#but like. the whole thing. an overarching theme that brings the story together. the whole story. is it paradise lost coded.

[livingthedragonlife]

i want to talk about the mimic chapter!!!!

kui is a genius at weaving overarching story themes and character themes and arcs and details into every chapter, but i love the way it happens in the mimic chapter the most.

the first thing that happens is chilchuck noticing the possibility of a mimic. he notices it instantly, because he remembers what the room looked like the last time the party was there. it's a great demonstration of how perceptive he is, and how seriously he takes his job... but he doesn't tell anybody.

the party could be in danger, there's a monster right around the corner, but he assumes (rightly, but still) that laios and senshi would only want to eat it and marcille would be mad at him for bringing it up. so he says nothing. out of sight, out of mind, ignoring the problem will have Zero lasting consequences. his emotional unavailability demonstrated right after, in a way that feels so seamless!!!

later, he wakes up marcille before he goes to refill his waterskin, but when he gets trapped in the mimic room, he assumes she fell asleep right after he left and therefore can't help him. he finds out later that he's wrong. marcille stayed awake to wait for him and woke up laios and senshi when he didn't come back. they were a little bit late, but chilchuck could have relied on his party members to be there for him, but assumed they wouldn't. he thinks quick on his feet, he figures out the puzzle in the room really fast, but he doesn't come out of it unscathed. he relies only on himself, and it almost got him killed.

obviously getting killed isn't too big a deal in the dungeon, but the point is that chilchuck put himself through unnecessary strife that could have been solved easily if they had just taken out the mimic right when they got into the room together—if he had told them there was danger in the first place. and the mimic turned out to be delicious anyway!!!!

BUT. THEN. when he finally DOES decide to be vulnerable, having learned this lesson, and tells everyone how old he is... they laugh. they still treat him like a child. they don't understand, they assume he's just as young as they did before.

this gets solved too, when he tells them about his family after the griffon/hippogriff fight. and sure, if he had been more open and vulnerable about having a family from the start, he wouldn't have to keep explaining that he's not a child only for them not to listen. but no wonder he doesn't!! no wonder he kept quiet when the one time he tried to open up, he got laughed at anyway! and that's just THIS PARTY, we know he's been through some shit with other parties—he formed a whole union about it

just!!!!!! all the actions from all the characters make sense if you look at it from their perspective, and it's all weaved so delicately into the storytelling you don't even realize how much you're absorbing about the world and the characters. chef's kiss.

[99corentine]

How To Write Good by Corentine

THE DRAFTING PROCESS, PART 1/2

Hello, people were interested in some writing tips by me so I, uh, sort of kind of cranked out a writing guide in a few hours. I’m not sure if this will be a very comprehensive or helpful guide but let’s give it a try!

⭐ Starting disclaimers: Please remember as with all things that my method is not necessarily the best method, everyone is different and over time you’ll find your own process.

I write romance, so my advice is skewed towards writing that and I’m not sure how helpful it will be for gen fic. I publish fanfic chapter by chapter to AO3 so it’s also skewed to someone doing the same, not someone writing a full novel they want to get published. 

I’m going to be using GOL HAH DOV (GHD) for writing examples because, well, it’s a finished longfic so it’s as good a reference as any, but obviously GHD is not everyone’s cup of tea. I’ll also occasionally reference Tooth for a Tooth (T4T) which apologies is very far from finished, but the Baldur’s Gate 3 fandom is vastly different to the Skyrim one, so it’s useful to cross-compare them.

Also worth bearing in mind: I have been writing fanfiction since I was about 13, and I’m now 33. That’s 20 years of experience. Do you know what I wrote when I was 13? Hot garbage. Writing is a learned skill that, much like playing a musical instrument or learning literally any other craft, you must put time and effort into to improve.

However although ‘practice makes perfect’ is fundamentally true, that’s also kind of lame advice. So here is what I personally do, which may be helpful in figuring out what you want to do. 

STEP ONE: YOU NEED AN IDEA FIRST DUMMY

Think of a fic idea. Probably you have lots of vague ideas. As I’m trying to turn something from a daydream into an actual writing project, I tend to ask myself these questions:

⭐Who is it about?⭐

Pick your pairing, romantic or otherwise. Think about what you like about the character and what traits you want to emphasise in your writing. If you’re writing about fan character x fan character, what makes them go well together? What causes tension between them?

If you’re writing fan character x original character, do remember that your readers are here for the fan character, not for your OC. There is no getting around this, your OC is not what brings people to the fic. GHD’s Chrysanthe was largely intended as a blank slate, quite literally, I made him an amnesiac because the point of the story was Miraak not Chrysanthe. 

Over time I was able to shape him into something more distinctive (softly-spoken, stoic, paladin-like, secret tricksy side only Miraak brings out, gets more dragon-like as the story progresses) but that was a gradual thing. Your readers will hopefully come to love your OC as you do, but it takes time for them to get invested. I’m very grateful that people did come to root for Chrysanthe – but make no mistake, if the story had no Miraak in it, people wouldn’t be reading it. Your OC is always a vehicle for the fan character.

⭐What are the overarching themes of the story?⭐

A cohesive story has a theme that repeats throughout, and picking one early on will let you write with that theme in mind. As an example, the themes of GHD are:

Soulmates / we were destined to meet each other

There’s no-one else like me / you and I are the only real ones here

One’s a hero one’s a villain

Zero to hero / hero becomes progressively more badass

Redemption arc but the villain is never fully redeemed – for GHD this turned into the repetition of Miraak’s theme he’ll never be pure but for you he’ll try and later Chrysanthe’s I love you exactly as you are

Your own themes might be something like best friends who don’t realise they’ve been in love this whole time or can’t live with you can’t live without you. Tropes count towards this too, so something like soulmates, Modern Coffee Shop AU, hanahaki, all of that stuff is a story theme.

⭐What does this fic do that other fics like it don’t?⭐

GOL HAH DOV was sort of easy mode in this regard because there aren’t many fics featuring Miraak at all, so writing anything was already doing something different. Of those existing fics, I wanted to see more where Miraak was evil and scary, and you should be the change you want to see in the world (of fanfic), so I decided to write it myself. I get a lot of comments on Miraak’s personality, so I assume this is mostly what makes GHD stand out!

I’ll use T4T as a contrasting example, because Skyrim is old and Miraak is niche, but Baldur’s Gate 3 is new/popular and Astarion is a fan favourite. That means there’s a veritable sea of fic about him, so what can you write that will stand out from the many, many other fics out there? It doesn’t have to be the only one of its kind or anything, but it does need to have something special about it.

You’ll want to either go for a strong theme or trope (i.e. soulmates, magical spell curse, we’re both monsters), or change the setting (canon divergence, ‘what if X happened instead?’, or even outright alternate universe and a brand new plot). Personally, I choose to follow the source material but go off-script. I gotta say, nothing makes me sadder than seeing plot and dialogue lifted straight from a game with zero changes made to it. That’s a personal preference obviously, but I think if you write a fic it should strive to do something different to the rest.

⭐Do I have enough enthusiasm to finish it?⭐

This is more applicable to longfic, but you really need to be in love with a story to see it through to the end. Be realistic with yourself, how much free time and energy you have – if you start it, do you think you can finish it?

I have a whole planning process (detailed later) and sometimes I start planning out an idea just to realise I don’t really have the enthusiasm to actually write the whole thing. This is fine! Even just planning is still a writing exercise, and it might spark some different ideas.

Once you have your idea, and you’re confident you’re going to actually write it… then for the love of all that is holy, do not share it in detail with anyone. You can pitch an idea to see if people will be interested but if you go into specifics about story events or certain scenes? You basically get the endorphins from having ‘created’ it, only you haven’t actually created it, and now you’ve had the chemical pay-off you probably never will. Keep your ideas to yourself until you’ve actually written them.

STEP TWO: WRITE THAT DOWN

In terms of writing software, I use Scrivener, which is a paid-for software but is not subscription based (I wouldn’t pay continually for software unless I was reliably writing every day, and sometimes I go ages without being in the mood to write). Scriv’s word processor isn’t the most intuitive thing, but I like its organisation features. This is what a work in progress looks like for me:

That’s essentially a folder (the story) containing a bunch of word documents (the chapters). You could break it down even further and have a chapter folder with each document being individual scenes, then stitch it together later - if writing is a daunting process for you, it’s useful to break it down into small, manageable chunks. You can do this in other software obviously, I just find Scrivener the most visually pleasing.

Set up your writing document, and let’s get to planning what we’re actually going to write!

...Apparently tumblr has a word limit I've exceeded, so I'll write the next bit separately. Here's PART TWO.

[fangirl-erdariel]

If you were given the job of 'showrunner of a show about Faramir' what would you do?

Oh that's a fascinating question, thank you! I will freely admit that I don't necessarily consider myself the most knowledgeable person about Faramir or the best at writing him even in my immediate fandom circle, so this is unlikely to be anything particularly groundbreaking or interesting, but I'll give it a shot

I think, since you've not given me specific limitations on when in the timeline this will be set, and that I would go for a show that focuses on Faramir in the months leading up to Boromir leaving for Rivendell, ending with that event. Not that a show about him in the times after the War of the Ring wouldn't be fascinating, but I don't think it's something I'd be very good at writing. And I'm not necessarily interested in following the story through the events of LOTR, either. So, like I said, following Faramir in the times leading up to the event that basically ties him and Boromir so tightly into the events of the story.

Wouldn't be a very long show, obviously, with that sort of time frame, but I'm a firm believer in deciding on the limits of the story you want to tell and narrowing it down to something you can manage, before starting to tell it. (Let's ignore the fact that I don't actually do that irl when I write fanfic, I just sit down and write and see what happens; the imaginary me who is a showrunner of a tv show is obviously more organized than the real life me anyway.) Not everything needs to be ten seasons long. And you could still get a full-length season or two out of even that premise, I think.

I would probably go for a somewhat episodic problem-of-the-week format, but with some overarching themes and plotlines developing across the whole show. I can't off the top of my head give you a list of episodes or their synopsis (how do you pluralize that? synopsis? synopses? synopsises? why is English so difficult), but, you know, most episodes probably focusing on the various troubles of leading the soldiers in Ithilien, one episode focused on the planning of an attack on an enemy troop that will be moving through, another of "how the f*ck has the enemy been managing to constantly mess with our supply lines that we thought were secure and how do we stop them from doing that", maybe one of the classic "there's a spy among our midst but who is it??" plot, one where Faramir has to handle a bunch of young inexperienced soldiers who are either uncertain or too reckless and eager to pursue glory and probably going to get either themselves or other people killed if he can't get them to get their act together. And so on and so forth, I'm sure you get the gist. Probably mix it up sometimes and have some episodes set in Minas Tirith, maybe a couple bringing Faramir on some errand to more southern parts of Gondor, too. Ithilien episodes would probably have elements of military drama, Minas Tirith episodes elements of political drama.

I think the second-to-last episode of the show would have the first time Faramir has the dream that'll send Boromir to Gondor, and would have the attack on Osgiliath and that whole thing. And the absolute last episode would be just focused on the dream and what to do about it, and would see Boromir leaving on his journey.

I think one thing I'd explore a lot would be the differing ways that other characters see him. Both in terms of the relationships with his family, the way that he is a beloved little brother to Boromir but always the less capable and worthy in Denethor's eyes, but also in terms of outside that family circle. Like, we see in the books that he is adored by the people, and that he is greatly respected by the soldiers under his command, he is a captain they are glad to follow, a skilled leader who is able to keep troops from panicking and retain good order even in difficult, chaotic situations.

And then, going off of that, how does all that compare to the way Faramir sees himself? How does the place he is appointed by those around him fit, or not fit, what he himself would want to be, if he could choose? Even people who love or admire you can still view you in ways that aren't entirely true, or treat you in a way or put you in situations that you find constraining or poorly fit for you, and I think playing with that with Faramir could be interesting. I think I might go for making one of the conflicts carried through the show be that while Boromir loves Faramir, he doesn't always quite treat him as a responsible adult and an equal, but a little brother to be protected and watched over and helped, and for all that Faramir also loves Boromir, it's still frustrating. And though Boromir does insist on being the one to make the journey to Rivendell because he's older and stronger and doesn't like the idea of Faramir going off alone on a long journey to the unknown, it is still in some ways also an admission on his part that he trusts Faramir to be responsible and clever and capable enough to be in charge of the lives of soldiers and of various duties Boromir has that will fall on Faramir in his absence, without Boromir's constant oversight and being always somewhere near enough to come to his aid.

Besides that, I think I would like to incorporate hope and despair as one central theme, seeing as it's also so very central to LOTR. Also, this isn't anything about deep themes or being clever or whatever, it's really just self-indulgence, but I think I'd like to incorporate songs and poetry the characters actually sing and recite into the story. Just, like, whatever, military marches, funeral laments, narrative stuff sung to pass the time, people competing on who can most accurately memorize some tricky poem just for the hell of it, all that. Like, Middle-Earth just has music so intrinsically bound into the stories and it's an aspect of the books I really love, but so few adaptations incorporate it much at all! (I am tooootally not jealous to my mom because she got to see the 1988/-89 LOTR play that actually included a bunch of the poems from the books set to music, totally not, why are you asking)

Also, can we cast Luke Pasqualino as Faramir? No particular reason except that I think he's pretty

Geez, that got long ':D Idk how much sense any of that makes, but, hey, thanks for giving me an excuse to ramble!!

Out of curiosity, if you were given the same job of being a showrunner for a show about Faramir, what would you do with it?

[darkonekrisrewrite]

Togachako is interesting

From both a smaller (personal) and larger (Plot) perspective

(Side Meta, not connected to the others) (Spoiler Warning)

Romance is and isn’t a central theme of Togachako I think, it’s more about the concepts and resulting individual goals motivated by love than anything else.

I don’t really think Toga and Ochako will wind up being Girlfriends by Bnha’s end, so much as the connections they develop through the themes of love, whether it’s for each other or not, is a bond that has a lot of interest to everything in Bnha.

Why that is, Togachako as a pairing that’s not exactly equal in their identities when separate, put together brings so much more to the story.

Toga Himiko is fascinating on her own and she has overarching plot relevance, which makes her one of the best in Bnha.

From a single character point of view, she’s a sympathetic villain with emotional weight. Having been born with a Quirk that eventually made it impossible for her to live a normal life, to the point of self-harming (biting her own wrist open) due to her bloodlust and constantly wearing a psychological mask, playing a role though her life.

Parents who didn’t care for her ^ and took no responsibility for how they failed to help their Daughter.

Toga’s whole relationship with the Lov, especially Twice, all the sweet moments (strictly friend based) and their tragic parting.

And from a wider point of view, Toga has a place in Bnha’s overall themes too.

Societal judgment based on a person’s Quirk (another way of looking at what happened in the picture above ^).

A direct connection through Twice to the moral arguments of the Hero’s choices/actions (then connecting to Hawks), and wherever that plot thread will lead as Toga is still hunting for Hawks and fighting other heroes with the Clones.

And finally what will happen in the Future of their society as a direct result of the Lov’s actions.

There’s a lot going on with Toga Himiko and all of it, the many connections and nuances, make her able to stand out and on her own as a character.

 But with Ochako, while there still is a lot of great character there, there doesn’t seem to be as much weight or impact on her own.

Ochako isn’t as much without Toga, even though Horikoshi stated that he created Toga for Ochako’s development (or something along those lines), most of the time it feels like the opposite of that, in never quite reaching Toga’s level until recently.

Ochako’s origins and ‘place’ in Bnha is very ‘normal’ most of the time, very ‘Hero Girl Teammate’.

While her goal of earning enough money so her parents can lead easier lives may seem different from the other hero kids (or at least that’s how Ochako acted when she first stated her goal), it’s never really brought up in any way other than being her motivation.

There’s never anything else surrounding this goal, not any conflicts or attention brought to the money desire specifically.

Does Ochako ever have any plot relevance with Hero Killer Stain, with their ideals and goals tailor made to oppose one another?

No. They never meet, before Stain’s arrest or even after Stain broke out of Prison and came close to other UA students.

Although Ochako’s goal soon changes or I guess you could say evolves to being ‘I love seeing People’s smiling faces’, so it seems like development without resolution?

It feels like that happens a lot in Ochako’s story, as she does change and grow over the Arcs but it always feels a bit…tacked on.

Like after the important things in the Arc are done or close to being finished, Ochako will have some form of personal revelation, one that doesn’t seem to be capitalized on anytime soon (in the case of ‘who saves the heroes’, her megaphone moment addressing the civilian mob at UA came much later).

There are crumbs or maybe put more generously seeds of character development but no big hero moments or victories accompanying them, nothing to really impress or put an epic point to.

An example of this would be Kirishima’s big hero moment during the Overhaul Operation, with him fulfilling his heroic ideals while at the same time having a Plus Ultra moment against his enemy.  

And even after her big scene of convincing the civilians to let Izuku stay at UA, her desire to ‘protect the heroes who need it’ falls a little short after that too.

Because where was Shoto and Aoyama’s help, specifically from Ochako?

It’s true that they already were getting help from their other friends/classmates but why didn’t Ochako have a moment here?

She didn’t have to make another big speech or anything, maybe just a small moment of Ochako trying to comfort Shoto as a friend or stepping up beside Izuku to say something in Aoyama’s defense.

Because having her only do that sort of thing for Izuku gives the impression that Ochako only did it because it was for Izuku.

I’m not saying all this to hate on Ochako, I’m just pointing out what did and didn’t happen in her story, and that being paired with Toga changes all of that for her.

Toga elevates Ochako by capitalizing on her evolving ideals and makes sure to point out that it’s her story, her hero narrative, influenced by Izuku but not involving him.

(Along with Asui too I guess? But no, this is definitely about Ochako/Toga.)

Putting Ochako into focus against her chosen Villain, completely of her own decision, in a greater conflict that will help to decide the course of Bnha’s future, all the while sticking to her ideals as the fight goes on.

Through Toga bringing Ochako higher on a personal and plot level, maybe that’s what Horikoshi meant when he said that he created Toga for Ochako.

Though I’m sure they’ll have to be developed equally from this point on (I hope).

(Side point: Izuku x Ochako is standard, not boring but kind of leaning towards it. It’s just like most of the other ‘main boy x side character girl’ Shonen relationships, unless it’s literally the first one you’ve ever seen then you’ve probably seen it before.

They work together to the same goals, they never have any real conflicts with one another, and they’re both firmly on the hero side of things.

Unless you’re really into uncomplicated Hero x Hero relationships, and there’s nothing wrong with that if true, there’s nothing in Izuku x Ochako to really point to and say: “Wow! I wonder where this will go?!”

It’s not bad just predictable, and if you’ve seen the same thing play out in other series, it gets old after a while, again unless you like it personally.)

 Final Point: How Togachako develops may direct how Bnha’s story ends, at least I hope it does, it’s pretty much the only Villain/hero pairing that I’d bet on.

Because Dabi is pretty Toast at this point (definitely not as in dead or will die, just extremely burnt) and might not be functioning well for a while until he is somehow healed later.

And as long as Izuku still believes in Hero Society and his heroic answer hasn’t yet evolved beyond ‘Give helping hand’, I can’t think of anything he could say that would sway or impact Shigaraki.

With Togachako there are still a lot of possibilities left, another reason why it’s so interesting.

[goldenasirpa]

There's a LOTTTT to say now that I've finished Disco Elysium (first time) but something I really, really love is the overarching theme of letting go of the past- the importance of moving forward.

Rene and Gaston were my favorite NPCs- something about their story really hit me like a truck. Just two dudes who never moved on- who spent their whole lives thinking about politics that no longer matter and some long-dead girl. As a result, they waste all the time they had to spend together arguing. And when Rene dies it hits like a gut punch.

When the Deserter brings Rene up, it feels beyond appropriate. Of course. These men are the exact same, despite being on opposite sides of this conflict. They have spent every day since the war still in the war- festering like an infection. Rene and the Deserter both refused to engage in the world around them after their perceived *loss*- and then had to gall to assume they still understood it.

This theme is very present re: Harry/Dora... But honestly, I don't think it's the main thing you're supposed to get out of the Harry/Dora narrative (I'll post abt this later once I've formed thoughts).

Instead, I think Harrys narrative around drinking executes the theme better. I played an alcohol-free run without really thinking about it. Just seemed natural. And one of my favorite side-quests was earning back Garte's trust after the bender. To me, this captures the theme perfectly. You can't, under any circumstance, change where you begin the game. You're always a fuckup drunk who destroyed everything. But that doesn't mean you can't fix things- you just can't do it by living in the past. You move forward.

[veliseraptor]

Novel Xuexiao or CQL Xuexiao ? Or both ?

a secret third thing: my personal frankencanon mix of both

I'm not being flippant here! genuinely I feel like I do end up kind of mashing together my canons as I please when I'm writing fic, usually tilting one way or another but not necessarily committing to one specific canon unless I really really have to. the great thing about this when it comes to Yi City specifically is that a lot of the actual changes are...pretty minimal, in a core thematic sense? like, the major differences that come up are:

Different first meeting - we don't see the scene from Villainous Friends where they encounter each other at Jinlintai (and the CQL timeline is such that it wouldn't work). Instead they encounter each other after Xue Yang has killed the Chang (and apparently others on his way there, which I guess is a more dramatic difference but since it's never really followed up on...). It's unclear how much Xiao Xingchen is involved later on in the confrontation with Jin Guangshan once Xue Yang starts working with the Jin, but he's not the one initially arguing for his punishment right off the bat.

The impact of the fierce corpse "they're not dead they're just uhhh something else" edit - a-Qing not being a ghost rather than whatever she's supposed to be is the biggest one here, since Song Lan not being technically dead (strictly speaking, look, everyone knows what's going on there) doesn't really impact much.

Don't get the whole of Xue Yang's story, particularly in the way it's split up between the storytelling scene and the confrontation later on. The way that MXTX chooses to reveal information is significant and I think it's relevant that this one comes in two parts; as far as we know in CQL it only comes up when things are really going to pieces.

Less of a sense of the relationship between a-Qing and Xue Yang as something less than totally hostile all the time, which is really not that huge a thing but is important to me.

The Wen and Yin Iron stuff/Xue Chonghai connection.

and while these are all, I guess, significant on a plot level, the thing is that they don't have a huge amount of impact on how I read the characters/overarching themes of the story. to a certain extent the details I choose to go with depend on what specifically I'm talking about, the kind of fic I'm writing, or the context of analysis I'm doing at the time. but when I'm just freewheeling it rotating xuexiao like a rotisserie chicken, I feel like what I tend to end up going with is an unholy mashup that more or less looks like this:

Drop the Wen part of Xue Yang's timeline and the Yin Iron subplot.

Their first meeting is at Jinlintai, but both Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan are there at the Chang massacre. (Only really changes if it's important to me that the characters interacted with the rest of the cast at some point.)

Regardless of whether he tells it or not, the entirety of Xue Yang's backstory remains as it stands in novelverse.

If we're talking post-Xiao Xingchen's death, A-Qing is her semi-fierce-corpse-y self from CQL if I want to bring her back somehow. Otherwise she is a ghost.

It's important to me that Xue Yang personally beheaded Nie Mingjue. I think he deserves that opportunity.

Song Lan kills Xue Yang in Yi City (rather than Su She snatching him away at the last minute), unless for some reason I want Xue Yang to not be definitively dead (i.e. nurture the tiger).

All Yi City characters look like their CQL designs in my head.

but really it's just...it depends? when I'm writing fic it depends on the story I'm trying to tell what I choose to go with on various points of canon, whether I consistently stick to one or the other or borrow from both. the same is true for headcanon nattering. if I'm doing any actual meta/analysis, I try to at least be clear where I'm drawing my evidence from/the textual source for my argument, or focus on one version of the text at a time.

I guess if I had to choose at sword-point or something then I might narrowly go with novel xuexiao, because the novel fills out the story with more detail than CQL did. when I think about the show versions of the characters, it's hard to do that without it being on some level informed by the background information that's on page but didn't make it on screen.

[morethansky]

*TBB SPOILERS*

Now for Actual Thoughts about my new favorite episode:

The way Hunter tries to get Crosshair to fight with him like they used to (to the point of drawing blood!) so that they can work out their issues the way he expects them to, but Crosshair no longer has the will to fight and even seems afraid of confrontation. And then with the memory of Mayday and Barton IV haunting him, Crosshair finally meets Hunter head-on and lashes out like he used to. And Hunter finally feels like he's found his sea legs! They can punch it out, just like old times! But then when danger rears its head, his protective instincts kick in and he pushes Crosshair from the spray of snow from the wyrm—reenacting what Mayday did for him when he pushed him out of the way of the boulder during the avalanche!!!!!!!

Honestly cannot believe they went to Barton IV. It's so on the nose, especially with the ice vulture, and I am HERE FOR IT.

The juxtaposition of Crosshair specifically being shown practicing his sharpshooter skills on Pabu—this beautiful, tranquil island paradise where Hunter is trying his damndest to retire and leaving the fighting behind. Because Crosshair still believes what they're good for is being soldiers—particularly himself—and he doesn't remotely know how to do peace.

BUT THEN during the wyrm fight, Crosshair uses his rifle not to shoot at things or kill them like he wanted so badly to in the previous episode (he even specifically says that shooting the wyrm "makes it angrier"!!!), but by using the blaster bolts to melt the ice to get to Hunter and using the butt of the rifle to pick Hunter up. Crosshair is learning that he doesn't just have to shoot things perfectly to be helpful! And that his fighting skills can be used for good ("I...did things")! This is the lesson I've wanted so badly for the whole Batch to learn but only Echo had so far, I'm so happy!!!

I love Hunter slowly piecing together how different Crosshair is now and trying to figure out what he's been through that would have caused such change. This is what we were owed in seasons 1 and 2! I've wanted so badly to get inside Hunter's head and understand what he felt about losing Crosshair and we finally got a version of that!

Still so weird that this show keeps talking around the chips? Almost like the showrunners just want these things to have happened to the characters regardless of the chips. But it's such a key part of the story?? Like one of the overarching themes of the show is about the clones' agency and self-determination, and the chips and the Empire are specifically in opposition of that.

I'm so happy Echo finally showed up and so relieved that there is actually going to be a rescue mission for the clones in Tantiss because I was super worried after episode 3 that they were just going to leave them back there. It's also a great tool for the structure of the season. My guess right now is that Hemlock will attack Pabu to get to Omega in the midseason climax, and Hunter will finally rally and bring the fight to him in retaliation.

After the episode 4 cliffhanger, I was worried that Wrecker would be skeptical of Crosshair, but that felt too tragic, and I'm so glad they eschewed it. Wrecker being the one to present Crosshair's old kit to him was perfect, especially because in season 1 he was the one who kept Crosshair in mind the most (on screen, at least). And the hug!!! I genuinely didn't believe we were going to get one!

They kept his toothpicks, just like we've written in every reunion fic!!!

[yellowraincoat]

writing ask: 10, 24, 28 also bc hearing about delightful characters is a delight

10. Has a piece of writing ever “haunted” you? Has your own writing haunted you? What does that mean to you?

A very not deep answer to a pretty deep question but, sometimes my old writing haunts me in the sense that it’s just that bad 😎😎

Like, it’s sad to know I’ve truly outgrown stories that I used to think were important to tell. And it’s very strange to know that at one point in my life (high school) I really put my whole chest into some very mid plots and cheesy characters. But I was learning— it’s a learning process.

As far as writing that haunts me with its emotional depth/tragedy, i have scenes I’ve written that hit me very hard, but i don’t know if that’s really the same thing…

24. How much prep work do you put into your stories? What does that look like for you? Do you enjoy this part or do you just want to get on with it?

Oh, it’s allll prep baybeeee.

In fact, the first step for me before I decide to write a story is looking into what genre tropes appeal to me, then picking overarching themes I want to work with, then the general plot. I literally construct characters to fit what I think I need for the plot, which I think is backwards to how a lot of writers opperate.

Anyway I love the outlining stage. All the joys of writing without worrying about good prose

28. Who is the most delightful character you’ve ever written? Why?

[i’m going to go with delightful to me, bc I don’t know if any of my characters are just purely delightful.]

Anyway, Chase!! My son!!

He exists in a universe where he’s a famous superhero and I get to let him do all sorts of batshit things like come in through windows several stories up just bc he thinks it’s funny.

He’s rich and successful! He’s flunking out of his senior year of high school! He cannot do his own laundry!! He refuses to make plans during high stakes superhero missions! He has clinical depression! His crush and his ex girlfriend become friends and make fun of him together [affectionate]! He’s contributing to a really poorly regulated policing system that he’s never once analyzed morally!

Basically he’s written to be slightly hateable and he brings me nothing but joy.

[dailyaudiobible]

3/7/2023 DAB Transcript

Numbers 8:1-9:23, Mark 13:14-37, Psalm 50:1-23, Proverbs 10:29-30

Today is the seventh day of March, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian, it is fantastic to be here with you today, as we continue to move our way, step-by-step through the week that we are in, and through the season that we are in, and through the Scriptures, obviously, which is why we gather around the Global Campfire every day. And so, it is a joy to be in your presence today and all of us to be in the presence of the Lord, as we immerse ourselves in the Scriptures. So, let's dive in, we are working on our way through the Book of Numbers, and we are observing everything get set up. There is a destination in mind here, that these children of Israel are to embark upon, a destiny, a place, it’s called the Promised Land, the Land of Promise. And now they are being equipped, not only for the journey but what things are supposed to look like when they get there. And so, let's pick up the story today, Numbers chapters eight and nine.

Commentary:

Okay, let's take a brief look at this Proverb that we just, that we just read. The way of the Lord is a strong hold for the honorable, but destruction awaits evildoers. The righteous will never be shaken, but the wicked will not remain on the earth. We read a Proverb like this and immediately gravitate toward the promise, the way of the Lord is a strong hold for the honorable, the righteous will never be shaken. And so, we hold onto those things, standing firm in them, believing that we are the honorable and righteous one’s, but there is a dark contrast here. The opposite is true, the way of the Lord is the stronghold for the honorable, but the way of the Lord is destruction for evildoers, the wicked will not remain on the earth, which gives us insight into what God is doing. God is putting back together what has been broken. He is restoring what has been destroyed. He is healing humanity from within, bringing humanity back into relationship with Himself. Part of that process is ridding humanity of the things that pull it away from how it was made, pulling humans away from God: deception, wickedness, evil. These things do not stand in the presence of God. God's righteousness does not permit evil, evil breaks things. Wickedness is an adversary to redemption. So, we can certainly stand on the promises of God and the wisdom in the Proverbs, but we can just apply this to ourselves in our own struggles and trials and think that this is all about us. When actually we have a view of what God is doing, separating us from wickedness and destruction that we might be honorable and righteous. It's not just about us getting through today and getting what we want out of this week. It's about God's work of redemption in the world that we get to participate in and that we get to open ourselves to, that we might be transformed. May we open ourselves fully to the voice of wisdom in our lives today and become more and more aware that what God is after is our wholeness and for us to be whole, that which is wicked, or evil must not be a part of our story. And He will come after these things and walk with us through these things, but sometimes we get ourselves entangled and if we actually want to walk into freedom, it will probably be a process that we engage in, that we stick to, that walk in a straight line out of bondage and into freedom. If we’re aware of what's going on, then we learn to endure, which the Scriptures, that is such an overarching theme in the Bible. We won't be able to escape it as we continue forward. So, let's think about it today because it kinda brings up the posture of Jesus in our lives, we’ve watched Jesus do a lot of things. Most the time He asks, what do you want me to do for you? Do you think I can do this? Do you believe I can do this? Do you want this? It's almost as if the question is being asked to us. Do you want to be free? Are you willing to trust the process?

Prayer:

And Holy Spirit, we invite You into that. Life can be so confusing that we just know when things are comforting and feel good, and we know when things are, bring anxiety and feel bad. And so, we have that pretty clear, and we fight against things that make us, make us anxious, make us feel bad. We’re supposed to cast these cares on You, but that's more than just we need to get out of this feeling it's like we need to cast all of this on You. It's pulling us away. It's pulling us around the margins of deception, it's pulling us into places that we don't belong, and we certainly can't navigate without Your Holy Spirit. And so, we’re inviting You, that we might have eyes to see what You are doing in our lives and what You are after, what You are touching, what You are asking us to open ourselves up to You in. We trust You. There is no other hope. We are utterly dependent upon You, and we know this is true. But we functionally live so much of our lives as if were our own sovereign Lord until we get ourselves into trouble. May we walk with You on the narrow path that leads to life, along the paths of wisdom, wherever they may lead, knowing that if we are together walking with You, there is no other safe place to be. So, we open ourselves up to Your work in our lives, making us honorable, making us righteous. We pray, in Jesus name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com, that's home, home base and that is where you can find out what's going on around here. The Daily Audio Bible app puts that in the palm of your hand, and you can get that from the App Store that works with your device. So, just search for Daily Audio Bible. And check out the different sections like the Daily Audio Bible Shop. There are a number of categories in the Daily Audio Bible Shop with resources that are available to take the journey deeper and wider as we continue step-by-step, day-by-day, through the Scriptures. And so, certainly go check that out.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible. Thank you, humbly. We’re in this together and because of that we’re here, we wouldn't be here or anywhere if we weren't in this together and so thank you, humbly for your partnership. There is a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you're using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or the mailing address is P.O. Box 1996 Springhill, Tennessee 37174.

And as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app or you can dial 877-942-4253.

And that's it for today, I'm Brian, I love you and I'll be waiting for you here, tomorrow.

Prayer and Encouragements:

Hello, my name is Rachell. I’ve been listening to Daily Audio Bible since I was a teenager but never actually stayed committed to the whole year. I always fell off. Never felt interested in trying to hold onto it. Except for these past few weeks, now, in my young adulthood. Trying to get back into it. Trying to remain faithful. And the Lord’s word has been such a comfort for me these past few weeks and what I’ve been going through. And I’ve been listening to the prayers at the end, I never done that before. And I’ve been hearing the prayers of other believers calling in and the words of encouragement. And it’s just been a blessing to hear. And I never really thought about calling in before but today, on the 25th of February, I heard a plea from a mother asking for prayer for her daughter, Tricia. And I know exactly what it’s like in Tricia’s place. I know exactly what it’s like to not want to live anymore. And I also know what it’s like in her mother’s shoes to plead and pray for somebody who doesn’t want to live anymore as well. I pray Lord that You will be with Tricia, to give her peace that she needs. And she will rely on You when she feels like she can’t walk anymore. She knows that You’re carrying her. I pray Father, that when the enemy tells her lies and deceit, she won’t believe it cause she finds her peace in You. I pray that You will put resources and loved ones in her path, God. And that she would just really trust in You, God. I pray that You strengthen her mother, during this time and give her the words that she needs to say to her daughter. Let her know that she is not alone in this, as well. I thank You Lord for all things You do provide. For all the prayers that have been said for Tricia.

Hi, this is Victorious Soldier, just calling to pray for some of the DABers. I want to pray for Bridget from New York City. I want to pray for David Browning of Savannah, Georgia. I want to pray for David Olive Brown. I want to pray for Selena a prayer for the lady from Haiti with the kidnap, a person that was ransomed. I wanna also pray for Soniya in Augusta, Georgia. I wanted to pray for the lady that was pregnant, and she’s got diabetes. I wanna pray for her and that precious little baby. I wanted to pray for the lady whose son came back, I think her name is Daphne, Walking in the Light. I wanna pray for her. I wanna pray for Jessica in Texas. I wanna also pray for, for like I said I wanna pray for Jessica in Texas and I wanna pray for the lady whose husband left her after 31 years. I wanna pray for that marriage, that God be in the midst of it. I wanna pray for the lady from New Jersey. And I wanna pray for Julie and Chris. And I wanted to pray for Neal from Georgia, his wife and the challenges that they’re going through. Gracious Father, we just praise You today. We just ask You to touch those names I called and some of the name I didn’t remember the name, but You know the incident and You know them because of what they’re going through. Father, I just ask You to have Your way. Oh, Father, in the name of Jesus. I just ask You to have Your way. I ask You to heal, I ask You to deliver. I ask You to bring back that spouse that left, that didn’t know, Lord. I ask You to touch that abusive one and deliver them Lord. Convict their heart and let them come and do what is right, Father. In the name of Jesus. Touch that young girl that went back to the way. And touch the one that didn’t want to say what it was about, but Lord, You know all about it. Father, we just ask You to touch. We just ask You to heal. We just ask You to deliver for Your DABers, Lord. They need Your help today, Father. We ask You for life and favor.

Hi, Daily Audio Bible family. My name is David, I’m from Kansas. And I’m calling in to ask for prayer. A little bit about my testimony, I was, my dad’s a pastor, a great pastor. And I had a strong faith growing up and but then after I graduated, I strayed, and I got so far from God, I couldn’t even feel Him anymore. I then came back, God woke me up, changed my life. Since then, I’ve had a brain injury that has left me with many different issues but one of the biggest is I am extremely anxious all the time. I have panic attacks often. Just because of what the possibilities of what this injury can do. I just, I found myself often doubting my faith and I teach the children church at our church. I help with a group we have called Awana’s, and I read my Bible daily, I listen to Daily Audio Bible, which is just been a huge blessing. I find myself understanding more and more of God’s nature. But in my moments of anxiety and weakness I seem to forget all that. And I, I just become very fearful. I just would ask for prayer for that. That I would remember in those times of weakness that God is with me, no matter what. I just wanna say thank you guys for your prayers. All that you guys do as a community. Thank you.

Hello DAB family, this is Sheila. Two really quick prayer requests. I am still looking for a job and I have an interview today. I just pray that God would find me the right job and that His will would be done in my life. I want to serve Him and please Him and I want to enjoy my job, I want to bless so many others. I want God to bless so many others through me. So, please pray for a job for me. And the second thing is really a big prayer request. All my family is Hindu. Only my cousin and I, really, became Christians, a while ago. We both came from a Hindu family and this past weekend we had an opportunity to witness to about 15 of our family members about Jesus and Christianity. Meanwhile, they were attacking us and trying to point out all the wrong things about Christianity and about Jesus and our beliefs. And they’re so prideful about Hinduism and all that they believe in. I just pray that God would bring each one of them to their knees and would humble them and would reveal Himself in a unique personal, supernatural way that God does. My cousin and I are just in prayer for that and there’s often so much persecution and attacks and we just pray that God would fight these battles and would water the seeds I’ve planted. Thank you so much for your prayers.

Good morning, Daily Audio Bible. I'm Tyler from Kentucky. I just wanted to say how encouraging you all are. The last 17 months I've been in jail, wrongly accused and innocent of charges. But while I was in there, I lost everything. But through the tablet at the jail that I could purchase, I was able to listen to the Daily Audio Bible, those 17 months. And through that and other sermons and stuff, I was able to grow closer to God. And I can't say enough how much of a blessing to hear your all's prayers and I hear Brian read the Bible. It’s took God to break me down to every, to below bare bones, just for me to get right with Him. I asked for you to pray for my marriage. We’ve been separated for about four years. Last week she said that she's filing for divorce. She's seeing somebody else and she's beyond happy. And I don't believe in divorce, and I will do anything in my power to save this marriage. I just pray and ask God that He do His will and do a miracle in my marriage for His glory. Thank you all. Bye.

Hi, I’m calling to encourage the young lady that said that she’s been dealing with mental challenges for all of her life. She hasn’t been able to keep a job and she’s dealing with anxiety and she’s on disability and she’s trying, you know, the disability is running out. I want to encourage you really quick to continue to do what your doctor says: take your medicine, in addition, take your medicine, go see your therapist, whatever you got to do. In addition to that, make sure you are digging into the word of God. Pull out God’s promises for you that He has secured for you in his death, burial and resurrection. Open your mouth and decree them over life on a daily basis, even if you have to do it by an hourly basis, if you gotta do it by a minute-by-minute basis. Decree these over your life. Continue, I already said continue, see your therapist but continue to see your therapist and make sure you plan. Make a plan to get back to work because you can do it. Declare over your life as often as you need to that I am free. That’ I’m, say it, say it out of your mouth, I’m free, I’m free from fear, I’m free from anxiety. And after you have prayed and sought God and you know, hopefully you have a support system or someone to talk to about anything that you can sit and pray with you. And even if you don’t ask God, God would just provide it for you. Do what you need to do even if you have to be afraid, do it and declare over your life that you are free and You will be declaring over yourself that you have overcome. You have a authority. Don’t be scared of the devil, let the devil be scared of you sister. And I love you and people at the Daily Audio Bible love you and are praying for you.  

[bogkeep]

i was looking through goodreads reviews to see if anyone else had the same problems i did, and i DID find this after scrolling through multiple reviews praising jj abrams for his genius (insert the longest, deepest, groaniest sigh imaginable here):

It was almost entirely perfect were it not for the Obituary. Being Brazilian, one of my biggest pet peeves – in books, movies, TV series – is when they depict Brazilians speaking Spanish. We don’t. And Abrams/Dorst thankfully used Portuguese when Brazil was involved in the storyline. In all of it, but a little piece of the Obituary, which was all in Portuguese except for 12 little displaced Spanish words left unnoticed by the editors. I know it seems like nothing, but in a book like this, where every minor detail counts toward bringing the whole story together, it broke the magic a little bit.

truly this book was not intended to be read by bilinguals! which sucks because it was the multilingual aspect of it that drew me in, so i had foolishly hoped it would be like, accurate? i'm not expecting every cultural detail to be perfectly spot on, but they could at least had a couple consultants look over it before publishing. or as a friend pointed out - it didn't NEED to involve other languages! this project is plenty ambitious even without involving other languages for Fun International Flavour. the creators bit off more than they were willing to chew.

and yeah no my real problem isn't getting some words wrong, it's just the unwillingness to engage with its own premise in a way that feels true. why pretend it's a translation if you're not going to treat it as a translated text? i get that there's something about the Mysterious Tenth Chapter that the translator may or may not have completely made up, but it didn't have to be a translator. it could be a publisher or any other person who was handed the incomplete script.

also, i maybe i'm just poisoned from a decade on tumblr but i see literal teens write really thoughtful analysis of fiction and literature every single day. meanwhile, the characters of this book:

old pencil notes: "so is the monkey S.'s familiar or his rival? blue pen: "or both... which is funny, i think." black pen: "but dark, too - being at odd with another version of yourself..." blue pen: "isn't that pretty much the definition of *regret*, though? i mean, you don't have to be some tortured artist (or scholar) to feel that way."

like... there's a lot of stuff like this. it reads very fake deep to me, like instagram poetry that's just a Relatable Feeling that would've lived its best life as a tweet. a lot of "oh... this is so real... imagine feeling LONELY... waow..."

the thing about academia and analysis is that it builds on top of existing discourse. it means deconstructing the overarching themes of a story rather than pointing out lines that are relatable and pretend that they're deeply profound for it. i'm happy to discuss the blueness of the curtains but what these characters are doing is "my curtains are blue too" or "this person had blue curtains once; maybe he's the author". idk man it just doesn't feel that smart to me! on one hand i understand that the book needs to be accessible to people outside of academia, but it's also set itself up to be this super intricate ARG but it's all tell no show!!

MAYBE IT GETS BETTER WHO'S TO SAY

some time ago i watched This Video about ergodic literature and got inspired to get the book S. by jj abrams & doug dorst. i've finally started reading it and i have Thoughts

the video i linked shows and explains the premise of the book, but here's the tl;dr - two students(ish) are writing annotations in the margins of a novel called 'ship of theseus' by mysterious author V M Straka while passing it back and forth. they are getting to know each other as well as trying to solve the mystery of Straka. it's a non-linear epistolary story told through a footnotes, scribbled comments, and inserts such as postcards et cetera.

there's a couple reason this book caught my eye in particular:

- i love "two people getting to know each other through letters/accidental text messages/notes" trope. it may just be the internet denizen in me but i'm a sucker for characters who get to know each other through text.

- immediately intruiged by the mystery author's name, Straka - it means magpie in czech, so i feel like i'm getting a head start on the mystery because i'm the specialest little boy in the world!!!!

- it looks cool as hell

(i purchased a used copy that was apparently a library copy so it feels extra Authentic hehe)

ANYWAY i'm still very early in, but i have many impressions to chew on already. first off, i really love the whole premise/medium, and it looks Really Good. there's a lot of really cool details that make it look authentic (if we ignore the COMICALLY LARGE MARGINS) - the book absolutely looks like something i could find in my grandparents' bookshelf. the comments being written in different colours of pen to signal when in the chronology they were written is very good. everything is pointing to a Very Fun and Immersive reading experience.

howeverrrrrrrrrr

while i Am having fun so far, there's also a lot of details that keep shaking my suspension of disbelief. like i am trying my best to hold on to it - im accepting the Comically Large Margins and the silly premise that these two people absolutely had to pass the book back and forth to communicate. like i am fully on board with that. it's just... i feel like this book is trying to Appear more clever than it actually is?

i think maybe the main problem for Me Specifically is that it's pretending to be a book written by a Probably European author and translated to english, but S. was so obviously written/created by americans and not intended to be read by someone who knows any of the languages they're dragging into this.

i was correct in assuming Straka is meant to be czech, as ship of theseus was originally written in czech - but it's weird to me that the narrative is completely uninterested in like... the original? there is a foreword by the translator, who goes on and on about the mysterious circumstances under which v m straka died, but the fact that the original language is czech is mentioned in a *footnote*. i would think a foreword by a translator would, realistically, say more about their credentials or their actual process of translating. or is that weird??? i took a class in classical literature in uni where that's kind of a big deal so maybe i'm biased???

BUT ALSO the fact that straka's identity is So very mysterious and very possibly a pseudonym... if you're like, genuinely trying to untangle this mystery, wouldn't you make a note about the meaning of the name??? like wouldn't you put a picture of a magpie on your conspiracy board about it?? Straka is absolutely a valid czech surname because most czech surnames are seemingly random nouns or adjectives, but if you think it's a pseudonym then someone made a very deliberate choice!!!! HELLO!!!!!!

then they listed the names of people who are thought to possibly be v m straka (of varying nationalities), and like okay maybe i'm nitpicking but i has to take a pen and fix some of them. they used SOME special letters for some of the names but very sporadically - they wrote vaclav instead of václav, and ekstrom instead of ekström... like at least be consistent if you're going to ignore special letters!

the worst language offender by far is this:

if you want "the monkey dances" it's "opice tancuje". you could also do "opičí tanec" for "the monkey's dance". this particular abomination is causing me physical pain.

one of the first inserts i ran into was a letter written in swedish + a direct translation:

GUESS WHAT I CAN READ SWEDISH TOO... i can't tell if the "original" letter is supposed to be the swedish or the english one - while the swedish seems to be grammatically correct (I THINK), it extremely reads as Something Written In English And Getting As Directly Translated To Swedish As Possible. it reads very stilted and oddly phrased. i get the impression i'm not actually supposed to be able to understand it, it's just here for Flavour, and that's fine! this one i can easily justify as the swedish being the in universe translation.

here's another very small thing that made me sigh very deeply

"at what point does this book stop being straka's alone & become *theirs*?" THE BOOK IS CALLED SHIP OF THESEUS. AREN'T YOU GUYS DOING LITERARY ANALYSIS OVER HERE??? IT'S THE FIRST CHAPTER AND YOU'RE JUST SPELLING OUT THE PREMISE TO ME TO THE POINT OF CONDESCENSION.

like. okay. maybe not everyone knows what the ship of theseus refers to (also i want to point out it feels like a very english language phrase to me. it Does exist in czech but it doesn't sound like a good or catchy title i think) - but i really do feel like two university students doing a deep dive into this book + author would 100% analyse the meaning of the title, that's like 101 level stuff!! this comment would be so easy to save - just have Mr Black Pen add a quippy comment about this being a bit on the nose, or pointing out the aptness or irony of the title, Anything. it would add so much to the believability for me.

like i didn't study literature at a higher education level so maybe i'm completely off base, but i DID study art history, and it seems almost absurd to me that these characters are doing so much digging and mystery solving about the author's mysterious past and rereading all of his books to find out more... and not engage with the basicest basics such as, the original text(s) pre-translation, possible cultural contexts, tHE TITLE... why are they drawing connections from choices made BY THE TRANSLATOR that absolutely would not be there in the original czech!! !!???!!!????!!

anyway my biggest actual problem so far is that i'm really struggling to read the actual ship of theseus. i have fun reading the annotations, but the actual book... i am Struggling. i've never been any good at reading ~*The Classics*~ so it might just not be my vibe, but i'm not sure if TOS is even a Good Book? like in this universe it's Allegedly a classic and very iconic or whatever. and obviously it's a challenge to write A Classic that makes its mark on history. and gods know there's discourse about whether or not The Classics are actually good books and that's way above my paygrade. but idk i couldn't get through chapter 1 without skimming through it because it kept boring me so bad.

i suspect i might just, keep reading the annotations storyline and not bother too much with the 'book' part of the book. i genuinely wanna see where the story goes!! despite my complaints i Am sold on the emotional core of it.

i think the premise rules so hard but i really feel like the authors are too monolingual and american and maybe haven't read that many books????? i can't speak on the latter but the former.............. maybe im the one who's too european

[awakeanytime]

I'm thinking about. Guys I'm thinking

So mcr has always color coded their eras. Gerard likes having a theme, a story, an overarching aesthetic to bring everything together into one cohesive whole. Bullets might not have had as strong a coordination going on as the rest, but looking at the album art, and their promotional material, it's all dark, brooding, fucking painful. Revenge is the epitome of the black, white, and red emo national colors. The black parade gets rid of the red entirely. And then we got this fucking nuclear explosion of color with danger days, but it's so neon and God damn radioactive that it burns your eyes.

Now, in the era of their return, they're giving us soft greens, earthy purples and browns, so desaturated and yet so full of life. Sure, they're the colors of decay. But what follows decay if not growth? The fuzz of moss over bones. Mold on stale bread. And life, living, breathing things.

We're seeing the shades of healing. Of becoming something more than what once was. We're seeing how they've changed in the time since they broke up, in the time since they announced the reunion. We might all be flies swarming the corpse of something dead and gone, but we are part of the natural process of returning something to the earth, of allowing it to decay and be recycled, built back into something just as important as it once was.

Or maybe they're just colors, and I'm reading into it too much. Who the fuck knows anymore

[the-lone-witch-and-secret-room]

The Owl House and pacing, a perspective from a fanfic writer that works with a large cast

I’ve seen a bunch of complains about the way The Owl House is paced lately. People claiming that it’s bad writing, and rushed, and whatnot. But from how I see it, you’re complaining for all the wrong reasons, and to the wrong people.

TL;DR: this is an overlaying issue with Disney and the industry that doesn’t allow long shows anymore, essentially forcing writers to pick between good pacing and complex stories being told with large casts.

For context: the fandom I wrote for before I got into The Owl House had a pretty small main cast. There were a few reoccurring characters, but most of them only showed up like five total times over the course of four seasons or had little personality, so my main cast I was writing about always consisted of my main five characters, with occasional cameos here and there. All characters were living together and experienced the adventure from the same perspective. There was one overarching storyline and not multiple. The interpersonal relationships still varied, though, for obvious reasons.

Now think about how large The Owl House cast is, and why that’d send them running into issues. Or don’t, because I have a whole-ass in depth analysis under the cut because this got unreasonably long.

(Also I’d appreciate a reblog, I spent… an unreasonable amount of time on this, lol)

The Owl House is different. There’s the main characters: Luz, Eda, King, maybe Hooty, technically (someone recently pointed out that he’s technically the titular character of the show and I’m still processing that, lol).

But they also have a HUGE additional cast to work with. There’s Lilith, Eda’s sister, and the main antagonist of season one, who has a lot to her character and gets a ton of screen time. There’s Amity, and there’s Willow and Gus, Luz’s friends. They’re all very fleshed out characters, and got a bunch of screen time and development, despite “only” being reoccurring characters and not the main characters.

Then there’s characters that have played a fairly minor role so far. There’s Belos, the big bad villain, who we will likely learn a lot more about this season. There’s the Golden Guard, the new main antagonist our cast deals with personally, who we’re just starting to learn more about. There’s Camila, Luz’s mom, who, despite only showing up a couple of times in the show so far, is very relevant to Luz and how the plot will ultimately turn out. There’s Edric and Emira, Amity’s siblings, who despite only showing up a few times as well seem to have a very worked out personality and background and also have a story that is (at least to some extent) going to be told according to the AMA.

There is at least one more seemingly important character whose role in the bigger story is hard to tell at this point, Raine, but according to the description of the episode, they’re probably going to influence the story a bunch.

There’s Alador and Odalia, who are responsible for a lot of their children’s toxic behaviors, and seem to have bigger plans that will probably be relevant later on.

The characters that are only focused on for an episode or two (like Matt and the troublemaker kids) all have very worked out personalities and even short arcs.

And heck, even characters like Boscha, who is extremely minor and seems like a very one-dimensional bully for the most part, get their moments that hint at there being more to them. We know Boscha has a clingy mom, that apparently has a rivalry with Odalia and works with Amity’s parents. The scene at the beginning of Wing It Like Witches tells us a lot about her general mindset and how she’s embraced that winning at whatever cost is the only thing that matters.

This leaves us with: 3-4 main characters

3 friends with fleshed out stories

Lilith, who is probably the most relevant aside from the main cast

Belos, the main antagonist, and the Golden Guard, currently starting to become a lot more relevant

A whole handful of minor reoccurring characters that have the potential to become bigger characters at any point in time

A handful of minor reoccurring characters that mainly seem to be there to further the story, but still get to have distinctive personalities and motivations (looking p.e. at the troublemaker kids)

That is AT LEAST 9 pretty major, relevant characters whose stories have to be tackled in the same show, in addition to the people that joined in season two and a huge supporting cast of well-developed characters that clearly also have stories of their own, even if not all of them will get told.

On top of that, the Owl House lives from exploring different relationships and different storylines. There’s the overarching story of how flawed the system is that will likely end with them overthrowing Belos, but there’s so much more.

Eda and the curse. Eda becoming a better mentor for Luz. Eda coming to terms with the loss of her magic.

Luz learning to cast magic with glyphs. Making friends for the first time. Slowly falling in love with Amity. Fighting to be able to learn whatever kind of magic she wants to. Learning that she’s not a burden to people. Struggling with her relationship with her mom, and trying to restore the portal so she can get back to her. Figuring out her future and what she really wants.

Lilith trying to cure Eda, and now in season two coming to terms with the loss of her magic and fixing her relationship with her sister. Lilith learning to ask for help.

Willow switching tracks. Willow growing more confident.

Amity becoming a better person, fixing her relationship with Willow, standing up to her parents, falling in love with Luz. Starting to fix her relationship with her siblings.

King finding out where he came from.

Hints at Gus struggling with decision making and stressing himself out less. Gus learning to be more selfless. Struggling with his magic track and being the youngest in his grade.

The newly introduced plot point with the Golden Guard. The plot point about the rebellion that will get introduced next episode.

The mystery with the letters.

And I’m like 90% sure I’ve forgotten something.

That is… a lot of different plots and relationships that are in some way important to the story.

In comparison, as stated, the last show I wrote for focused mostly on the same five characters and their relationships with each other, and one overarching plotline aside from some minor interpersonal relationships with two people’s family members that weren’t even introduced for several seasons. The first season fully focused on establishing the bond within this found family with exactly 1 important reoccurring character, an antagonist that had little personality and got a total of one line of backstory before he died.

If you have 90% of a season to develop 5 characters who live together, that’s a lot easier to do than developing twice the amount of important characters + introducing reoccurring characters season one of The Owl House has—the majority of which have separate lives and do not live together and thus can’t be focused on at the same time.

I’ve seen a bunch of people complain recently that the pacing of The Owl House is off, that the writing is bad, that the show is rushed, etc. etc.

And I get those complains. Believe me, as a viewer and also as an author that takes a lot of time to develop each character and their issues individually, I 100% get it.

But as an author that’s currently learning how hard it is to tackle a cast of the size that The Owl House has, I’ve also come to a whole different understanding from the perspective of the writers on the show.

For context, Locked Out focuses on a couple of serious themes, in the same way that the show does. It has 4 main plotlines: Amity Camila and Luz, Edric and Emira, Eda and Lilith, Willow and the Grudgby Squad (as well as a Gus arc that ties into the last one while also being its own thing, we’re getting to that part). So far, it prominently features: Luz, Amity, Camila, Eda, Emira, Edric, Willow and Gus, and to a lesser extent King, Lilith and Boscha, Skara and Amelia in relation to the separate plots.

That’s eight main characters across five different households. And then there’s the reoccurring characters that will have a larger role later on that I’ve not even had the opportunity to bring into the story yet/feature in a more prominent way. The cast is still growing.

And heck, I have all the time in the world to write this thing, because I don’t have an episode limit, or a deadline, or a limited amount of money to produce it.

For Locked Out, it took me 120k to get through a single week of plot at a very high level of character development, with about as many important characters as TOH has in season 1, and with an equally high number of reoccurring characters, some minor, some major. I think you can compare it to the show pretty well. I’d say, if I were to split Locked Out into episodes, I’d set one episode at about 10k. That would be 12 episodes. 12 episodes to get through a single week. Heck, even if I said 20k words were to be one episode, which I’m pretty sure is too much realistically, that would still be 6 episodes for one week.

And TOH covers more than three months.

That would be at least 72 total episodes to get through the three months of summer camp. And we’re currently progressing past that point.

72 episodes.

Let that sit for a while o.o

Everything that’s happened in season one (which as we know now was about 2 months) would have happened in 48 episodes rather than 19. Pacing-wise, everything would happen at less than 0.5x the speed. The first four episodes of season two would’ve been 24 episodes, assuming we hadn’t skipped a week and a half and had instead shown the immediate aftermath of the petrification ceremony, too.

And I’d love if we could have that, and if we could actually develop the characters and their relationships that thoroughly.

But the sad fact is that shows like The Owl House do not get the amount of episodes that would be required to develop every single aspect of the show to its fullest potential. Disney rarely greenlits shows of 150 episodes anymore. They used to, once, (Phineas&Ferb for example had 130+ episodes—you could tell one hell of a story in that many episodes), but that’s not a thing anymore. And the writers know that going into a show. They know the chances their story will be told in that way are very low.

And thus, the writers, especially ones working with large casts, have to make a choice: cut characters they love, and plots that are important to them, because they know they won’t get the amount of episodes required to do everything perfectly, OR include most of what they want to do, but at the cost of the pacing being off and everything seemingly happening too fast.

The Owl House crew went with the second option. The biggest issue the show has isn’t bad writing. The show’s biggest issue is that its cast and the story the crew members want to tell are too big for the amount of episodes they’ve been given (especially now that Disney decided to cut season 3 down into just three 44 minute specials).

And that’s on Disney, and Disney alone.

The crew is making the most of the amount of episodes they have, and unfortunately the lack of time forces them to rush things, and to sometimes sideline characters to focus on others.

Lilith got a bunch of screen time in the first four episodes. I’m sad to see her go, but she’s basically guaranteed to be back by season 2B. And there’s other people that have gotten way less focus than her so far. We‘ve seen basically nothing of Willow and Gus for the first few episodes, and I’m super happy Gus finally got some focus! We haven’t been inside Hexside all season except to see Luz expelled! And episode seven is even going to introduce a new character. Sometimes there’s parts of the story that certain characters don’t have a place in. And it sucks if they’re characters you like. But Lilith has to go for a bit so other characters can get the same amount of spotlight she did. At the end of the day, Lilith is not part of the main cast. She’s a very important reoccurring character, yes, but so are Amity, Willow and Gus. The main characters are Eda, Luz and King, and they’re the only ones that will always be around. And heck, even Eda got sidelined for a bit in the last two episodes, because we needed to focus on other characters. If not even the main characters are always around because we need some spotlight time for other characters, you can’t expect any more minor reoccurring cast member to be.

God, I wish they’d be given more time and more episodes to bring every part of the plot to its full potential, but they don’t have those, so they sometimes have to take shortcuts that unfortunately cheapen the story here and there. It’s the only way they can hope to tell their story to the end at all. And that makes me hella sad because it’s so obvious that they have an incredible story to tell, and that there’s so much more to so many of the characters we just don’t have the time to focus on.

The thing is: I liked the episode with Gwendolyn. It sends an important message that will hopefully get some parents who watch with their children thinking, and I’ve seen a couple of people talk about how close to home it hit for them. I have also seen a couple of people complain about that being too fast—and also just in general about things in the show getting sorted out too fast. And I get it. At least with this particular episode, I 100% get it.

(I’ve also seen some people complain that “Amity stood up to her parents too fast in Escaping Expulsion”, but I vehemently disagree with that. We’ve been building towards that moment since season one, with her doing more and more things that were technically defying her parents. I don’t see how this was rushed.)

Just… please don’t blame the writers. Dana even said that Keeping Up A-Fearances is one of the episodes that hit very close to home for her in the recent stream iirc? So I highly doubt this was rushed on purpose, or because the whole thing is “bad writing” when the entire writing quality of the show says otherwise.

A lot of shows in general have the issue that they have to be written season by season rather than as a full story these days, because there’s always a chance that they won’t get a next season. How large scale the story they want to tell actually is doesn’t matter if there’s a solid chance they won’t get to do any of it.

From a viewer perspective, I get being frustrated at the pacing being off. But from a writer perspective, the chances are very high that this is a choice they had to make, rather than one they wanted to make. And I don’t think you can truly see this if you’ve never worked with a fleshed out cast that large—Locked Out was really eye-opening for me in that regard.

This isn’t simply a case of bad writing/bad pacing by choice. It’s forced. They’re forced to rush through their plots because otherwise they won’t get the chance to tell certain parts of the story at all. And the saddest thing about this is really that those 72+ episodes to flesh out these plot points further wouldn’t have been an impossible thing to get, at a time.

Go for Disney’s head. Yell at the industry for being what it is today, for constantly axing shows before even giving them a real chance. But this isn’t on the crew.

[admirableadmiranda]

I remember Dee (aka Vrishchika talked about this before) and I referenced it loosely below because she touched upon it perfectly.

A relationship is a work-in-progress that eventually becomes a habit, requiring effort and dedication from whoever is involved.

With fanfiction, you can ship anyone with anyone, depending on the story and how you plot it. Fanfictions aren't canon. Metas aren't canon, just discussions and extrapolations. Canon is the raw text in the novel. In the raw text of the novel, WWX says there is no one he wants aside from LWJ. The guy hasn't even kissed anyone but LWJ.

As someone who's new to MXTX, I think there's a lot of conflation of compatability with choice. Choice is a central theme too in the story in terms of actions, right?

As Dee said, it's not that either WWX or LWJ can't be happy with anyone else because I don't think any human is really built for a lifetime of solitude. However, they choose each other everytime. With the MXTX couples, they're whole and happy on their own, however they choose to be happy with each other. They never even consider anyone else romantically I would say they're like stars orbiting each other with their collision being inevitable regardless of time and obstacles.

You can ship any characters for xyz reason and you might no want it to be canon or maybe you want it to be. But I don't see as to why fanon becomes this overarching single truth as if what MXTX wrote wasn't written intentionally. I don't know if you remember the last bit of discourse a while back by some artist (soursoppi or smth like that) about how MXTX wrote these characters when was younger, so she made mistakes. I think that's what she said, but please correct me because I feel like I'm missing something. I don't know why MXTX's works in particular attract this kind of attention as if she didn't deliberately write these characters and their romance intentionally with little details connecting from the beginning to the end.

People are allowed to play and experiment, but if you're unable to characterize these characters in a way that actually lends to them, that's just poor writing lol

Sorry for the rant, Sangsang! Sending you a big hug, tea and some cookies 😘❤

Awww, I remember that too. It was a long time ago, but the words she said then were fantastic, so thanks for bringing them back to me.

You are absolutely right that MXTX is very big on choice in themes and actions. You can especially see it in how the villains try to protest that they had no choice but to do the terrible things they did and how very clear it was that they actually did. It was their choice to follow through and do it anyway. Xie Lian and Wei Wuxian also have a lot on choice regarding that making the choices they did may have led them into misery at times, but they still consider it worth it and don't regret those choices even though they may have still ended badly.

I feel like for MXTX's protagonists, it's basically the 1 in a million principle, only they're working with much smaller numbers than we are today. But also they really aren't alone even if they don't have a lover. Lan Wangji has his family and his ducklings; Shen Qingqiu has his peak sect martial siblings and his students, Xie Lian makes connections with people everywhere he goes. Just because there's not necessarily someone sharing their bed does not mean they are alone.

Hahaha, you reminded me of my Wangxian are as inevitable as colliding stars line there, anon! Thank you. <3

Fanon is a strange beast because in a way I think it sustains due to how communal it is. Fanon rarely is born out of one person keeping it going a little while ago, but many people coming together to tell stories about these stories and characters they like together and I can get how that's a compelling bond. If you like this same interpretation I do, maybe we could be friends! So that's why it seems to have so much odd staying power even when it's really odd ooc fanon.

I definitely remember the Soursoppi discourse. One of my friends was right at the center of that because she pointed out that Soursoppi was lying about the Ancestral Hall scene in order to misrepresent Wangxian because Jiang Cheng is in the wrong the entire time and in revenge, Soursoppi decided to try and make up a really stupid, flimsy lie that because MXTX had created Xiao Xingchen and Xue Yang back in high school, it meant that MDZS was actually fanfiction. This is...this is not how it works. MXTX is so very deliberate and careful and I think where the real tripping points are is that there's not many holes for fanon to go into but people try to make it anyway because they're used to being in fandoms with more holes than fabric and also that there are a lot of very relevant cultural and societal details as well as MDZS being a deconstruction of regular Xianxia that especially western fans tend to ignore even though they are incredibly relevant to the story itself. I've read some more Xianxia and Wuxia now and holy hell is she deconstructing the fuck out of common tropes there.

"If you're unable to characterize these characters in a way that actually lends to them, that's just poor writing" Anon you are speaking my language and I love you.

The rant was lovely, it made me tear up with happiness! Thank you for such kind words on this wintry day, the big hug, tea and cookies are perfect for my snowy weather!

Thank you very much for stopping by today, anon.

[thefools-journey]

So. Some of you may be wondering why we haven’t written a whole ton about the secondaries or what have you. Here’s the reason: we were waiting for them to end before we really dug into the problems we were noticing. We felt that it was only fair to wait for the routes to finish so that we had an understanding of the writers’ vision. Who knew, we thought, maybe they would see the problems themselves and course correct, maybe they are building to something we can’t quite see yet and these issues will have actual payoff, maybe-

In light of Muriel and Lucio’s endings, and the general mess that has dominated Portia’s route for a year plus now, we are breaking our silence. We are actually going to talk about this shit show.

The fandom at large has talked about a bunch of issues with the secondaries but for me, the cardinal sin, the thing that really all the issues lead back to, is this: the writers lost sight of the tarot themes which so strongly defined and held together the primary routes. Let me explain.

The primary routes each center around three thematic cores:

The Love Interest’s Major Arcana and its Reversed/Upright meanings

The MC’s Fool’s Journey, both how it can go right and how it can go wrong

A question about the MC’s identity and their relationship to said identity

Asra’s route asks: Who was the MC? How does the MC navigate a past they cannot and will not remember? What do they owe a past they cannot remember? How do they handle the revelations of what Asra, Nadia, Julian, etc did? How do you right the past? Can you?

Nadia’s route asks: Who is the MC? The MC has no past. Are they the Fool only? Are they actually the same person they were? How can they tell? Who are they, really? Are they an imposter? No one can answer these questions for them.

Julian’s route asks: Who will the MC become? How does the MC see their future? Is there anything worth fighting for for that future? What will become of them and their loved ones? 

Now, if you notice, these themes are expertly woven throughout the primaries. Asra’s past dominates his route, Nadia is also missing memories and trying to construct her identity both with her family and with Vesuvia, and Julian’s fear of the future drives his flailing for control. Asra has to learn to take a broader view of his actions to get his Upright Ending, Nadia has to learn to trust herself and those around her for hers, and Julian has to learn how to let go for his. These lessons are the issues their cards stand for. The primaries are so dang elegant and delicate in their handlings of theme it is honestly awe-inspiring.

Thematically, the secondary routes have completely lost their hearts. First of all, the MC does not have strong, core questions which need to be answered. They just don’t. I suppose the writers did not want to retread old territory (which is weird considering how tightly bound the primaries are; it really tricks you into thinking you’re living the same events but from different angles depending on your route) but they did not replace the old with anything new. Muriel’s route is, on the surface, about discovering and owning his past, the good and the bad. Why not tie MC’s self-discovery to that story? Or they could have taken the angle that Muriel’s route is about convincing him to be present and active in the world while MC builds an identity for themself outside of Asra, the shop, and the memories they cannot retrieve. Why not tie the investigation themes running through Portia’s early route back to MC and their past? Portia has the unique angle of being as in the dark as MC about all of this, why not discover the past together? And for goodness’ sake, Lucio has no future when his route begins, why not tie that to his need for growth, responsibility, and MC’s own future between the Fool, the Devil, or something mortal and in between?

Secondly, the routes lost their tarot backbone. We have a primer on how to get specific endings for each LI and it still holds, but the writers did not follow through on the thematic coherence of each secondary. The Hermit is looking for something, be it perspective, insight, a solution to a problem, whatever. The key here is that the Hermit must find or learn what they are searching for, this thing must change their understanding of the world, and finally, they must bring this lesson back to the world from which they retreated. Can someone please enlighten me as what exactly Muriel learns then teaches the world around him? Nothing Muriel learns from Morga, MC, or even the Hermit ties back into anything. The Devil warns that you are out of control and exerting a lot of manipulative, destructive behavior on the world around you. It asks you to take responsibility for yourself and your actions. So can someone tell me why Lucio’s route actively avoids any interaction or reflection on two of Lucio’s biggest victims: Muriel and Julian? Why does the route only try to make amends with the “easier” of his victims in the cast? The Star is first and foremost the card of clarity, the light at the end of the tunnel. Perseverance, if you will. Yet Portia’s route has been the muddiest of the trio; the writers drop the investigation aspect of her route in favor just handing her and MC information they could have easily found and muddying the waters with Tasya (she blows up the palace but it’s all okay bc she has a secret daughter Julian never thought to bring up or mention) and the complete removal of the Devil as antagonist. 

So that leaves just the Fool’s Journey trying to hold this stool up with only one leg. And well...it doesn’t go well. At best, the secondary route books pay the barest surface level homage to the themes of the individual cards. At worst, they ignore the cards completely. Muriel's Moon book has nothing to do with illusions or delusions or lies or even an Alice in the Looking Glass upside down world. Portia's back half is a complete and utter mess, starting with her Temperance book being so badly mangled that Muriel's aftermath book does it better. Lucio's route too bungles the Tower and the Star. There just isn't enough here to carry the routes alone.

Add to the core loss the loss of intertextuality. The primary routes are very good, even great but they too do have their moments and mistakes. What helps strengthen them when the cores stumble is how the trio is woven together. Things you learn in Asra's route can inform the way you play Nadia's, for example. Julian's route informs what is going on in Asra's route and slots some missing puzzle pieces together. Nadia's route tells you of the power struggles she is facing and informs the other two routes' handling of Julian and his trial. On and on, the three routes support each other because they are built out of the same basic plot beats, just tackled in very different ways. Now, the writers are allowed to try and write whatever they want. They apparently wanted to be more experimental and less tied down to an overarching plot with the three secondaries. Okay, fine, they are allowed to do that. The problem is that they sacrificed one of the key strengths of the primary trio and didn't replace said strength with anything else. They also, on some level, harmed the very premise of the game, which is that only the player's choices and route selected change the overall plot. Instead of feeling like legitimate possibilities or offshoots of the same timeline/plot, the secondaries feel almost like Arcana AUs. The secondaries throw out all relations to the primaries and each other as quickly as possible and for what? 

It is probably the height of arrogance to suggest fixes for works whose behind the scenes I do not know. At the same time, some small, obvious changes could have salvaged Muriel and maybe Lucio's endings (rip Portia). Instead of having the Hermit appear as a disappointing cameo, why not have him say something cryptic to Muriel, then have MC start trying to seal the Devil. Then let Muriel use his forget me mark to cloak MC and hide them from the Devil's attacks. Protecting MC by hiding them from Lucio, keeping him focused on Muriel, seems to me a simple third solution between Muriel's desire to run and his desire to never fight again. It lets him stand up to Lucio and let him have it while holding onto who Muriel has become. The Reversed End would have MC try to draw Lucio's attention at some point, disrupting the sealing, and eventually leading to Muriel killing the Devil. With Lucio's Upright End, I just have to ask: why doesn't MC fully claim the power of the Fool instead of the Devil? We don't need the other Arcana involved in this fight; we have three routes that demonstrate that. Just have MC pull Scout into the conflict, then have Lucio tell MC he believes in them, then add his power to the mix. You got yourself a full Fool who leaves Scout guarding the realm until they and Lucio's mortal bodies fail and they return to the realm to be together forever. Boom, you're done, you can even add some ambiguous lines so that players can decide how happy their MC is with this arrangement, send me the check.

Here is the bottom line. Our group is full of aroace, and several combinations therein, individuals. We are the last group who should have gotten into a dating sim of all things. But the Arcana did something with the primaries that was special; they wrote a compelling plot with dazzling lore, complex characters, and strong themes wrapped up in a dating sim bow. The writers know better and we know they know better. I do not know what happened with the secondaries, especially around books 10-11, which is where minor issues slowly start spiraling into major ones, but it is clear that Nix Hydra needed some more planning before they released these routes. Hopefully they will learn.

TL;DR: Nix Hydra fired their tarot consultants about eighteen months ago and it has wrecked their secondary routes until they were just embarrassments. They never intended for the secondary routes to even exist and once they had to make them, they scrambled and threw out everything that made the primaries work.

- Mod Telos

[senseandaccountability]

Hey, did you get a chance to watch season 6 of Lucifer? What did you think of the finale?

This is going to be salty (sorry) so I put it under a cut for people who prefer joyous things in the feed.

I didn’t like the final season.

To be brief: It felt like a story where the writers knew how they wanted it to end, and therefore the plot ruled over the characters. It wasn't a main plot I enjoyed at all, and it was told in a way that made it difficult for me to appreciate even the small bits I liked. (Ella reveal. Ghost Dan.) I thought it suffered from a jarring tonal shift and when it comes to several overarching themes, I felt it negated/trivialized previous seasons. In many ways it also managed to be both cheesy and cruel, often at the same time. I had the impression it was a compilation of (unfortunately rather boring) fandom wishes and tropes more than authentic storytelling.

To be anything but brief:

I dislike the season in part because it undid a lot of great things about Lucifer as a character.

By the end of 5B Lucifer had come full circle. I think that season finale is great. The Lucifer vs Michael fight was so well done thematically - he fought himself, and unlike the first fight in 5A when he wants to hurt his twin he had now reached a state of personal growth, of compassion. Not even when Michael kills Chloe does he deserve death because everyone deserves a second chance. And then the funny and pitch perfect “Oh, my me”. Ambiguous enough about the details to fuel the fandom, clear enough about the themes and the lore to offer closure. (No, Deckerstar didn’t have a date or much of a snog but I can fill in the blanks there though I am aware that many fans were disappointed by the lack of on-screen love.)

Excellent way to end the show.

Except they didn’t. S6, I feel, tried to tell the same story all over again, only not as well or even coherent.

Over the seasons it’s been pretty clear that while Lucifer can be caring, he mostly cares about the handful of people in his life. S6 even touches upon this, has him trying to care for random people in their hell loops. But S5 already did this, but better, with Michael. The family dinner with God was excellent, it showed broken people all around and had Lucifer, the self-centered drama queen of the family realizing that he’s not the only one that’s been hurt. It showed the best and worst of them all. Sparing Michael, considering Michael worthy of redemption, was peak growth for Lucifer as a character because in that moment he also considers himself worthy of the same thing. That’s when he truly forgives himself. I thought. And then season 6 shows Michael as a prisoner in Hell, just once, never to be mentioned again. Is that a second chance? Is that redemption? Is that really the symbolism they were going for or just a spiteful and stupid little addition because LOL SOME PEOPLE DESERVE HELL. (Do they? Says who? The show doesn’t answer that because the show that focuses on the neutral character the Devil and the totally untarnished place Hell doesn’t much care about such divisive matters, but more about that soon.) I dislike the season, in parts because I wasn't satisfied with the moral/quasi-theological backdrop. The system is wrong, Lucifer concluded by the end of 5B. Season 6 has him return to the system, as an Afterlife Coach of the Damned. Is that really the best they could do?

I mourn all the cool possibilities of what Lucifer, the advocate for free will and defender of desire, could have done with hell as a concept. Blown it apart, closed it, tossed the keys to someone else and rode off in the sunset. At the very least he could have altered it so that it’s no longer solitary confinement but a collective of doomed souls trying together to achieve redemption but hey, never mind me, I’m a bleeding-heart socialist and I don’t believe in revenge and I don’t believe in God but if I did, God would forgive. Otherwise, what the hell is the point?

I parsed through the season with my husband, a real-life minister who doesn't think anyone deserves hell and who gets to suffer my long-ass questions about the theological themes of popular culture a little bit too often. Because we both felt slightly insulted after watching. "Is this bullshit what they offer me?" my husband asked me as the timey wimey time travel plot unfolded. But timey wimey bullshit aside, we concluded that the real reason we were both so annoyed and frustrated with the season is because it highlighted how flat the background lore really is. I mean, I guess they wanted to be yay, neutral and non-divisive themes galore! It’s good to be good, folks! If you’re not, well, I guess you might have your spine broken by the Devil or sent to a never-ending hell loop but let’s not talk about religion! The main issue, for me, with the whole system of heaven and hell and earth on the show is that for every equation, there’s a part missing. The show has borrowed the character from the comics verse but left the entire lore and its internal logic behind. It borrows a bit of moral philosophy, but cuts away the troublesome bits otherwise Lucifer can’t both be on a redemptive path and happily slaughter people in fits of vengeance; it uses Heaven and Hell and vaguely also the concept of sin but never answers any questions about it, apart from the central message of course: it’s up to you. In fact, the show discourages questions about the lore because it has no answers. It doesn’t care. The ending of the show brushes off the much needed systematic changes of heaven and hell like it’s just another joke. (Want to know a show that has compassionate writing about morality while managing to be very funny? The Good Place. And you know what, morality should be serious. I’m a softie and again, a bleeding-heart, but it’s important to be a good person and it’s important to get a chance for redemption. It matters. It’s not just a minor detail.)

Which brings me to the damn therapy theme. I know a lot of people like it and I have also liked it a lot in previous seasons. I have. It’s been quirky. (Also highly unprofessional, but hey.) But as the key to your afterlife/redemption/second chance it’s just not good enough.

It is so very, very individualistic that it makes my skin crawl. It’s the ultimate American solution to systemic injustices and suffering - hey, it’s up to you, man. You decide if you deserve hell. You decide if you deserve Heaven. You make the difference! You can do it! Live the afterlife dream, achieve all your goals, get a hell loop that no longer loops but… stays in one static place where at least you’re moderately happy. Navel-gazing into your soul is certainly one way to get some insights into your mistakes. But it’s not redemption. Redemption is an active choice to be a better person. You don’t have to earn redemption or deserve it. And redemption isn’t the same as forgiveness either. Redemption is the opposite to pointless, everlasting punishment. It’s hopeful and it’s ugly and it’s full of purpose and the chance to be better and add something good to the world. Even Lucifer doesn’t get to do that on the show. He deals only with the already doomed. The here and now on Earth fades into the distance as Deckerstar, too, gets their happily ever after in Hell. You’ll get pie in the sky when you die. Or you get to shag on a throne in Hell. Either way, life on Earth doesn’t matter. (Here the show lean into some really dodgy Christian themes, I’d argue, but hey, it’s not about religion! It’s just a fun romp about a reformed bad boy!)

“Hell is just revenge porn for fundamentalists and other people who believe in eye for an eye. I just want there to be a level of collective forgiveness and hope, you know?” I told my husband whilst chugging down beer. As you do when you watch crap that makes no sense. “A level of hey, I’ve got this, I forgive you, you can do better. Go and do better. And then the actual opportunity to do so, even if it's just reliving your life as a ghost again and again until you figure out what went wrong.” “Honey,” my husband said. “I hate to tell you this since you’re an atheist but that level you’re talking about? That’s Jesus.” Well, screw that.

I really don’t want to need Jesus to make sense of a story. I just want decent bloody storytelling.