#but that just makes the character less accurate to the source material

[meet-me-at-box5]

i would totally get into cosplaying, but i have a bit of a personal problem: i wear glasses. it’s not like i can just take them off, i have very bad vision that isn’t even perfect with my glasses on (i have 20/25 vision in my left eye with glasses). there aren’t that many characters i can easily cosplay with this obstacle. either my face needs to be completely covered or the character already wears glasses. plus i mostly like period pieces/classics/fantasy media, making the glasses a bit out of place and i’d need those circular wired frame glasses. it’s just a nuisance. not to mention most of the cool and recognizable characters i know of don’t have glasses.

[annabelle--cane]

it's fascinating to me the way that different social media platforms result in different types of fandom behavior. while s5 of tma was airing, I spent a good amount of time on tma tiktok (I log back in about once every two months now, going back to in-person school after a year a half of lockdown seem to re-blanace my brain and made me once again not really enjoy the format) while still using tumblr as my main socmed, and while there was a lot of overlap in the fan culture, some things were notably different.

tumblr tma fans had near-encyclopedic knowledge of the source material, but it was kind of an ongoing joke for tiktok tma fans that everyone binged the whole show in a week-long fugue state and lost memory of about 35% of it. tumblr has virtually no character limit and allows posts to be passed around by users indefinitely, which lends itself to fairly in-depth meta analysis being made and shared until most any fan could say "the time and space discrepancies at hill top road? psh yeah, I know all about them, I've read seven scrupulously cited posts that lay out all the details." for the entire time that s5 was airing, tiktok videos could still only be a minute long, and I know from a lot of personal effort that there's only so much you can fit into a one minute script that you also have to memorize and record (and cc manually with tiktok text stickers, as they didn't add the caption feature until april 2021) if you want the process to take less than four hours of your one mortal human life. and then you only see the video if your following or fyp algorithm shows it to you. there were a few tma meta-ish videos that got popular because other people would make their own videos referencing them and tag the account so their followers could see what they were talking about, but it's much harder to circulate content you like there. several times I saw people post videos saying "I got into cosplay to film some [agnes or annabelle or gerry or another secondary character] and I just realized I have no idea what their deal actually is 💀".

a thing that tiktok tma fandom was definitely better at than tumblr tma fandom was accurately remembering certain pieces of characterization and the flow of certain scenes. I've seen a bunch of posts on here where someone is trying to argue a point with excerpts from the text ("x character is nicer than you all give them credit for" "x character is so mean to y character in this scene" "z theory can't be true because y character said a line that disproves it") where the argument only holds up because the poster has gotten these excerpts from a transcript dive and hasn't listened to the episodes they're from recently, because while the text alone can be construed to mean one thing, the way it's delivered on-podcast clearly intends another. tiktok, being an audio and video based medium, allows audio clips to be shared around a lot, and cosplayers would often all make videos acting along to the same show clips of juicy interpersonal drama, and so tiktok fans, though they may have had less overall memory of what characters said, always had a better grasp on how they said it. an average tiktok tma fan might not have remembered melanie's subplot about war ghosts, but they would know the nuances of how the way she talks to jon changes between mag 28 and mag 155.

[lazywitchling]

[This is a fictionalized account of something that was communicated between myself and J, my familiar spirit. For storytelling / convenience / communication's sake, I will write it out as a conversation with words as if he were a person standing next to me, but the reality of it was less tangible and more... woo-woo. While dialog is fictional, the message that was communicated is accurate.]

--

I had my recently purchased copper pendulum in the pocket of my work jacket, and was fiddling with it in stolen moments in between stocking the walk-in cooler. I wasn't divining with it, just playing with it like a fidget toy. I had a theory about the conductivity of copper being good for communication with spirits, and judging by how apparent J was making himself, the theory was pretty sound.

"Some materials are easier for me to touch than others," he said. "Metal, stones, sticks, feathers, seeds..."

"Natural materials," I summarized.

"Sort of, but not always." It didn't exactly explain much, and my confusion was evident. So J continued with an explanation. "Show me what's in your pockets."

I pulled out two of my pocket trinkets, knowing which ones he meant. In one pocket, a small potato that had fallen onto the deli floor. A good thing to have on me to absorb unwanted 'bad vibes', of which there were many in retail. In the other pocket, a plastic d20. Not a nice one, just the generic blue one from the starter kit, so that I wouldn't be sad if it fell out of my pocket.

J 'pinged' the potato first. A nice spiritual reverberation, a sharp crack like a heeled shoe hitting a marble floor. Then he pinged the d20. A dull thud, more like a boot in mud.

"So... natural materials," I repeated.

Head shake. He indicated a wooden crate on the shelf I was stocking, then gave me an image of one of the plastic action figures on my bookshelf at home. "The action figure is easier to touch than the crate."

He'd lost me now. I was trying to figure out what the copper pendulum had to do with an action figure.

"It isn't necessarily the materials," he explained. "Natural material is one factor, yes. But narrative is also a material."

"So... my Caduceus Clay figure isn't magically resonant because he's made of plastic, but is beause he's also made of story?"

Somewhere in woo-woo land, I got the sensation of the little bell and woosh sound of a character level up in an RPG, and approval from J. The idea started clicking into place less like a slow conversation now and more like a file upload.

I had a plastic Yoda figurine that I found in my basement. He had long ago lost his robe and walking stick. The painted details on him had started to fade a long time ago. But I decided he was my Lucky Yoda, and I carried him in my pocket for every theatrical production I was part of all throughout college. When one of my cast mates was nervous about their role, I would pass Lucky Yoda off to them. 'Here, take Lucky Yoda. He'll help.' Soon enough, people would ask for him for comfort, or start asking about him during tech week to make sure I was going to remember to bring him. On days when I forgot him, the production was worse, even when I didn't mention to anyone that I hadn't brought him.

Was Lucky Yoda more or less powerful than a four leaf clover would have been? Common advice I had seen from other witchy sources said that the closer an item is to its natural state, the more powerful it will be. A tree has more power than a log which has more power than lumber which has more power than a picnic table. By this logic, Lucky Yoda should have been far removed from any sort of magic. But there was no denying that he had an effect on myself and my cast mates. (Whether or not this effect was magical or psychological is not something I'm here to debate. Believe me or don't. I'm not your priest.) A clover would have had more 'nature' magic to it, sure. But Yoda had story, and that story gave him power. J might not have been able to 'ping' Lucky Yoda as well as a clover just by nature of its materials, but the narrative of him was something that J could ping.

The ethereal concept of 'story' seemed to have a more concrete physical substance in the world of spirits. And I am reminded of the folklore that angels or fairies cannot be creative, and that the ability to create is uniquely human, a little spark of the divine in us. And in the world of spirits where everything is intangible, why wouldn't the intangible nature of a story be just as concrete as everything else in their world?

"Now you're getting it."

I found myself standing stock-still in the cooler at work, staring blankly at a half-unloaded cardboard box of packaged soup while the vaguely blob-like form of a spirit bounced happily at his student's understanding.

I shook my head off and got back to unloading. "So... story: good conductor. Copper: good conductor. Plastic: bad conductor."

"Plastic without care and creativity, yes." J gave me the image of a flimsy, shitty, plain dollar store pencil box. One of those ones where the plastic didn't form correctly, so there's little bits of sharp plastic that you can break off of the edges. "If there's anything you don't want me to touch, you can put it in one of these. But don't put stickers on it, otherwise it starts to get easier."

"I think I get it. Thanks! Here, would you like some soup?" I place a plain plastic container of soup up on the shelf.

"Ha ha."

[dead-enby-detective]

To continue my comparison of the Dead Boy Detective show and the Doom Patrol episode with them in it, I wanted to talk about the exploration of Charles’s aversion/fear of water in Doom Patrol, I thought that was an interesting way to give him some more depth in the short time frame (especially since we get to see more of Edwin’s depth with his pain being used to open the door to the afterlife and Larry reaching out to him to discuss his feelings for Charles).

In the scene above Charles has to work himself up quite a bit in order to cross the lake and continue their case.

DBD Charles, in comparison, doesn’t seem to feel the same way about water.

In episode 2, he’s delighted by the enchanted ocean container.

In episode four, he even calls the view “pretty brills” while staring out into the ocean.

He doesn’t hesitate to run to Crystal when she’s dangling over the ocean.

He walks on the ocean side later (probably partially to ensure she doesn’t try to throw herself into the ocean) and even walks toward the water without any fear.

And when the Night Nurse has him relive his memories she sends him to the lake.

To me he seems more confused, maybe frightened because he doesn’t know where he is or what’s going on and than is far more scared when he gets attacked by the boys again rather than afraid of the water itself.

Then after the Night Nurse lectures him he’s angry,

and willing submerges himself to get away.

Then when he returns he, in his anger, sends her over the wall into the water.

To me, if he was afraid of the water, he’d be less likely to want to go towards it, or he’d at least hesitate before putting his plan into motion.

In my first post comparing and contrasting the Agency from the two show, I said the Doom Patrol Boys feel far less reactive to violence, especially their own. They doesn’t seem scared of it or using it themselves. But while DP Charles isn’t afraid of violence, though it did cause his death, he is afraid of water, which also played a role in his death.

In the DBD show Charles is scared of violence (especially his own) - as violence impacted him greatly in live with his abusive father and bullies but doesn’t seem to be of the water which also played a part in his death.

It’s very interesting to me which parts of his death the writers focused on for each show, the DP writers focused on the water/hypothermia and the DBD writers, the bullies.

As I said in my first post, obviously there’s far less time to explore the boys in the Doom Patrol episode than in the Dead Boy Detectives show so that absolutely could have been part of it.

I haven’t yet read the comics so I’m unsure which version of Charles’s fears is more accurate to the source material, if there’s an exploration of it at all.

It makes sense, in the Doom Patrol episode to show his fear of water. It naturally introduces his death, just as the door to the afterlife being opened by open naturally introduces Edwin’s experience in Hell.

The actor handles it really well. Just as the DBD actor handles his fear of violence really well. Both feel natural and important within the context of their shows.

Additionally, I tired looking up to see if Charles’s father was also abusive in the comics and I couldn’t find anything (please let me know if you know otherwise) and according to his wiki Charles actually died from burn injuries - though he did have to spent time in the icy lake as well.

So it’s definitely interesting that both shows focused on the hypothermia from the lake rather than the burns and it makes sense that if there’s isn’t a major storyline about his father in the comics that DP Charles has less negative feelings about violence than DBD Charles and thus, going back to my first post, reacts differently to it even though he too was bullied to death.

It’s incredibly interesting to me to see how the same character can be played/written in two very different ways based off the same source material and the ways the writers chose to focus on their traumas and fear differently.

What do you all think about how the shows chose to handle Charles’s fears?

[always-a-king-or-queen]

there are literally so many reasons why we don't need a third Narnia adaptation

first of all, while they might not be the most accurate, the Disney movies are actually so good and, in my opinion, still manage to capture the heart and soul of the series and what it's truly about. The characters are each perfectly portrayed; the Pevensies act like actual siblings and yet love each other dearly and would die for each other even through all the petty arguments; the music creates perfect atmosphere and emotion and never fails to make me tear up or get shivers down my spine; and the CGI is honestly just absolutely stunning.

I really do not feel like we need another adaptation by Netflix.

Especially not through Netflix.

Netflix has already been known to mess up so many shows and movies by completely changing the source material or adding in unnecessary things that completely take away from the purpose of the story. I can already see them warping Narnia into something that barely even resembles the books, that strips it of its purpose and simply makes it about a fantasy world, nothing more. I've already seen posts saying that the new movies just can't end the way the books end, that heaven must be explained away, that Susan never forgets and falls down a dark path, that the faith aspect must be taken out so as not to offend new viewers.

Here's the thing.

If you take faith out of Narnia, you remove the very heart of the series. you remove the entire purpose. Because Narnia is entirely about faith, and trust, and Someone greater than yourself who sacrifices everything to save your own traitorous soul. the Disney movies did not shy away from portraying this faith as openly as possible. if anyone was offended, I've never seen proof. I have seen many nonbelievers talk about how much they were affected by Aslan's death, which goes to show that you simply don't have to be Christian to understand what Narnia is about, and to love and enjoy it.

So if these new remakes remove the faith aspect, then what is the point? four siblings go to a magical land and save it from a witch and befriend a talking lion with nothing special about him and live there as kings and queens and return home and live happily ever after? there is no sacrifice, there is no "he's not tame, but he is good," there is no creation, there is no redemption, there is no last battle, there is no "in your world, I have another name", there is no sister straying down a dark path because she has forgotten how to hope, and then returning because her story is unfinished and the road to heaven is paved with flowers that symbolize her name.

so then, what are you left with? Aslan is just a talking lion, nothing more. the stone table never cracks, the sun never rises. "That by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there" is forgotten entirely, because why would Aslan exist in our world if he is merely a talking lion in Narnia? Aslan's country is changed to be something else, and there is nothing about how Aslan suddenly no longer looks like a lion, and how the things that happened after are more great and beautiful than can be described. Edmund's life is never threatened because of his traitorous deeds; Aslan never offers his own life in place of a guilty boy, is never killed, is never resurrected.

the very core of Narnia is removed, and what you are left with is emptiness.

sure, it might make for a good fantasy story nonetheless. you might still have sweeping views and epic music and an intriguing plotline, but something will always feel like it is missing. like there is an empty hole, desperately needing to be filled.

of course, I don't know that all of that will happen; it's just speculation at this point. But I am fairly sure that it is safe to predict these upcoming movies as such. I highly doubt the producers will want to include the faith that shapes Narnia, because according to them, having a faith aspect means less viewers since too many people would be offended.

but if only they would look at the already wonderful existing adaptations, they would know that is simply not the case.

[room-surprise]

Dungeon Meshi Anime Review, Season 1, Episode 13 review

This episode has one of me and my spouse's favorite jokes in the manga... And yes, the little sign moves with the hams as they roll away.

This was another great episode!

Thistle!!!!!!! He's perfect. Love that he looks accurate to the manga at this point of the series, and wasn't updated to look more cutesy/younger like he looks in the later manga as Kui's art style evolved to give everyone bigger eyes and cuter faces.

His monarchist speech was chilling and just as good as in the manga. This is a man taht 100% believes in feudalism and the divine right of kings and it's as natural as breathing to him. Love him giving this context for readers and viewers. This is WHAT PEOPLE IN THIS ERA BELIEVE...

Love how we can have Marcille spend an entire episode in just her underwear, fighting for her life, covered in blood, and it's not sexualized. Nothing wrong with sexy things, but very refreshing to see a character able to do that and to feel that the camera isn't focused on objectifying her.

Ok, so time for a pretty big complaint... Leed's voice in the English dub.

As I stated in a previous review, BangZoom entertainment, the English dub company, cast a black actor to play Zon. They have made a pattern of casting real life minorities to play the fictional minorities in Dungeon Meshi, which I think is a noble idea and can certainly bring nuance to the performances! Good for them attempting to do this!

However they rewrote Zon's dialog to have him speak what was either African American Vernacular English (AAVE), or "broken English." In the original Japanese, the orcs do not speak this way, their dialog is more or less the same as everyone else's.

I gave the dub studio a benefit of a doubt because they hired a black actor to play Zon, and I expected that Leed would also be played by an actress of color and that they would rewrite her dialog to match Zon's.

They did not do that.

As far as I can tell, Leed's actress is not black, though she has a Hispanic last name... But much more important than the ethnicity of who they cast, BangZoom did not rewrite Leed's dialog the way they rewrote Zon's dialog.

These characters are siblings, there's no reason Zon and the other orcs would speak a different dialect from Leed.

Did they do this because Leed is pale and pink and they thought that she shouldn't talk in AAVE? They should have known that she was coming later and not done that to Zon then, if they weren't going to continue the trend with Leed.

Very weird, not a fan, makes me question the studio's knowledge and understanding of the source material...

[genericpuff]

I’ve seen some people try and defend Lore Olympus by saying that movies like Hercules and such aren’t accurate to Greek myth, yet they’re still loved. And I somewhat get where they’re coming from, i really do.

BUT- I feel like part of the problem with LO is the fact that if you replace the names, you’d almost be right to assume it takes place in a completely different setting. Meanwhile, if you take away the names from the Hercules movie, you can still tell where it’s supposed to take place. (And who’s who, if you know your myths). Plus the writing of Hercules is 100% better than LO.

The difference between LO and Hercules is that Hercules clearly has respect for the source material put into it. It might not be accurate to the source material - because it's being retooled as a Disney movie for children - but you can tell there's still a lot of thought, love, and effort put into it. The team behind that movie did research on the art and culture of Greece, and adapted it into a movie that was entertaining and recognizable as a Greek myth adaption.

They put our home boy Heracles/Hercules in a tunic! Do you know how shocking that must have looked to American viewers who didn't know a shred of Greek myth and wondered why the big buff hero was being drawn in a skirt? Still accurate though!

LO, meanwhile, writes Greek myth as if it hates Greek myth for existing. It comes across more as a white woman using these stories purely for profit and colonizing it with American-esque culture. The outfits have become noticeably less Greek since the beginning, the characters never eat Greek food anymore, and the locations are left as vague as solid color backdrops to indicate "The Underworld" and "Olympus" without actually showing any set pieces or understanding of how these locations would look and feel in a modern setting.

All of these examples I gave are things we saw a decent amount of in S1. But since then it's just become talking heads on top of flat color backgrounds, eating Chinese food and dressing in American-style clothing. When was the last time we saw a mortal? There's just nothing Greek about the comic anymore because either Rachel has gotten so complacent that she just defaults to what she knows without any research (so what she watches on TV and in movies) or she only bothered with her research in the beginning to get people hooked and convinced that she's a "folklorist" so that they'd keep reading the series and giving her money on good will alone.

Using Hercules as an example of "well it's not accurate to Greek myth either!" completely misses the point of what people are getting at when they say that LO is a bad Greek myth retelling. Guess what else isn't completely accurate to Greek myth? Hadestown. Hades (the game). God of War. Stray Gods. They all take creative liberties with the source material in order to adjust it to the medium and audience they're creating it for, but none of those adaptions are quite as disrespectful as LO's. And God of War literally has little angry man going around and brutally murdering the gods. It still respects the setting of Greek myth more than LO, but unlike LO, it doesn't try to constantly sound smart with its inaccuracies, it knows fully well that it's a video game first and foremost.

And that's the beauty of myths. They can be adapted across generations and used to tell new versions of the same stories. So it begs the question, why bother writing a Greek myth retelling if you're going to make it so non-Greek that you could have just as well just written a normal soap drama and have it still be virtually the same?

Compared to all of the other examples, LO is the definition of confidently incorrect. It should have stuck to just being Greek myth inspired, not a retelling.

[professorhayforbreath]

my blog probably gives the impression that i think the show is bad as a whole, but the reason this show frustrates me so much is because it's definitely NOT 100% bad

like... the movies are bad adaptations. everyone knows it. they have some great moments (an embarrassing amount of which are better than the show lol) but overall they are widely considered blatantly bad adaptations. it's easier to make peace with that

the show, however, is far less consistent and i find it much more difficult to wrap my head around. there are parts that are bad and i'm happy to say that with my chest, but underneath numerous questionable-at-best writing choices, there are glimpses of really, really good stuff. the first few episodes had so much promise—percy burning blue jellybeans and praying to sally, the consensus song. these are brand new additions but they're good, they capture the spirit of the story and characters successfully

and sprinkled throughout the rest of the show are other strong choices! for example in the last episode i really liked that they set the betrayal scene during the fireworks, it created a fantastic ambience. i liked that grover left camp at the same time as percy and annabeth so the three of them got to part ways as a trio on half-blood hill

there are good changes being made, but they're almost all small in the grand scheme of things. in my opinion, the bigger, more consequential things are where they missed the most marks, and that prevented me from fully enjoying the show as a long time book fan

when it comes to writing nothing frustrates me more than wasted potential. mediocre writing is one thing, but mediocre writing that could have clearly been so much better is INFURIATING. i don't dislike the show because i wanted it to be a 1:1 recreation of the book, i dislike it because it's just okay when it could have been great. it so EASILY could have been great and i don't get why it's not. a lot of the writing choices are just baffling in their mediocrity, and sometimes technical weakness, when compared to the well written and effective source material. i wish i could have been a fly on the wall in that writers room when they were making some of these decisions, seriously

the cast is phenomenal. their budget is more than sufficient. they marketed it as a "redemption from the movies", as the adaptation that would finally give fans book accuracy. and the show we got is... fine. it's all right. it's not all that book accurate even though it was advertised as such. there's plenty to like but it comes hand in hand with plenty to dislike. it's only natural for people to be disappointed

i know my critiques can come off as venomous but please never mistake my harshness as hating for the sake of it. i adore the original pjo books so i really wanted to adore the show as well, but unfortunately i can't get there yet. "yet" being the key word because there's still plenty of time for this show to pick up the slack, and for that reason i'm glad it got renewed. i don't have the most faith the writers will listen to the feedback but i'm rooting for them to prove me wrong

[zephyrstargame]

well here's something I can do!

this is a little spin on an idea i've been seeing around that i think is wonderful... I personally, am not in the best financial place to be donating, but i can use my platform as a game developer to help out and do something cool at the same time :3

In exchange for donating esims to gaza, I'm gonna populate the world of Zephyr Star with your characters as NPCs! currently: OPEN!!

Here's the deal-- scurry on over to gazaesims.com to figure out how to buy and donate an esim to the people who need em-- any plan works for me, as long as you're gettin something out there!

then slip into my DMs (or anywhere else you can contact me directly) and show me a screenshot of the email, preferably with timestamps for proof that it's from after this post was posted... or really, any proof that you did do the thing-- also show me:

a reference image for what character you want me put in the game

what this character should say as an NPC (just a few lines at most) (optional; if you'd like i can just write some general dialogue instead)

how you would like to be credited in the in-game credits (ie what name i should put)

below the cut are some submission guidelines and extra notes, please also read that if you're interested :>

here are some general submission guidelines:

nothing too lewd, please!

or racist

or otherwise offensive

fandom ocs MIGHT be fine if they're Legally Distinct enough from the source material, but try not to get me sued here

In general, this game's world has No Humans, but that's not a strict requirement-- just a general suggestion

and keep in mind that characters with super intricate details might have to be simplified in order to work as pixel art

otherwise, anything works! furries, robots, sentient objects, your cat, whatever

and here's some notes, so you know what to expect:

i'll take anywhere between a few hours to a few days to finish, depends on how i'm feeling... either way, i'll tag you in a new post when i'm done!

the character will be done in small pixel art, with maybe some additional effects if i feel it works for the design

i will adjust the sprite size depending on the character-- an average sized character is drawn on a 32x32 canvas but if it's like a giant or really tall or something, i'd make it bigger so that the scale is accurate

everyone also gets a zoomed in headshot for the dialogue portrait

no secret bosses, shopkeepers, or other special story purpose for now, sorry! these are just some guys that stand around and say 1 or 2 lines as you go about your adventure

im putting the characters in various places at random, but if you want your guy to be in a certain type of location in-game let me know

this game is STILL in relatively early development-- but i do promise that each and every submission will be in there by the end! it might take yeaaaars for the full game to finally be out, but i'll be posting screenshots as I put em in the game so you know im not slacking around :>

and alongside the screenshot, i'll also post the sprites on their own if you'd like to save them for yourself

legal stuff uhhhhh im not good at legal stuff-- by participating, you are giving me permission to use your submitted character in the final game-- credit will be given in-game where you would expect to see it (the credits) and i will not claim ownership of any of your guys

(cartoon mafia boss voice) if at any point you want your character scrubbed out of the game, or you want anything changed, let me know in my DMs or anywhere else you can contact me and *click* *sinister laugh* we'll make it happen

no money goes to me ever, im not even gonna be the middlesnake between you and the esims-- i just think its less of a hassle to work this way -w-

did i get everything? i think that's everything... if i forgot something important sorry i'm a scatterbrain failgirl who has never done anything like this before im trying my best okay

may the rift be filled with your cool little guys! but more importantly, let's keep gaza connected! free palestine! 🍉

[queenvhagar]

So I’ve seen a lot of people talking about how Fire and Blood can’t be seen as accurate because it’s a compilation of accounts and I would like to point something out about this:

If we lived in Westeros it would carry the same weight as your average history textbook or historical artifact. But the readers don’t live in Westeros. This is the version of events that George R R Martin gave us. I feel like that gives way more weight to everything in that book, especially how so many notes about “this source isn’t accurate” are included. It may be a source with an unreliable narrator in the world, but it’s the recorded version of events in universe, and nobody should act like it’s totally made up because the real life author published it. It won’t be totally accurate, but it certainly shouldn’t be cast aside.

The unreliable narrator is also used in the Great Gatsby. Nobody acts like Nick is making shit up, they just note that it probably isn’t completely accurate. Fire and Blood should be the same: not entirely accurate and certainly containing unreliable narration, but the author published it so it’s what the real life author wants to be seen as canon

100%.

Treating Fire and Blood as a completely inaccurate collection of sources, made up solely of propaganda and lies against one side, created by GRRM to intentionally portray a skewed version of the REAL history that occurred... it's like, why would GRRM have written it at all then? If he didn't want you to know the real history of House Targaryen, he would have just... not written it. Not sure why people think he would write a convoluted book that turned out to be completely false with fake things that never really happened.

Thinking about it as the history book it was intended to be... WHAT happened in history should be clear, and this is recorded. Same goes for WHEN it happened and HOW it happened. But the WHY... now that is something that the writers could have been exploring. WHY did certain people do the things they did? WHY did certain events play out how they did? This is the part of Fire and Blood that is open for interpretation, not the events themselves. This allows for the creation of character and motivations and arcs and the exploration of inner psyches.

Instead, the writers think they know better than the literal author about how this story and universe work. They're changing the material from the original source while trying to justify it with their excuse and interpretation of "propaganda," and they won't shut up about how profound they think they are in doing this. Meanwhile, they're undermining the themes of the story and rendering it ultimately meaningless in addition to it being a poorly written and confusing adaptation. It has no weight, no depth, no real stakes. The characters are barely characters, as their motivation changes to fit the plot beats. The story has become oversimplified and black and white in its storytelling it's looking less like a quality show à la Succession and more like your average MCU or Disney+ production (just with more shock value of nudity, murder, gore, and incest).

[saintbleeding]

do you have any advice for writing image descriptions? I’ve been wanting to add some to my art but I don’t know how to go about it

hello anon!!! that’s a wonderful thing to want to do and im happy to offer whatever help i can :3

so because image descriptions are very much a community effort, that does also mean there isn’t really a style guide or anything, which can be freeing but also quite intimidating! here are some kinda off the top of my head suggestions:

If ur comfier putting the ID in alt text than the post body, that is still much MUCH better than no ID at all (and side note, if someone copy+pastes ur id into a reblog, it’s not a suggestion that you did anything wrong, they’re just trying to make them maximally accessible. while a lot of ppl who need IDs will use screenreaders and will prefer alt text, there are ppl whose preference is plain text in the body of the post (i personally fall into this category))

similarly, if you are struggling to write an ID/don’t have the energy/etc, i cannot recommend People’s Accessibility on discord highly enough. there are some wonderful folks in there who can give you pointers or even write IDs for you! likewise, i can’t speak on others’ behalf but i’ve gladly written IDs for ppl’s posts before they’ve put them up before, and i’m happy to do so, even if we havent interacted before! you can shoot me a DM with the image you need described and i’m glad to assist

more specifically:

it’s good practice to include the name of the fandom and the characters, assuming it’s fanart. altho it’s likely that fanart will stay broadly within a circle where people are familiar with the source material, there may be ppl who encounter the post and wouldn’t know this detail without it being laid out explicitly

you’re welcome to mention whichever details you like, especially if you are the artist, because you know what’s important to the image as a whole. it’s also perfectly acceptable not to get super detailed on things like clothing/hairstyles, especially if they aren’t relevant to what’s going on

a good rule of thumb is to ask yourself, if you didn’t have the image in front of you and just had the description, would it be a true representation of what the image looks like/portrays? would your mental image be accurate? that’s what you’re shooting for.

the best advice i can give is to just dive in and start, bc it gets a lot less intimidating once you’ve done a few, and it also gets easier the more you do it :3

also, i think trying to follow ppl who describe images helps a lot, because you will get more passive exposure to descriptions and what you think works/doesn’t, which can improve your own ID writing! on that note, highly recommend @princess-of-purple-prose/@pathos-logical (kay is a pillar of this and every community tbqh), @ryutarotakedown, @lucky-numberme, @fox-guardian, @squeeneyart, @hotdrinks, @samwise1548, and @rq-described (a breadth of interests represented here, but also if you’re asking me i presume you have at least a passing interest in audio drama and adjacent :3 )

thanks so much for asking and as i said i’m always happy to help however i can!!! happy describing, i believe in you!!!

[aita-blorbos]

FAQs

You've asked, and we've answered! ...a lot! Here's a compilation of (most of) the questions we've been asked, all in one place.

What types of submissions are not allowed? Anything that 1. makes the mods uncomfortable or 2. is inaccessible (... for people using screenreaders, for people with low vision, for people with migraines, etc). There's a list here, but that's just stuff that's come up often enough we feel the need to mention it. A good rule of thumb is that the closer it is to any real-life horrible thing, the less inclined we are to post.

Genocide, especially if your ask can be summed up as "AITA for submitting/being the victim of genocide?" (Also, if you explicitly term what the POV character has done as genocide, we immediately stop caring about if that's actually accurate.)

SA of any kind, especially if your ask can be summed up as "AITA for committing/being the victim of SA?"

Incest, especially if it is really central to the submission (Also, we may have a different definition of incest than you, so be warned in advance in case your submission that you thought was fine gets sent back or deleted.)

Abuse of any kind, particularly if your ask can be summed up as "AITA for abusing [x]/being abused?"

Suicide, especially if your ask can be summed up as "AITA for committing suicide/making someone commit suicide?"

Extreme violence towards children, especially from the POV of the person doing the violence.

Anything that could be alternately summed up as "AITA for being a bigot?" Yes, fictional bigotry counts.

Submissions about real people.

Harry Potter submissions.

MCU submissions.

All-caps asks. Depending on what software is being run, this can mess with screen readers.

Small-text asks. These are hard to read for people with low vision.

Leetspeak asks / typing quirks of any kind. Again, screen readers, but this time it's for all of them.

Colored text. It can cause migraines.

... For the last four, if your ask makes minor use of caps, small text, leetspeak, or colored text, it will probably get posted with tags like "small text," "not screenreader friendly," or "colored text."

Excluding, to the best of our ability, Harry Potter, we do not delete submissions based on what the source material depicts. 9 times out of 10, we don't know what the source material even is.

Can I submit something about real people if they've been dead for a long time? We would still prefer that you not. If your media of choice is something like SIX, Hamilton, Our Flag Means Death, or any other fictionalized account of real peoples' lives, we may choose to delete your submission even if we recognize the fandom... or there may not be enough to distinguish it from real life, and delete it because we thought you were submitting something about the real Anne of Cleves.

What about Jesus? Jesus was probably a real person but we'll make an exception.

Are 'sequel' submissions (the same scenario from another point of view, a followup, etc) allowed? Yes! However, it's up to you to figure out a way to tie back to your previous ask. You are welcome to do this in the form of a reblog, but we probably won't see it.

Can I submit an ask about my OCs/fanfic/roleplay/other non-canon thing? Sure! Though if you're submitting something about someone else's fic, we'd prefer if you had the author's permission. Same principle with roleplay--everyone involved should be OK with it going here. (We won't know if you don't have permission, but we'd like to remind you that it's polite to get it.)

Do I have to tell you if I’m submitting something from a fic/roleplay/AU/OC/whatever?

You do not! You can if you want to but it doesn’t make a difference to us.

Can we post stuff that has spoilers for X media? Yes*. * Please don't send in submissions for stuff that's less than a month old, as we can't realistically tag spoilers.** ** The exception to this is remakes/adaptations/remasters/etc, which we don't consider to be "new"*** *** Unless something new actually is added, in which case only that specific thing is considered "new." So, if you have a scenario that utilizes that specific thing, please wait a month. If not, you're good.

Can I ask if you've gotten my submission/if it's been queued? Yes, but only off anon, and we will only tell you if it's in the queue or the askbox. We want to answer asks like this privately instead of clogging up peoples' dashes with them, and we do not want to dig through our blog for a specific post. You do that.

If I submitted something off anon, will you let me know if you decide not to post it? Yes, we will answer your ask privately to tell you why we do not want to post it.

How many times do you post a day? 12 posts are published a day.

Can you post more? No. This is an irritating question. You are encouraged to make your own blog if you don't like the way this one is run--we don't have a monopoly on this idea!

How long is the queue? A few days to a week, usually, including stuff in the askbox that hasn't been properly queued.

What do these acronyms mean? YTA = you're the asshole NTA = not the asshole (this means someone else is) JAH = justified asshole NAH = no assholes here ESH = everyone sucks here INFO = more information is required to make a decision

Some of the characters I want to post about are nonbinary. how should I format my submission? We do not require submissions to include the age or gender of any characters. However, if you want to include this, what we've seen other people do say is 18NB or 18X.

Can I put trigger tags at the top of my submission? Yeah that's fine! We also try to tag common triggers, although we don't tag for murder or human death because so many of these stories involve murder.

Right now we tag: - Unreality (every post) - Animal death - Suicide - Rape/CSA - Child harm/death/endangerment - Abuse - Kidnapping - Stalking - ... And a whole bunch of other stuff

All our trigger tags are just the trigger with no CW/TW

Why do you sometimes post submissions that are basically just a characters name? They're not what this blog should be for.

People think they're funny, so we publish them. It's not the joke format the blog was originally intended for but it's one that people seem to enjoy, so we're happy to post those types of submissions!

[seananmcguire]

Hi Seanan! I recently threw some more of your creatures into the my DnD5e-ish game I'm running- I homebrewed a Cait Sidhe race, and let my players rescue a colony of Aeslin Mice (redubbed "loremice," so I don't have to figure out what "Aeslin" means when my players ask.) The mice have so far named a God of Smokey Rescue, a God of Deceptive Size, and a God of Ominous Declaration. :)

I realize I could make up whatever rules I want for their specifics, since it's my game and I haven't gotten my players to read your work yet, so they wouldn't notice any inaccuracies. But I think it'd be cool to portray them as accurately as possible to the way you see them.

So! If you're willing, I have a couple questions!

1. Do you know what the rough ratio of Shadow Roads distance to not-Shadow-Roads distance is? I'm homebrewing a spell for the Cait Sidhe Shadow Roads thing, and I'd like to give my Cait Sidhe player some hard numbers to work with when they wanna push the limits of their range.

2. For the same player, can you share what the Shadow Roads look like to a Cait Sidhe? We can assume Tybalt isn't as blind as October is in there, but I can't remember her ever asking him precisely how he navigates.

3. I was gonna remove the Aeslin "God/Priestess" gender distinction for my loremice, because the women at my table would have questions and I wouldn't know how to justify it. I don't expect you'd mind much, but it feels mildly disrespectful to the source material anyway (like, what if I'm just using this as an excuse to remove it, because I dislike this Aeslin habit myself?). So I'm torn. Do you know an explanation I could give my players to make sure they don't mistake the mice as sexist?

3.5. I was also considering a compromise solution to this. I'm considering making all the player characters "Gods" to the mice initially, then having the mice switch to using "Priest(ess)" to refer to PCs who converse most directly with the mice, who make the most effort to force their way past the HAILs and be treated as equals. I'd have them act slightly more casual and less reverent to the Priests and Priestesses, make it easier for them to hold productive conversations with the mice than it is for Gods. I felt this could pay enough homage to your work to alleviate my baseless guilt, while beating the potential sexism allegations. And since I have you here on Tumblr, I wanted to get your input on it- is that uncomfortably far from your vision of Aeslin Worship?

If you can't answer any of these, either because they feel spoilery or because you haven't canonized answers to them in your own head, that's fine! I can figure it out. But you've found time for my Tumblr asks before, so I figure I may as well run it by you.

Maybe I'll add Cu Sidhe as a playable race next... if my players are mature enough to handle how I believe it's pronounced, haha.

This is all very neat, but I started my numbered list before I said that, and can't get out of it!

About 1:10.

The Shadow Roads are absolute blackness even to the Cait Sidhe. They're just a little warmer/it's possible to breathe there, if not comfortably. They navigate by feel, and generally "know" when it's time to exit to the "real world" again.

It's not disrespectful to the source material, honest. The mice who live with the Price family, whether Portland or Penton Hall, are still operating under a foundational commandment that Beth Evans didn't know she was giving, when she told them they couldn't set her above her husband, who they had already declared a god. So the mice aren't sexist, because they barely comprehend human sexual dimorphism: they're just following the orders they were given when they were first adopted by this particular liturgical tradition. A colony that hadn't received that commandment could pick any other set of titles. As a rule, you will have two: one for people who are worshiped but not listened to, and one the other way around.

That works!

[quidfree]

hello! i've followed you to indulge in your TSH content, having just finished the book and your fanfic Sober II (Melodrama) back to back! (i'm destroyed!!)

i'm wondering if you've given any thought to whether Richard (Tartt's Richard, or yours) is gay or maybe bisexual? he ofc probably would not make that distinction himself - given the time period, or his aversion to that kind of self reflection, or the apparent finality of his relationship with Francis, or maybe all of the above - but it's fun to think about now, especially myself being someone who now IDs as a lesbian after 10 years of IDing as bi.

thank you for your service 🫡

hello! love your username btw. and thank you, glad to have you in the quidfree extended tartt community.

i like the 'tartt's richard or yours' distinction- i would say i do make an effort so that (to me at least) my richard is a plausible iteration of hers, i.e. i do not like to write so that the characters are 'my' versions unless i think the source material is bad (or at least bad in that specific way). but some of my less serious tsh material veers further into the 'my' side of the scale, for sure. anyway all that to say i don't have separate sets of thoughts on 'both' richards, it's more that there's some stuff i'm 100% on being in canon and some stuff i know i extrapolated into the extended materials my tsh fic constitute.

all that aside, i actually do not have strong feelings on whether richard is gay or bisexual. i think both have strong canon grounding and present similar but slightly different psychologies of the character. the obvious thing is that richard is repressing his attraction to men, but whether he's also comphet in his attraction to women is debatable. he's consistently attracted to them and sleeps with/dates them across all of canon, but on the other hand the key female love interests for him are 1) judy, whose interest he doesn't reciprocate 2) mona, who he sleeps with post murder in a fugue state 3) camilla, who he deifies as a feminine ideal and also always lauds the androgynous beauty/looks she shares with her brother of and 4) sophie, who does lend the most credence to him actually being into girls but also is someone he latches onto when his whole group has deserted him and then fails to emotionally connect with despite several years of dating. of course that could be the trauma, the repression, or both! but my point is there's evidence both ways, no pun intended. richard has very distinct ways of thinking about men and women but it's not as simple as one thing- there's his own self-perception/masculinity, his sexism, his homophobia, and his sexuality all playing a part.

you're right that he wouldn't make the distinction himself, though- either way, his canon thought process is very much 'well i'm not one of those' and that's a catch-all. if and when he gains self-awareness it would have to be through a prolonged relationship of some kind, e.g. with francis in sober ii-verse, because one-offs he can excuse and repress. which is why i think once that sort of long-term realisation happened he would think that he had been lying to himself/everyone the whole time beforehand and secretly consider himself a homosexual (regardless of whether this would be accurate).

i think modern day richard would be more likely to call himself bisexual regardless of which option you go with as more likely. you know that quote from obama's biography about reading marx to get with bisexual college girls... that's somehow richard-coded but in the sense that he thinks calling himself 'flexible' or whatever lets him sound liberated but plausibly heteronormative. in any setting francis delights in the corner he paints himself into.

[anotherlibrocubicularist]

Pjo movies: exist

Pjo fans: the movies are shit for inaccuracies like the actors' ages, Percy and Annabeth's romantic chemistry too early on, Annabeth's hair colour and many changes in scenes and plots from the books

Rick Riordan: hates on the movies (despite him never having seen them in the first place) and promises an adaptation more faithful to the original source material

Pjo fans: thrilled

Pjo series: exists

Some pjo fans: the actors look nothing like the characters we grew up with (and with the pace things are going, will be way older than the movie actors should the series continue beyond s2), there are Percabeth romantic scenes added in the first season that weren't there or weren't romantically charged in the books, Annabeth isn't blond (and with the way the fans treated the movie actress I am side-eying that not more people were upset Leah didn't go blonde), and many things were changed from the books

Rick Riordan: I'm the author, these are my decisions, deal with it.

Other pjo fans: the changes are great, just stop watching if you don't like it.

Some pjo fans: stop watching show

Pjo show: ratings go down, won't make it past s3 or 4 (my prediction, but still)

This is a more or less humorous take on what I've witnessed in the pjo fandom when the series ws announced to when it aired. Personally, I think Rick shot himself in the foot when he hated on the movies for not being faithful to his work and got the fans' hopes up for a more book accurate adaptation that he ultimately failed to deliver. He would've probably received less backlash and the fans would've been more open to changes if he hadn't hated on the movies for exactly that, changes to his source material.

[hueberryshortcake]

also it is sad when people get so caught up in fanon they forget the joys of canon.... like i feel like there are certain patterns that people fall into that give them blindspots. like none of the kids (HDLW) is in general any less close with the others, and pretending any one of them is an outsider is not accurate. In My Opinion. louie's clever but he's also eleven and if there's something that all the other kids AND multiple adults are missing it's not likely he's going to figure it out on his own unless he has a specific reason to. etc. mandatory random paragraph break

making characters out to be 2 dimensional and static in order to make your focus character more dynamic and cool is generally ineffective and not compelling. do you understand where im getting at. like if you have to heavily disengage with source material to enjoy it that's fine i guess do whatever you want but couldn't you just love what's there?