues since he wasn't raised around normal people. (Boy has a bad habit of invading people's personal space. XD)

More than anything, he just wants to be a normal kid.

He's a bookworm and loves to research whatever catches his interest into oblivion.

Design + Other Notes:

Udando was honestly very difficult to design! I have this brainstorm paper I've been chipping away at for like a year, but I always struggled to get it to feel right. When doing this iteration of Udando's design, I honestly threw out quite a bit of what I'd initially brainstormed. Stuff like his head shape, the fact that he had ears, the shape of his feet, and him having a cape instead of the scarf he has here.

I've always known that Udando was going to have pitch black eyes. I thought it would be a fun contrast because, fun fact! Tharos is absolutely covered in bioluminescent, glowing plants. I also thought the black eyes would be good for making Udando somewhat mysterious since you can't tell where exactly he's looking. But back on the topic of Tharos' plant life, I realized it would make total sense for Udando and the rest of the Tharians to be very bright and neon in coloring, since way back in the past, those with colors matching the environment would have a better chance at surviving in what I'm thinking was a very hostile landscape.

I debated giving Udando those dragonfly wings, but ultimately decided to let him have them. They made a lot of sense because the eyes and antennae were already giving insect vibes. And speaking of the antennae! Udando can use them to detect vibrations and sense changes in the atmosphere.

Tharos is absolutely riddled with objects of symbolic importance, so I made sure to give Udando a few accessories as part of his royal getup. The crown, the wrist gauntlets, and the ankle rings all have special royal importance. I think the scarf was given to Udando by his dad shortly before he died, so even though they weren't on good terms, the thing has meaning to Udando and he refuses to get rid of it. Erikonia probably wouldn't let him throw it out anyway. As for the necklace . . . that's where things get tricky.

You see, Udando originates from this unposted AU of mine called The Black Prince. There, as part of Tharian tradition, Shadow gave Udando that necklace as a symbol of friendship between the Tharians and the Black Arms. (Shadow has a similar necklace in the AU that identifies him as the crown prince of the Black Arms.) Here's where the problem comes in. I kinda REALLY want to put Udando into my Sonic-verse, but that necklace and his relationship with Shadow is kinda VITAL to his character development. And without the context of The Black Prince, I'm not sure how Udando would meet Shadow and get that necklace. I'll keep working at it. I've got a few vague ideas right now, so we'll see how they go.

But for now, yeah! That's Udando! I love him so much and I hope you all do to!

[absolutely-normal-about-x]

Okay so yall really like mah X and Sticks post so I have a pitch idea for a hypothetical Rewrite of Worlds Unite. Just a rough concept lmao

Basically Fiona and Cake but with more action and stakes (Maybe a bit cartoony-)

The premise is…a semi multiverse travel story following X and Sticks as they travel across the multiverse to find a way to return to their respective homes soon they discover that there's more going on that they thought now they must stop the Villains plans!! Will they work together to save the multiverse or let everything they know and love fall apart right in front of their eyes?

The Sonic and Megaman stuff would still happen of course but with the removal of the Archie characters (sorry yall). Instead taking place in their comics it be just like worlds collide in their own games. So unite takes place post Sonic frontiers and megaman 11. So both Sonic and Megaman kinda remember eachother so that’s neat! Plus it makes the sequel thing more believable in a way.

Since I’m cutting off some of the Archie characters stuff it allows the X and Boom characters (I will not forgive Xander being the one that ended sigma cause come one X deserves to take out sigma not him-) to shine a bit more that also leads into another fun spin to include….Lyric!

Since Lyric is kinda there for the Sonic boom games I thought it could be the best way to introduce him as one of the main baddies along with dear old Sigma ba- . So Eggman and Wily are terrified of both of them! Fun times :3

(Also I can see Bass, Treble, Sage and Metal Sonic trying to rescue them from their claws, but it’s not gonna be easy and might have to reluctantly join up the heroes)

Plus we can have fun interactions between the X and Boom characters working together to get their friends back and then running into Sonic and megaman’s pals along the way. We been ROBBED OF THE BOOM AND SONIC CAST MEETING EACHOTHER OKAY!?

So yeah X and Sticks having adventures across the Sega Capcom worlds helping folks out, learning about the unity engines, unraveling the Villains schemes along the way!! It would make the whole recruitment montage make sense since the worlds that the heroes go through are the ones that X and sticks helped out so they would be familiar with the genesis portals. Plus it can be a pay off (Or not it depends haha)

An idea would be that the events of World’s collide actually have consequences of the use of the Genesis wave that affected other worlds (X and Boom worlds maybe more). That created more Genesis portals, that’s how Sigma and Lyric find out and team up (Capturing Eggman and Wily) but also how X and Sticks got tangled up in this mess, it would be accidental of course they have absolutely no idea what the hell is going on. Knowing Sticks she might put together what’s really going on (It’s sticks come on) and then X would understandably be confused, serious and just wants to go home but at same time is determined to help sticks and the others before the grand reveal of who’s behind this mess.

Plus I would absolutely Kill to see X having an existential crisis whenever or not he’s gonna harm humans cause it would be interesting and hilarious. But also him properly meeting the light family leaving all sorts of angst and drama (Zero is trying to hold himself together to not Murk wily right now)

Also Golden Armor X (Or an original armor design for it) fighting alongside Sonic and megaman by using the Chaos Crystals. That’s be be so much fun to add.

Of course it’s incredibly ambitious but it does set up things to make things more smoother (if any y’all have more ideas aldjslsj)

[reimenaashelyee]

how did you get your comics seen? it's one thing to make them and a whole other thing to get people to lay eyes on them and read them and I have no idea how to do the second part

I think you'll have to at least make friends with some of your peer group (artists who are at the same stage in their career as you) so you can both share your audiences and if nothing else, have each other as readers. If you're really new, it's kinda a fact that your work will be tiny for a few years: there's a lot of stuff online.

I am not a spring chicken anymore so all my current advice for promotion wouldn't apply as the majority of it required years of presence and establishment with the comics industry... now that my peer group has matured and become successful creators (I know that my peers are casually aware of what I put out, they may or may not read it or even comment). Additionally, my way of promoting is as avoidant of playing the algorithm and virality and tailoring to the most amount of possible audience. If you want the opposite of that, you can ask @secondlina - who has done a lot of experimentation with social media and gaming the internet attention economy.

I'm not all that interest in gaming anything: I only want to serve the audience I have and always had - thoughtful, chill readers who are ok with slow reading, in the sense they don't ask me for constant content since they get what my vibe is. They are here for my lush visuals, original material and approach to topics/characters. It's this audience, and the academics + people who tend to be older and are equivalent/less levels of "online" to me. I personally find that gaming for views on purpose steals time and energy away, since a lot of the tactics tend to ask you to behave or post or draw a certain way that might feel unnatural with no guarantee whether the effort is worth it. For example, making memes of your characters, doing funny reels with music. If you are cool with doing all that though, again, @secondlina is your expert. I can see why those tactics are popular: that's how Big Tech dictates you get access to their "discovery" algorithm.

For me, in the early days what got new eyes onto my narrative work was making one-off illustrations (not necessarily of the comic - just some original character concepts) that somehow got popular. This was during the peak eras of Twitter and Tumblr though. The other thing was mostly talking about my comics: I document so much of my process. People love this apparently. It's the only guaranteed way for myself that gets people hype and aware of the comic's existence - though this might partly be caused by the aforementioned audience I always had. It's very low effort cos I mostly post screenshots of WIPs or developmental sketches and include a comment.

But like, with webcomics, I always operated on the assumption that people don't read my work. I am just here vibing. If there are readers (and I know who you are because of comments made across social media / my websites over the years) I appreciate them, but I don't want to ask much of them either. I put out the work I like, and whoever comes across it and likes it can stay, maybe comment, maybe get the print edition.

Yeah, this is not such a satisfactory answer for marketing if you're not subscribed to my brand of being an online artist: which is slow-growth, sustained working. My established methods now are: talking about my work, documenting it, connecting with peer group + older generations of professionals (established critics, journalists, editors), running a newsletter, going on interviews/podcasts, submitting my art to whatever I think would help promote it - pitch to Shortbox Fair, apply to Knife Beetle or the Cartoonist Cooperative, join a Discord.

And advanced methods, like applying for artist residencies.

In the end I cannot emphasise enough to get to know your peers who are at the same level of career as you are. Find creators who started at the same time you did and read their work (your choice); talk to them directly if the style/vibe matches. This is long-term mutual commitment - you won't see the effects until years later when you each find success in the paths you chose. And just to give you an idea of who my original peer group is - choo, Ariel Ries, Kay O'Neill, Bree Paulsen, Toril/Eden Orlensky, Kaeti V, Kevin Jay Stanton, Victoria Grace Elliot, Britt Sabo - we were all obscure mutuals/friends at more or less the same time. Then we each found our own way. Over time the circle grew to include other peer groups - ones that started slightly earlier or later, and new contacts of the same level. And that's how one gets established. As this is happening you will get eyes to your work naturally.

[not-poignant]

hi pía, this isn’t really a question but i was thinking of a post i saw from you the other day, in reference to hannibal and will fics. I am a HUGE lover of their ship and the fics that come with but i’m also a massive lover of yours and was thinking about how similar but different they are. maybe i’m psychoanalysing this buts it’s really been on my mind how someone could write fics like yours but not find the dynamic of hannibal and will interesting. there’s definitely a lot of different reasons but i think it mostly boils down to this:

hannibal tends to cause will a lot of pain in an attempt to monopolise him. he only loves will because he sees him as an extent of himself, like an arm or a leg if u will, a true narcissist.

where’s as they dynamics in most of your books, original or fanfic, whether they start out with someone in pain theirs usually a sort of arc where the character heals and growsi think the closest would be mosk and im so sorry i forgot the other mcs name :( basically a lot of comfort after the hurt

i dunno i just thinks it’s a really interesting difference

Hi anon!

This is cool reasoning, and that is a part of it, but I'd like to add probably one of the most important things here - people just have opinions about things, and they don't always have to make sense.

I really can't stand the Steve/Bucky ship. It's squicked me from the beginning. I couldn't tell you why, it literally does have many of the things I love in a ship - someone with a trauma background, two people who are often trying to do better, crunchy consent issues, and more.

Can't stand it. As a multishipper I literally cannot read this ship. (Sorry folks, it's a great ship, I respect y'all who love it and I'm glad you have a lot of fic for it).

Not everything has a logical reason, because we're lumps of meat and we just make arbitrary decisions sometimes (or our body does).

(This is actually why people looking for moral reasons to hate or love a ship is kind of stupid, but that's a whole other issue).

So yeah, I mean if I wanted to, I could write a hurt/comfort Will and Hannibal fic with growth. There's literally thousands doing that in AU format where Hannibal was never a cannibal in the first place! I've even bookmarked a few of those. I could write a Hannibal who isn't horrendously physically and emotionally abusive to Will!

Like, all the things about the canon characters is true, anon, but we change things all the time in fanfiction and that's the fun of it. One of my favourite ships ever is Severus/Harry, but I don't think anyone would say that they have a particularly growth/positive connection to each other in canon (not while Snape is alive, anyway).

In Rise of the Guardians, Pitch is basically a theatrical monster who literally loves making children cry, and tries to kill Jack repeatedly. There's zero growth and eventually he's defeated.

It's one of my favourite ships of all time.

We just make choices, anon. The reasons I don't love Will/Hannibal are definitely in your above ask, but they're also just in the fact that I'm a lump of meat with electrons firing randomly who just makes choices and has random opinions about stuff!

That's why how I feel about a ship has no bearing on how anyone else feels about it, and vice versa! :D (I really truly mean it when I'm glad other people enjoy these ships, because them enjoying it says nothing about them, and nothing about me, because shipping is personal, weird, and often not at all logical. For every logical 'oh yeah that's true' I can think of a pairing where it's like 'oh but that do that and I love that ship.' Brains are just...really really really weird. :)

[alpaca-clouds]

Castlevania Season 4

Currently seeing a lot of people watching Castlevania for the first time and being as confused as everyone else once was about season 4 and certain story developments.

Spoilers - Obviously.

The story decisions in question basically show up in all the storylines:

Why is Alucard just okay with everything about having talked to Greta for approximately two hours?

What the fuck is the deal with the entire Targoviste storyline, that kinda goes nowhere?

Why are Hector and Lenore just fine after everything that she did in the end of season 3?

Why was St. Germain so easily corrupted? (And why does his love interest not even get a name or voice lines?)

Why does Carmilla so suddenly go off the deep end?

Why don't the four storylines never meet up, ending the story without the main characters (that is the group of Hector and Isaac, vs the trio) ever meeting?

Why is Varney?

And I mean, we are never going to fully know. But chances are good, that Warren Ellis had thought he would get five seasons to tell his story - instead of only four. Now, we never got confirmation for that, but there are a lot of points speaking for it - most notably just that the last season feels rushed af.

Now, a big question is, why it got then cut down into four seasons. There is a lot of speculation. For once there is of course all the shit coming out about Warren Ellis at the time. So maybe Netflix wanted to cut him off, before all of that came out. There is also the fact, that season 4 went into production in 2020 and we all know what happened in 2020. So chances are, that the show might well have been impacted by the pandemic. There is also the fact, that Ellis was allegedly in general hard to work with for some people. Another fact. And, lastly, it might just have been a Netflix thing, even though we are getting Nocturne. (You know... *cries in Inside Job and DeadEnd*)

There is also the fact, that a lot of folks harrassed Netflix and the creators about everything season 3. Especially the Alucard scene and what happened to Hector. And if we look at Rise of Skywalker, we know it would not have been the first and only time that fans harassing a studio got them to backpaddle on story decisions.

But I think a lot of writing decisions for the most part can be explained with simple Story Economy under the idea that Ellis had if not calculated for five seasons, then at least for more episodes in that last season.

I have often heard people talk about "But why are Alucard, Trevor and Sypha even there?", because it is very clear that for the most parts season 3 and 4 are very much the story of Hector, Isaac and the Styria sisters. With everything else kinda feeling more like an obligation. (Even though, unpopular opinion: I do like both the Alucard and the Lindenfeld storylines in season 3.) And this is very noticable in season 4 of course. The entire Varney thing comes out of nowhere. St. Germain's Face-Heel-Turn comes out of nowhere. Death comes out of nowhere.

The simple answer is, of course, that the main trio is the main trio and it would probably not have been within the contract with Netflix or Konami or whoever to write them out. Not to mention that, yes, Alucard is probably half the reason some viewers are there. Hence, they needed a storyline.

Now, again, I am mostly just speculating. But I do assume that at some point the plan has been to pitch Carmilla against the main characters. It would not have been surprising to me, if the original plan was to have her slowly go off the deep end in season 4, have her make a deal with Death and maybe give her a redemption arc in season 5 (because she feels like a too well developed character for the development in season 4 being the original plan).

But given the "end it with season 4" and "main trio has to do stuff, because main trio" requirements that had probably have to be met, a lot of decisions make sense.

Why does Alucard get over his trauma within hours of meeting Greta? Well, because there was no time for him to have a proper recovery arc, before he had to be there for a finale to happen. Maybe, too, because of the harassment and some fans not wanting to see Alucard in a position of weakness.

What is the deal with Targoviste? Mostly just to give Trevor and Sypha something to do, before they could join for the finale. Also to introduce Varney.

Why is Varney? Because there was no character, who would believably get into "making a deal with Death" within just one season. Hence he was just a tool to bring Death into the plot. (Which kinda makes sense, given Death is a main antagonist in several of the games.)

Why are Hector and Lenore just fine? Because here, too, there was no time for a proper recovery arc. Also, maybe, because a lot of people got angry, too, about Hector being put into the position of weakness. So it was just swept aside.

Why does Carmilla go off the deep end so quickly? Because there was no time for a proper corruption arc either. But she needed to be the bad guy for that storyline, because otherwise there would not have been a proper finale for the entire Styria storyline, as it was unable to reconnect to the Wallachia storyline.

And why is St. Germain so easily corrupted? I would assume because some executive decision had been made that he had to be put into the season.

The thing is really, that if you just look at it logically, the plot points kinda make sense - but because they are so rushed, they do not feel right. And of course this does kinda ruin a lot of it, because the ending is what matters a lot in stories.

Now, personally, I am mostly fine with where all the arcs end. I personally am fine with the ending of building a village around the castle. I am fine with Isaac taking over Styria. I am fine with Dracula and Lisa coming back from the dead. And yes, I am fine with Lenore dying. But it does feel rushed and I do not like how the plot gets there.

Most of all, I wished that there was a bit more emotional fallout from season 3. I definitely do not like how Alucard is just suddenly fine - or how Hector and Lenore are suddenly fine. It does feel emotionally... unfullfilling. *sighs*

But nothing to do about it now.

What I am getting at with this ramble: I do not think that Ellis (who is a horrible human being, but also a pretty good writer) has suddenly forgotten how to write stuff. I mostly just think that there was a lot of Drama going on behind the scenes. Partly because Ellis is a bad human, but also because of pandemic being pandemic.

[noellevanious]

Hey so I  just finished TAZ: Amnesty, and I have a lot to say about it!

to summarize: I really liked Amnesty, actually! If I were to rate both Balance and Amnesty on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being perfect, Balance would be 8, and Amnesty would be 9. Also, spoilers (of course!) 

The Story - The Bureau of Balance vs. Amnesty Lodge and Sylvane 

So the biggest reason I like Amnesty more than I liked Balance: the story, IMO is just way better and more interesting.  

The pilot/pitch episode right after TAZ ended gave the series a serious Gravity Falls vibe (especially from that first season where it was episodic Monster stuff, it was almost exactly like “The McElroys Do Gravity Falls”), but there were definitely interesting tidbits (Duck’s entire character was excellent – more on that later), and as it went on and the world(s) were fleshed out, I think Griffin hit a really nice balance of ideas that were clearly based around existing concepts but with his own, interesting spin on everything. 

Obviously, this point is imbalanced (pun intended) for Balance – A goofy DND 5E session with a pre-made campaign, turning into arguably the most popular Actual Play fiction podcast in recent history, vs. 5 years later when the creators set out to intentionally make a story-rich plot-driven epic – but I still feel it’s a valid point. I’m not relistening to Balance any time soon, if ever, because I just was not interested in the plot at all.  

I like Taako, and I like the goofiness that occurs in TAZ, especially in the one-shots, but I just never got on-board with the story. It’s almost definitely personal preference, though, so if you enjoyed Balance’s story, I’m glad! But it just wasn’t interesting. The contrast of Justin/Travis/Clint doing their own thing and constantly killing people was a lot of fun and carried a lot of the episodes, especially later. Off the top of my head, I liked the following beats – the Davenport revelation, Taako’s entire story, and the Red Robe twist – but pretty much everything else bored me at best, actively annoyed me at worst (I DO NOT like Lup, see the NPC section). 

But in Amnesty, I was constantly at the very least intrigued, if not enjoying the experience, and I generally had no issues with the story’s set-up or pay-off, at least until things got a bit… weird near the end.  

Again, Balance was Griffin basically writing a story every episode, so I understand the story isn’t perfect, but Amnesty to me is the culmination of his talents as a fiction writer.  

There was always a sense of intrigue, the setting and plot were both very well contained, nothing felt like it contrasted too much. The city of Kepler is a charming city, all the additions made over time such as H2-Woah That Was Fun had the goofy and odd spin that kept a nice flow between the comedy and the tragedy, and NPCs like Indred, Billy, Momma, and Minerva felt original, engaging, and appealing. Perfect marks all around from me. 

At least, until the final arc, where things just kind of go a bit crazy. It seems like Griffin really can’t avoid wanting to do a Big Blow Out the Barn Every Loose End Tied Up Finale for his works, which isn’t inherently a bad thing, but came out of nowhere to me. The entire Aliens pitting Sylvane Citizens and Earth citizens against eachother in a Scorched Earth tactic to get rid of both populations makes sense but just comes completely out of nowhere to me. It does genuinely feel like Griffin heard Justin as Duck say “it’s aliens” and go “wait…. What if it was aliens?”, even though Sylvane had already been fleshed out a great deal, and there was a lot of potential and unexplored aspects of that world.  

All that that being said, Amnesty’s story over-all is great, and while Balance’s characters work better for one-offs (as I’ve said before, the best Balance episodes are all the live one-offs – if you can ignore the audience losing their mind because Merle read what the spell he’s using does), Amnesty’s story feels more compete and full.  

 

The Characters – or, the Excellence of Duck Newton 

This is the biggest damnation I have against Balance – I didn’t like a majority of the plot-relevant characters. At all. 

I’ll start with what I’m sure most people are interested of/mad at me for – as I mentioned earlier, I hate Lup. 

I don’t care what anybody else says. To me, Lup is just transfem Taako. I have no issue with the LGBT rep in the series, and appreciate Lup being transfem, but it just felt weird that, so far into the story, Griffin introduced Taako’s sister, who was basically just Taako, and then formed a romantic relationship between her and Barry Bluejeans without really developing it at all. The umbrella plot point was good, but that could’ve been done with literally anything. 

 It’s nothing I’ll lose sleep over, I just…. Don’t like it! It didn’t add anything to the story to me. If Lup was gone, Taako and the plot would have barely been affected, at least IMO.  

Taako is a great character, and Justin does a great job fleshing him out, making him feel real, fun, and creative. I’m not as big of a fan of Merle or Magnus (though I appreciate Travis’s commitment to Magnus’s core personality), but I still like them more than most any serious or important NPC outside of Davenport.  

The one-off NPCs that show up for a single arc, and maybe make another appearance later for fanservice, are fun. Garfield is fine. The kid that helps Taako save the universe is fun. But It’s really hard for me to articulate why I dislike every other NPC outside of that clash between the goofiness and Real Play aspect and the Narrative-heavy Seriousness, and just not being interested by them.  

Anyway, back to Amnesty – I enjoyed basically every single character. 

The Player Characters – Duck Newton, Ned Chicane, and Aubrey Little – were, IMO, muuuuch better than the entire cast of Balance.  

As a person that loves to rag on Travis, I actually didn’t mind his Aubrey – I’ve heard people take issue with her being bisexual and having a lot of Travis-isms, but to me, that’s almost kind of sweet – it’s like if Travis was a bisexual Pyromancer girl. Her personality felt solid, she was enjoyable, she didn’t do anything that made me feel like Travis was just pandering, he did a good job! Would’ve loved to see more of Dr. Harris Bonkers, but small potatoes. 

Same with Ned Chicane – Contrasted against Merle, it’s no contest. I never liked the half-bit half-real thing where Merle’s entire gimmick is he’s bad at what he does. It’s not interesting, it’s annoying and creates this weird feedback loop where, if he does anything right, it apparently deserves a 5 minute applaud break or mocking by Justin. Those always grind the episode to a halt and they happen CONSTANTLY.  

But in Amnesty, Clint does a GREAT job with his characters. I think Ned is very interesting and appealing – a Con-artist that’s genuinely kind of a shithead, who’s trying to do right but has let his past control him too much, and his death is one of the more powerful moments of the series to me. Now, maybe I missed an episode or something, but it  also felt very sudden, which wouldn’t be a bad thing if Aubrey didn’t literally bring another character back from the dead earlier in the series, but even so, it’s a fitting, melancholic end to a character that, in a way, had gone too far off the deep end. It was really well done.  

After that Clint does an EVEN better job as Thacker. He was just excellent, I enjoyed every scene Thacker was in. 

And, of course, the star of the show to me, Duck Newton.  

Justin has proven that he’s easily one of the best, and funniest, actors and personalities on the internet, at least to me. Somehow, he went from Taako, a narcissistic, pacifist gay elf wizard, to a goofy forest ranger that’s awful at lying, and excelled at embodying both characters. Duck was my favorite character in Amnesty. He added so much to the levity, his bits with being awful at lying were always incredibly funny, he was just awesome. His story of being a Chosen one that doesn’t Want to be chosen was a bold choice, I loved his dynamic with Minerva and Beacon, everything was 10/10.   

Getting to the Amnesty NPCs – Everything was great about them! I can’t think of a single NPC I took issue with or groaned whenever they started talking. They all contributed to the plot, they all had their own reasoning, and characters that didn’t get a lot of develop Griffin explained – the players just didn’t interact with them much, so it’s understandable, not necessarily a flaw. 

 

The other stuff  

So I don’t end up typing another 1000 words, I’ll just run through some other points that jump to my mind about Amnesty. 

Didn’t like all the sudden relationships after the finale. Aubrey’s could’ve used a bit more developing, it felt like they crushed on eachother, halfway through they kissed, and then suddenly they’re dating at the end was bleh. Duck and Minerva make sense, but I don’t think it’s necessary to have EVERY character fall into a romantic relationship, especially after the same thing happened in Balance. They just seemed like unlikely allies, which was fine. 

I really enjoyed the contrast in Actual play, how in TAZ it feels like every story is “These three overpowered doofuses cause chaos, kill whoever they want, and literally can’t die”, and then in Amnesty, “these three charming idiots can do nothing properly, and it’s insanely lucky that they even killed the abominations”. 

I really like the music in Amnesty, the main theme is really charming, it sounds like a song off of an original trilogy Spyro game. 

Monster of the Week seems like a fun TTRPG, but I don’t think it worked well for the story. It wasn’t bad enough to impact my experience, but…. It DID feel like Griffin had to do a LOT to make sure they didn’t die during every single abomination encounter (and hell, the PCs literally did NOTHING to stop that last abomination causing the final arc). 

Conclusion 

Amnesty is great. If you want a good story with a bit of actual play TTRPG charm, I’d recommend listening to it before Balance. Balance is a classic and will go down in TTRPG podcast history, but I think Amnesty is WAY more deserving of the adaptations and TTRPG game (it’s still fucking wild that Balance is getting that, by the way). 

Thank you! 

[nebulouscoffee]

For the character ask game: Hoshi Sato, Seven of Nine, and Wesley Crusher!

Hahaha thanks for being my no.1 enabler as usual and sending me such a great triple ask! Prepare for Essay <3

Hoshi

one aspect about them i love

Her whole multilingual thing and having to figure it all out without the Universal Translator was so, so cool to me. Honestly, when I think back to what worked from Enterprise's whole "early days" pitch, it's the first thing that comes to mind. And gosh her backstory with the isolation she felt as a gifted child who spent most of her time in classes... all those languages, and no one to speak to. Really makes her presence on Earth's first deep space mission Hit Different!

one aspect i wish more people understood about them

Well, that she's actually quite a three-dimensional character! Yes, they often didn't know what to do with her and her screentime got reduced later on, but she's more than just the "naive young ensign" archetype- in fact, one of my favourite things about her is how uniquely real she feels (that scene where she had to settle a dispute with some aliens they'd accidentally pissed off and she didn't even speak their language and was straight up on the verge of tears while talking to them, but then gradually gained confidence? That sort of stuff with her was so good!)

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have about this character

Personally I will never be over the fact that in like season FOUR or something they just randomly dropped that she was originally discharged from Starfleet (!!) for getting into a fight (!!!?) over an illegal poker game she was running (iirc??) and breaking her commanding officer's arm (??!?) because apparently she has a black belt in Aikido (!!??!) Good lord, how many other secret skills does she have then? She's literally a prodigy who grew up with no friends I bet there's dozens lmaooo I bet she can pick locks and yodel and swing from a trapeze

one character i love seeing them interact with

She and Phlox have a sweet dynamic- you get the sense that her curiosity and open-mindedness and friendliness really make him feel more at home, as one of the only aliens on the ship

one character i wish they would interact with/interact with more

T'Pol!! T'Pol, T'Pol- the show gave them little to no scenes together, but it really could've been something so interesting, especially in the context of cultural exchange and nonwestern frameworks. And yes, they make for a wonderful ship too- but judging by the state of our dms lately I certainly don't need to tell you that😂

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have that involve them and one other character

She and Phlox have a whole mini zoo of secret and illegal pets.

Seven

one aspect about them i love

The entire premise of her character is fantastic imo, and Jeri Ryan is terrific in the role. Her quest to discover personhood as an adult while also reckoning with all the violence she inflicted on such a mass scale (which itself was a result of horrifying violations of her own body and mind that she can barely remember) while also trying to reconcile the grief of all those lost years... wow

one aspect i wish more people understood about them

... I mean, I wish the showrunners had understood that Seven works best as part of an ensemble, and "ensemble" means occasionally giving the others something to do?😂😂 And that the whole deal with her biosuit and conventionally feminine hotness just didn't match the character; she should've been allowed to look and act WAY more weird and off-putting I think

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have about this character

Ignoring ST: Picard canon (which I always do), I think after Voyager returns to the AQ, Seven would dig deeper into the concept and pursuit of "perfection"- the show painted it as a quasi-religious thing for her, and then never brought it up again! I think now, abruptly ripped from her home and family and confronted with a big scary quadrant to explore, she'd try on spirituality, at least for a little bit- try to reconcile it with her very scientific algorithms of thought, if only so for a brief while she can make the universe make sense

one character i love seeing them interact with

Many answers (Janeway, Tuvok, etc) but I'm going to highlight one I actually didn't notice much on first watch- she and Neelix have kind of an interesting dynamic! They have more scenes together than I remembered, and they give each other some really good advice

one character i wish they would interact with/interact with more

B'Elanna. Their supposed "rivalry" never really made sense to me lol, they could've come up with a legitimately interesting conflict between them, or just made them friends- as is, it just sort of comes off like they're fighting because... women be like that, I suppose? Lol, don't get me wrong- some of their scenes together are great ("We difficult patients need to stick together") but I wish we'd gotten more

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have that involve them and one other character

She and Tuvok sometimes hang out in the mess hall at night, when the whole ship is dark, and quiet, and they can just stare at the stars, help alleviate each others' loneliness, while also giving each other a break from the exhausting ordeal of conventional socialising. Four hours in and not a single word spoken😌

Wesley

one aspect about them i love

Apart from being generally very sweet and helpful, Wes (and Alexander too) is what makes the crew feel like a family to me- like, this kid just has so many sets of parents! (Bev & Picard are his Parents parents, Data & Geordi are his work parents, Riker & Guinan are his weird parents, Deanna & Tasha are his fun parents, and Worf is... ok Worf can just be Worf lol the poor man has more than enough on his plate already)

one aspect i wish more people understood about them

That he's literally just a child, I suppose. Like- he's fourteen, of course he does and says stupid things on occasion! It generally doesn't bother me when people dislike characters I like but a lot of the Wesley hate I've seen across platforms feels distinctly anti-children in a weirdly malicious way

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have about this character

Starfleet Academy must've been a WILD transition for him, I mean sure it's a high-pressure environment and very competitive and everything- but he was on the literal bridge of the flagship of the Federation! All his bffs were highly intelligent and competent (sometimes superhumanly so) adults at the tops of their fields. How much experience does he even have socialising with kids his age? Does he ever feel like he just can't relate to any of them? Probably??

one character i love seeing them interact with

Ooh lots of answers here; I do think he brings out the best in Picard, and I love his dynamic with several others too- but I'm gonna go with Geordi. I know I called him one of Wesley's parents earlier but that was just a joke lol, truthfully Geordi has this extremely chill and almost like brotherly friendship with him, and he always respects Wesley's opinions and hears him out and never really condescends to him and I just think it's neat!

one character i wish they would interact with/interact with more

Lmao, Beverly. It's really weird how little the show seems to care about their relationship! I mean they obviously do have a positive one, and Bev is very loving and protective of him, but they don't actually share all that much screentime per se. So that means I have to headcanon slightly less positive things, like-

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have that involve them and one other character

what if Beverly's absence during such a crucial year in his life (S2) sort of left a gap in their relationship they never quite managed to patch up? No resentment exactly, just... less connection than before. She's still very important to him of course, but not the first person he'd go to with good news. (I don't mean this in a negative way towards Beverly btw! I actually do like that the show wanted to give her more storylines beyond just being Wesley's Mum)

[cblgblog]

Hi there.

We've never spoken before, but as you can see from my username, we have at least two common interests.

Anyway, I'd like to talk to you about Wanda Maximoff. I've made it no secret that I am an avid defender of hers, despite the many, many bad things she has done.

I suppose my first question is, do you think MCU Wanda is still redeemable after everything she has done, especially recently? Personally I really want to believe that she is.

My second question is a lot more heavy: since you seem to be a fan of Elizabeth Olsen and her Wanda, you have doubtlessly heard people say that she is whitewashed. I've seen numerous people say that, and these are just a few examples:

There's also this one YouTube video that I've been trying to get help analyzing, but apparently video links aren't allowed in asks. Sad.

At any rate, what do you think? Do these accusations hold water? Is MCU Wanda whitewashed? Is Elizabeth Olsen a racist? Is it wrong to be a fan of the character like these people seem to think?

To be absolutely clear, I don't want to believe any of the questions I just asked, but the cynic in me is forced to consider all the arguments.

Hey there, fellow Wanda apologist, pleased to meet you.

Is she redeemable? That���s gonna be a your mileage may vary thing. Everyone has different thresholds of what they’re willing to forgive, and it depends on the writing. To me, the telling thing is Professor X, and them very blatantly stealing his line from Days of Future Past. “Just because someone stumbles and loses their way, doesn’t mean they’re lost forever.” That line is very telling that they’re at least leaving open the possibility of a redemption arc. To me, personally, yes, she is. The comics redeemed her after similarly catastrophic events, or they at least tried to. Some people bought it, some people didn’t, and that’s what I see with MCU Wanda’s future.

I will say that MoM majorly fucked over Wanda’s character development. Apparently the original pitch for the movie was the bits we see in the trailer: her teaming up with Strange to make up for Westview, and not having her bad turn until later. Then 2020 happened, stuff got delayed, Wandavision blew up, and, according to the commentary track on the flick, the creatives on that movie decided that they wanted to be the ones who got to shoot all the fun, scary, Wanda goes evil stuff, so they reworked the script. And while I get that theoretically, on a selfish level, I get the impulse….you idiots went and broke all her character development from Wandavision.

The whole point of Wandavision was that she messed up, she did the bad thing, then she undid the bad thing. It doesn’t undo the trauma she caused, but at least she was—supposedly—aware that this path she was on wasn’t sustainable. The thing would’ve made so much more sense if Wanda starts MoM on a path of helping Strange and America Chavez, then sees all these different universes where she’s happy with her kids, and that sets her backward. Because who wouldn’t see that and want that happiness? She’s still recovering from like…her entire damn life, it would make sense for her to backslide there. But having her start out the movie in evil mode just kinda…undid Wandavision’s whole finale, thanks guys.

But anyway.

They wrote themselves into a corner there. Do I think they’re gonna try to write themselves out of it and give her a redemption arc at some point? Yeah, I think we’ll get it down the line, and it’ll be too little too late for some people no matter what happens, and that’s fine. I will personally still love the character, while acknowledging that she did some absolutely terrible thing. Or, in the words of a friend who says stuff much more concisely than me: "If we can forgive Tony 'sold WMDS for funsies for years' Stark we can forgive Wanda "The darkhold took over my mind along with grief" Maximoff"

And now, the hornet’s nest.

Is she whitewashed? Yes, absolutely. Does that mean that you, or anyone else who likes the character is trash? No. You are allowed to acknowledge that something is flawed/has issues, and still enjoy it. Tumblr will tell you otherwise, but you are never going to find the perfect, Unproblematic Thing, that was written by the perfect, unproblematic person, and has no questionable aspects to it, or the people behind it. It isn’t happening, sorry guys.

As to Elizabeth Olsen being a racist: She didn't know who she was cast as until she'd signed a contract, so even if she wanted to back out that's a no-go.  You sign on these things for multiple movies, for millions of dollars. But I’m sure everyone who’s yelling at her for daring to work on these films is an expert in contract law.

The slurs: to my knowledge: Reportedly she's said gypsy twice, once in 2015 in an interview and once very recently in interview. Gypsy instead of Romani. The comics have been calling her gypsy for years, and we know Olsen’s read some of the comics, at least. Bad word choice all around. My personal feeling is that people slip up. I don’t know the woman, she might be an evil racist sociopath. Outside looking in? I think she’s used inappropriate terms before, without the intent to do harm, but she fucked up. I think the powers that be at Marvel—comics and movies—say gypsy in reference to her, so Olsen does the same thing at times.  

Again, every human being has problematic aspects. Celebrities are included in that. It’s your business to decide what’s forgivable and what’s not to you personally. All I know for sure is that every single person who shames strangers on the Internet has said or done something cancel-worthy, and every single one of us would look like terrible people if the Internet was able to put a microscope to everything we’ve ever done or said.

So anyway. It’s okay to like Wanda and want good things for her, while acknowledging that she’s done awful things. It’s okay to engage with the MCU’s take, while acknowledging that whitewashing absolutely happened. Tumblr will tell you otherwise, but you asked my opinion, this is my opinion.  It’s okay to like the character and not the actress. It’s okay to still like the actress and acknowledge that she’s done problematic things. It’s. Okay.

You aren’t poisoning the world by engaging with what you like in a way that you like, and anyone telling you otherwise isn’t saving it either.

[genlossneg]

I watch some of Ethan's content but I don't follow him closely enough to really know anything, but I'm guessing that his "yes, and" style is exactly why he was there. It sounded like a cool project and I could easily see someone being able to pitch it in a way that would interest him. Plus he's not entirely separate from that side of twitch. He's played games or done collabs with most of the cast and the one time he was actually in MCC he was teamed with Ranboo (the other time he got subbed out).

It does make me wonder if other creators were reached out to but said no. I'm assuming yes because that's pretty typical for big projects like this, that's not a criticism, I'm just curious who. Ethan might be the most out there of the final cast but there are a lot of similar creators that would've made about as much sense to invite. Also, another anon said that Ranboo wasn't originally worried about the view count but I feel like having such an eclectic set of big name streamers kind of proves that wrong even more than him choosing to be one of the actors.

yeah the yes and thing is pretty believeable i guess, my passing familiarty w ranboos circle was simply not factoring for ethan to be involved ig. ethan crankgameplays my beloved

also yeah the variety in big creators involved definitely doesn't add credence to the view count stuff

[jeremy-ken-anderson]

Playing with AI Writers

For the moment, let's set aside the question of whether the writing is stolen. In theory if you write prolifically yourself and/or it grabs exclusively from public domain, which is a LOT of text, a language model could get something that behaves much the same as the current stuff, even if the current stuff may have shitty moral undertones if its creators did a copyright violation because they're lazy.

In other words, from a structural standpoint, that's not the problem. "Ethically sourced" AI chatbots are possible.

I want to talk about the results, things I appreciate, and the current endemic problems.

So, most of the time the way a chatbot works is by slicing pieces of speech patterns into what it calls "tokens." These are usually a sentence long, but not always. It then finds sets of tokens that seem like the next piece of what should be said, like a longer-form version of how your autocomplete works on your phone. You press "t" and it offers the most likely options, probably "the" and "this" unless you have odd writing habits (more on that in a sec) and then if you follow up with u for "tu" it updates, tuned to the extra information; "the" and "this" are now impossible, and the most likely words starting with "tu" are "turn" and "Tuesday." With tokens all sliced up and vaguely grouped in a way we'll say is kind of like letters for the sake of letting this metaphor make sense, you can see how putting in a sentence - "I attempt to pick the ogre's pocket without waking it." - is much like putting "t" into an autofill-enabled device on a phone or word processor. Adding another sentence might get you closer to your preferred response, being as it is, in this metaphor, akin to typing "tu" rather than "t"; You're feeding in two tokens to help it respond with superior search results. For example if you follow up with "My arm grows weak as I near the creature and smell the flesh that I realize used to be my squad." that is a very different - more fantasy-horror - vibe, and both the odds of the creature waking and the results of its waking will be substantially altered by such a follow-up.

Now, in spite of how much I've enjoyed playing with AI storytelling devices on my own machine, I'm gonna trash these programs for a hot minute: The unsolvable problem is that context matters. People are treating AI-generated text like some magical context-maker machine, the way people who've had 1 but not 2 years of physics might think if they get their ring of magnets at just the right angle they'll get another ring of magnets inside them to spin infinitely for unlimited free energy. This metaphor is, I should mention, very good.

Because just like the fake infinite energy machine, there are a bunch of people trying to profit off of the idea that AI is infinite context-value for no work.

Because just like the fake infinite energy machine, it's not like there's no such thing as an engine; just not an engine that makes infinite power for free. The problem with AI writing isn't that it can't get you toward having a written document full of interesting and potentially even copyrightable text. It's merely that it has a bunch of hidden costs that make it way less efficient and valuable than the pitch men are claiming.

Let's talk Voice. AI doesn't have a writer's voice, because it's literally taking individual sentences from 800 writers at a time. And it can't get voice. You don't sound more like Sir Terry Pratchett by making Death TALK IN ALL CAPS. You sound more like Sir Terry Pratchett by making Death honestly as merciless as real Death and yet a compassionate and even relatable character. There's no combination of tokens, short of recombining the tokens into the original texts they were taken from, thousand monkeys on typewriters style, that results in doing that.

I do want to give props to the mimicry for a second, though. If you start a conversation with Bob-bot as Roger, and you want the story to go a certain way, you can keep feeding in tokens to improve results, right? And there's a fairly natural way to do this: By writing an extra sentence after your own response. I shake my head and grip at my hair like I want to pull it out. "Sure, that sounds like a great idea. Why don't we eat the children while we're at it?" Bob-bot can tell I'm being sarcastic, and while he isn't sure of why he can tell that I'm royally pissed off at his suggestion.

Not only does that last line of extra "here's what my interlocutor knows" prompting help a lot with getting the conversation to avoid some of AI writing's natural pitfalls, but after 10-20 exchanges, I noticed that Bob-bot started copying my formatting. [What Bob-bot does] "What Bob-bot says!" [What Bob-bot intends, or how Bob-bot's action affects Roger emotionally]

I actually found that really cool! But. But!

Let's talk rerolls.

This kind of thing is more immediately visible in AI Art; Discussions of how "prompt writers" who fancy themselves AI Artists are simply unable to fix "their" work, because the problem with an AI-generated picture is usually that it has bad fundamentals on proportions, has like six light sources (because different pieces of the picture are copied from different works), and most of all because the current generative programs are bad at segmenting their resulting images by physical zone. Once they make something with sixteen pirates behind Superman, they don't remember where in the picture there are sixteen pirates, so if they put that in without you ever asking for any pirates (let alone sixteen) they don't know how to take pirates out of the picture, where some dude you hired off of Fiverr would just go, "Oops, yeah I included a layer from a different picture because I'm working on six commissions at once, let me delete that rq" and it'd be fixed. With the AI you're better off just running the program again, asking for a new (equally flawed but for different and hopefully less egregious reasons) picture of Superman.

But the same thing happens in the AI writing. I had a character named Ari and apparently a lot of other people had male characters named Ari, because the chatbot constantly misgendered her even though I established in the character bio that she's a girly, womanly, female, feminine DAAAAME. I also had a female goblin at one point, and the misgendering on that one I understand a bit better (though I found it deeply annoying) because the proportions of written genders of goblins are WAY less close to parity than the proportions of written genders of humans or elves. If you think of all goblins in all fiction this thing would be pulling from, it's gotta be like 90% or more that "goblin = male" right? Makes me wonder how often it'd misgender dwarves.

Further props to the program: Much like how my mom's phone at first would attempt to correct "lesbian" to "Lebanese" but soon learned that no, mom really did intend to write the word "lesbian," local-memory caching does start to fix this problem as it goes. You can edit the AI's response so that "As Ari rounds the bend, his breath catches at the scene before him" -> "As Ari rounds the bend, her breath catches at the scene before her" and each time you do that the misgendering gets less likely for future replies within the same story.

...But this is where we get into that bit, before, about the hidden costs. Between its inability to generate a consistent tone, its complete inability to carry a story without you providing multiple pages of background and worldbuilding design docs, and the editorial work you'll have to do cleaning up its replies and/or writing stage direction into your replies and/or flat-out rejecting something that feels completely tonally unacceptable or just plain ignores the situation AI: "I stab the ogres with my +9 ogre-slaying knife!" Me: "You're not THERE! You're at the CLUB!" there comes a point where you have to compare the value of how much work you put into this engine in order to get an output you're happy with not against infinite time, but rather...against the mighty story-generation engine known as A Page of Blank Paper.

I've found that for all but the most intentionally-rambly forms of writing, the latter has a lower time cost, fewer bad detours, and easier repair work between starting the production and getting to something I'm really happy with.

AI Text Generation is really impressive, and the things it does that impress will likely continue to get more impressive, but until it fundamentally changes how it seeks out its results, those impressive things won't solve the fact that it's inferior to simply writing well. And if you're not good at writing well, I have my doubts that you'll even catch the fact that there are sixteen pirates behind your Superman and your outputs are gonna be shit but you won't realize it. (Which I guess is an endorsement for AI Text Generation as a choose-your-own-adventure toy, if you're bad at writing?)

[shadowsong26fic]

Coming Attractions!

First Monday of the month, so here we are!

As usual, we’ll do an Open Question Night--while my askbox is always open, tonight I’ll be keeping an eye on it if anyone has questions. Anything about any fandom/original project I’ve written about here or posted to AO3 is fair game. I do take prompts, but no guarantees on how quickly I’ll fill them.

All right, here we go!

Star Wars Fic:

I’ve basically only been writing my Year of the OTP fills at the moment. I’m also doing some betaing/podficcing for SWBB, as well as pitching in on the mod side, but not a lot of writing. Hopefully once the event is over I’ll get back to Precipice!verse (which I refuse to let die) and other projects in that fandom, but we’ll see how it goes.

Castlevania Fic:

I swear I haven’t forgotten Incinctus (or the one other plot idea I had, but I want to put more of Incinctus up before I start working on it). I just...yeah, nothing’s really happened this month, lol. Maybe in May...although I do have a lot of family/personal stuff coming up so IDK how much time I’ll have. Work at least should be somewhat calmer now?

BSG Fic:

I really am working on The Other Battlestar in the background of everything else, I swear, lol. Still no official posting/start date, but maybe?? soon?? I hope anyway.

Also been doing Year of the OTP for this one. I’m really proud of the one I came out with this month--it’s an AU that’s been kicking around in my head for a while, and I like some of what I managed to pull off with mirroring bits of language/etc. (May or may not continue this AU; there’s some Interesting things that could go on. This...is probably going to make me sound like a terrible person, but they obviously won’t succeed Completely because that makes for a much less interesting story, lol. But those 4-ish months between this bit and the eventual attack, plus the ways the aftermath would be different, could be a Lot of fun. I did have a few ideas here and there, but nothing like a coherent Story yet.)

Also! Galactica Big Bang is coming along! The amazing fracktastic designed some icons, and I’m putting a banner together/finalizing the FAQ/rules/etc. I’ll probably do a kickoff post sometime this month. Like...what’s normal for this type of event, lol. Six weeks before the signups open? A month? Two? (Technically I missed the window on two, since I’m opening signups on July 1...)

...I also need to actually design the signup forms, whoops...::adds to to-do list::

Original Fic:

Still doing OTP fills; I’m having a lot of fun with it. I did write one thing that was not a fill for a challenge on rainbowfic; might or might not do that again this month, I haven’t looked at the May prompts for Year of the OTP, but they could line up with this month’s RF challenge...

(I also might be going back to the Bridgerton/Regency AU for Lux that I put together a couple years back for a challenge. This is because I saw Les Mis on Saturday and I swear that actually does make sense in context XD

Other Projects:

Nothing concrete in the pipeline at the moment...one of my roommates has gotten back into AtLA again (not sure if that had happened by April’s Coming Attractions post and I’m too lazy to check lol) so a few of the things I poke at in that fandom are floating around. No concrete work on anything at this point, but we’ll see how it goes.

...I think that’s everything! Like I said at the beginning, Open Question Night, etc. What’s on your mind?