#but thats not (completely) the point of this post

[arminreindl]

Tewkensuchus: King of Punta Peligro

Last month we got our fourth croc of the year and our second notosuchian: Tewkensuchus salamanquensis (Forehead crocodile from the Salamanca Formation), a large-bodied sebecoid from the earliest Paleocene of Argentina. And GODDAMN is it a cool one.

Below some of the fossil material of Tewkensuchus, it doesn't look like much but stay with me for this post.

Starting with the fossil material, Tewkensuchus is admittedly not the most complete sebecid, hell Dentaneosuchus from two years ago is significantly better preserved. Essentially, Tewkensuchus preserves a bit of the skull and a few vertebrae. But the material we do have is exceptional in other ways. Like some European sebecoids, it had a high and broad sagittal crest that extends over its forehead flanked by two broad depressions. Remember the similarity to European sebecoids, thats gonna come back later. Theres also some interesting stuff in how the bony eyebrows, the palpebrals, articulate with the rest of the skull.

What is REALLY weird however is the shape of the postorbitals. Quick anatomy lesson, in crocs the postorbitals form the front corners of the skull table thats located just behind the eyes. They tend to be flat, but in the case of Tewkensuchus they are inclined so that they rise upwards behind the eyes. Now we have plenty of examples of crocodylomorphs with raised squamosals, giving them a somewhat ear-like appearance, but raised postorbitals are a new one.

Below: An artistic interpretation of Tewkensuchus featuring its unique cranial morphology by Manusuchus (give them a follow) from different angles.

One last thing on its anatomy, it was BIG. And I mean big. The team that described Tewkensuchus estimate that its complete skull might have been just over half a meter long, so some 20 inches. This might correspond to a weight of perhaps 300 kg (660 lb), larger than even the largest Cretaceous Baurusuchids.

Now, I hope you remember the part where I said that theres similarities to European sebecoids. Well that sentence has two key points the paper deals with. First of all, the connection to European forms itself. Phylogenetic analysis seems to indicate that despite being found in Patagonia, all its closest relatives are from the Eocene of Europe. These are the recently named giant Dentaneosuchus from France, Bergisuchus from Germany and Iberosuchus (I'll let you figure that one out for yourselves). So after Tewkensuchus disappears South America is inhabited by only distant cousins while its closest relatives show up some 20 million years later on the other side of the Atlantic.

The other noteworthy part of the statement is the use of "Sebecoid" rather than sebecid. That's because of taxonomic back and forth. Essentially, a few previous studies have not included European sebecoids (Bergisuchus and Iberosuchus) within the family Sebecidae, instead featuring them as a separate branch that split off beforehand. In some studies that branch is known as Bergisuchidae, in others they are two branches, you get the idea. Now the description of Dentaneosuchus for instance did away with Bergisuchidae and simply include these European forms within Sebecidae itself. Still as the basalmost members, but given the honor of being at least included. Same goes for Ogresuchus. Well, in the description of Tewkensuchus, we go back to the separate model. So Bergisuchus, Iberosuchus, Dentaneosuchus and Tewkensuchus all form a single not officially named group simply referred to as the "Eurogondwanan clade". This group was placed as the sister family to Sebecidae and together with Ogresuchus the two form the newly named Sebecoidea.

Europe's sebecoids, Dentaneosuchus (art by Joschua Knüppe), Bergisuchus (by Scott Reid) and Iberosuchus (once again Manusuchus)

And this is where we need to address the fact that Tewkensuchus creates a bunch of new problems and makes old ones worse. For starters, it's size. By all accounts its way too big. Keep in mind, this animal appeared some 2 to 3 million years after the extinction of the dinosaurs, an extinction event that is generally thought to have killed everything on land heavier than 10 kilos. And then you get Tewkensuchus with an estimated weight of 300. Well, there's two possible explanations for that. Explanation 1 hinges on the known fact that these rules don't quite apply to semi-aquatic animals. Sure, anything large on land got whiped out, but eusuchian crocodiles managed to survive quite well despite their large size in part because they were partially aquatic. So perhaps Tewkensuchus and sebecoids as a whole underwent an aquatic phase? Well, this would work quite well with what is known as the Sebecia-hypothesis. Essentially, there is some debate on the relationship between sebecids and other notosuchians. Some studies draw a link between them and the similarily terrestrial baurusuchids, placing them in the group Sebecosuchia. Other studies meanwhile believe that sebecids are most closely related to peirosaurids, which in turn are close kin to itasuchids and mahajangasuchids, with both of the latter being more semi-aquatic than other notosuchians. The problem with this is twofold. On the one hand, to my knowledge there has never been any indication that sebecids underwent an aquatic phase and even Cretaceous sebecoids like Ogresuchus from before the impact were clearly terrestrial. The other issue, as nice as this would fit with the Sebecia-hypothesis, this particular study actually recovers the Sebecosuchia model. So there's that.

Personally I don't really buy into this explanation, which takes us to the second possibility. Sebecoids got really jacked really fast. I mean, that's it really. If sebecoids didn't undergo some weird little phase that somehow excempts them from the 10 kilo rule then the only logical answer is that they must have grown to a ridiculous degree the second the dust settled. Do we have evidence for that? Well....kinda but not really no. The closest we have is the fact that Dentaneosuchus from the Eocene clearly reached an enormous size on its own, but that was over 20 million years after the impact. We do at least know that sebecoids were small prior to the KPG thanks to Ogresuchus from Spain, which grew to only a meter in length. But a sample size of one isn't exactly exact proof that all sebecoids were small prior to the impact, especially with shifting phylogenies. The paper itself argues that its most parsimonious that whatever sebecoid crossed the boundry was already fairly large, but time will tell if this holds up. Whatever the case, with a skull half a meter in length it was certainly a formidable predator and a terrifying sight to any unfortunate mammal to cross its path.

Tewkensuchus attacking a startled Monotrematum, a South American monotreme, art by Joschua Knüppe

Finally the last thing to address, paleogeography. It sucks. Moving on. Jokes aside, sebecoid geography was already a pain in the ass. Assuming the sebecosuchian model, sebecoids likely split off from baurusuchids during the Santonian. Mind you this is purely based in the first appearance of baurusuchids, since sebecoids didn't appear for quite a while. Ignoring the problematic Doratodon, the first sebecoid to appear in the fossil record is Ogresuchus in the Maastrichtian of Spain. In the Paleocene we then obviously get Tewkensuchus representing the Eurogondwana clade in Argentina as well as sebecids proper, which seem to be constrained to South America. But then in the Eocene we suddenly have sebecoids in Europe and Africa (for simplicity I'm assuming that Eremosuchus was a sebecoid rather than a sebecid as is traditional). So, how does any of this work? We don't know. I've been breaking my head over how to best explain this without just repeating the paper itself, so let me just say this. Maybe sebecoids originated in South America with baurusuchids, they managed to enter Europe at the very least once giving rise to Ogresuchus, probably via Africa given that its very much undersampled. From there who fucking knows. Maybe Ogresuchus was just one random branch and the two main groups both actually originate in South America. Maybe the Eurogondwana group emmigrating to Europe as well while sebecids proper remained. Maybe the Eurogondwana group originated in Europe and Tewkensuchus simply returned to South America, or maybe they originated in Africa and had members travel west to South America and north to Europe. Or maybe....you get the idea, we don't know. We don't know if they rafted or took land bridges (tho the latter seems more likely), we don't know where certain groups first originated in actuality, we do not know a lot and Tewkensuchus being such a blatant link between Paleocene South America and Europe, which were well separated by that point, raises so many questions.

I imagine this is what this entire last section reads like....

I wish that last segment wasn't as chaotic as it is, but like I said, its a big old confusing mess and it gives me a headachse just thinking about it. So for the time being, its simplest to assume that they split from baurusuchids in South America and then some stuff happened we don't understand. Personally, I'm very much putting my trust in Africa here, I am 100% convinced that some very important stuff went down that we just haven't found yet. But thats just me.

[aroaceleovaldez]

What is the PR disaster in question that made Rick announce TSATS? I wasn’t active in the online fandom at that point

Of course! This was awhile ago so it figures people don't remember it/aren't familiar:

Basically a couple years back (2020) the fandom had some posts circulate discussing the ways different characters in the Riordanverse were written poorly or offensively. There was a masterpost that went around tumblr but the two major points people were particularly focusing on were Piper and Samirah (particularly because Piper had featured prominently again in Trials of Apollo recently and the third MCGA book had further emphasized and discussed Samirah being Muslim, since it was supposed to take place during Ramadan). Basically each had multiple posts breaking down the ways they were depicted incorrectly or offensively. The entire fandom for a little bit was VERY intensely discussing this (and it's around this time the "RR crit" tag got very popularized on tumblr - it did exist before, but suddenly was being used VERY frequently - cause it was that wide-spread - though the discussion took over basically every side of Riordaverse social media on different platforms). People really wanted Rick to respond to these criticisms, so he did!

He made two blog posts, one about Piper and one about Samirah. He has since deleted both so the links are to archived versions. The short version: he essentially tried to justify his poor research and double-down that he hadn't written them offensively, actually, people were just being mean to him. The fandom, of course, reacted poorly to this.

[Further elaborated events under the cut since this got a bit lengthy]

(Fun fact, this all happened within a month or so of the time i posted an open letter on aphobic tropes in the Riordanverse that Rick replied to, and then he immediately followed with announcing that Reyna was intended to be ace-coded [which cause a LOT of fandom debate] before Rick dipped for a couple of weeks, and then came back to post the blog posts in response to Piper and Sam stuff. So I like to jokingly refer to this as "The time I imploded the fandom/drove Rick off of twitter." Twas I that set the house ablaze.)

Rick fully left social media after this and the LT Musical social media manager became Rick's social media manager for the time being.

So this all happened June/July of 2020. Tower of Nero would end up being published in October of 2020 and a few months after that Rick would state that he was done with the series and wouldn't be writing any more series installments involving Percy, and also that he wouldn't be writing a Nico quest following Tower of Nero as it "wasn't his place to" and encouraged the community to write their own versions of Nico's story.

The community continued to circulate the tumblr posts and discuss the topics of Rick's offensive character depictions, and this is also where we see the dramatic shift in how the fandom depicts Piper in fanwork (though in most cases it is admittedly not an improvement 😬) because of all this discussion. This is also around the time when the fandom brought Viria under scrutiny claiming that she was whitewashing Piper as part of the same discussions, through the justification that she was drawing Annabeth as having tan skin (which she does canonically), and if Annabeth has tanner skin then Piper then that's whitewashing Piper? Except they were using completely separate images of not fully rendered Piper art versus Annabeth in dramatic lighting, so it's all very awkward and poor logic, and did actually get kind of racist. A lot of people were calling it "Tannabeth Blackchase" (yeah, i know) or similar and a common sentiment you'd see repeated is "Don't draw Annabeth as having darker skin than Piper, because that's offensive/racist/whitewashing." (Note: it was not phrased "don't draw Piper as having lighter skin than Annabeth" - we also won't get into certain offensive depictions of Native Americans, but I digress). But yeah, the Annabeth stuff in all that did not age well at all.

Anyways, in October of 2021 however Rick would announce that he was co-writing The Sun And The Star - with a lot of heavy emphasis on how Mark Oshiro works as a sensitivity reader, and some false advertising from the official social media that Mark Oshiro was the first time a non-Riordan author would be collaborating on the series (disregarding the ghostwriters completely). One of the big criticisms in the breaking down of issues in Rick's writing was his lack of ever seeking a sensitivity reader, and fans claiming that a sensitivity reader could solve a lot of the problems. This was basically Rick's "look! I totally listened!!!!" (though it did little to actually improve things, based on the book) and in TSATS as well Piper gets a large cameo at the end where the text very directly addresses a lot of points made in criticism of Rick's writing of her.

We also then of course got the CoTG trilogy later, explicitly stated to be for advertising purposes for the show.

So basically, short version: Rick came under scrutiny for a lot of offensive writing within the span of two months, made some bad blog posts doubling down about it, left social media. TOA ends. Rick says he wasn't going to continue the series/write what would become TSATS. Community celebrates the end of of the franchise but also continues to discuss Rick's poor writing and the blog posts at length. Rick suddenly announces TSATS and Mark Oshiro's involvement. Everybody gets distracted from being mad. Show announcement stuff also happens and the discussions peter out.

[nymika-arts]

See this is why I am so confused at all the Tommy stans. It was obvious from the start that his and Buck’s relationship was doomed lol. I saw so many of them excited that he was coming back like it meant something but omg the way he did??? It further proved how completely doomed their relationship was lol. I got into 911 late in the game but it’s been interesting to see some people call people who think buddie is going to happen delusional yet turn back around and say Tommy is endgame??? Endgame where lol

honestly I've been saying in actual canon (outside of everything fanon has cooked up for him) tommy is really only about as developed as ana was. he's in a few episodes, they have some fun moments together, but overall not a relationship written to last and ultimately unsurprising when it ends. especially when everything in the relationship has been overshadowed by eddie in some way (JUST like we used to point out with every other love interest these two have had). like. buck spent the ENTIRE episode talking about eddie, including every scene tommy was in lmao. tommy saw eddie as competition and is now crawling back when he thinks the competition is over. buck was sleeping w him as a distraction bc he's so lonely without eddie. I've been watching since before s4 and I've seen a lot of love interests come and go this is like. textbook for this show atp lol

[flow2024]

I wish you would write a fic about irreconcilable artistic differences on a movie set between Joe and Nicky.

not really irreconciliable as in not solvable at all but you know i had fun with this

Joe squeezes his eyes shut, covering his face with both hands, and leans forward. His shoulders tremble uncontrollably. He takes a short, sharp breath, and another, and another, but he can’t quite seem to get enough into his lungs. There’s a lump in his throat and a weight in his stomach. He leans forward with a low, wounded sound and–

“Cut,” Nicky says softly. Then, because it takes Joe a second to hear him: “Joe, stop.”

Slowly, Joe raises his head. Wipes at his eyes and takes a few deep breaths to steady himself. Nicky’s already up, frowning ever so slightly as he looks at the camera. 

“What is it this time?” Joe manages. His voice is hoarse; he has to clear his throat once or twice. Nicky doesn’t look up. The clock on the nightstand reads 01.34, but Nicky’s changed it a few times over the course of the shoot. He has no clue what time it really is, only that it’s dark outside.

It’s just the two of them in the room. Nicky had wanted to keep this one small, just him and Joe and the camera. The apartment they’re in is nice, if a little empty, though Joe supposes that’s the point. They’re in the bedroom, Joe sitting cross-legged on the bed, shirtless, sheets bunched up over his lap, a phone lying on the nightstand behind him. One entire wall of the room is taken up by a floor-to-ceiling window which lets the moonlight in, though there’s a few low lights set up behind Nicky to send bars of silver light across the bed, because the natural light hadn’t quite been strong enough for the effect Nicky wanted. It’s otherworldly; it’s beautiful. 

Nicky still isn’t looking at him, so Joe says again, “What?” It comes out a little harsher than he means it to, but it gets Nicky’s attention.

Nicky runs one hand through his hair. Joe can’t see him well, not with the light behind him and the shadows in the room. “I don’t know,” Nicky says. “It’s missing something.”

Joe has worked with Nicky enough times before. It’s not that he doesn’t like working with him - they’re friends - but he can’t fucking read him, and so after the sixth take of the same scene he can’t help but take it a little personally. 

Joe reaches for the bottle of water hidden just under the bed and takes a long drink, mostly to keep himself from snapping. What time is it? “I can try again, but I can’t do this indefinitely, Nicky.”

“I know, I know,” Nicky says, fidgeting again with the camera, “it’s not you, it’s just–” 

“What else could it be?” Joe interrupts. He’s not stupid. This scene doesn’t work if he can’t get it right, which means the entire film doesn’t work if he can’t get it right. More than anything else, this one depends on him. No music, no camera movement, no dialogue, nothing but him and the camera. And he wants to do it right, he loves this project almost as much as Nicky does, but there’s a hollow feeling in his chest and he’s spent the last however-many-hours having a near-complete breakdown over and over again and it’s still not right. And Joe doesn’t know what it is he’s doing wrong.

“I don’t know,” Nicky says quietly. Now he is looking at Joe, and Joe can’t tell if he’s disappointed, or angry, or – or what. He’s perfectly expressionless, as always. 

Joe loves this job. And he wants to get this right. But it doesn’t mean it’s not one of the hardest things he’s ever had to do, and he’s tired.

“I don’t have much more left in me, Nicky,” he says, and this time he does snap. He wipes at his eyes again, can’t look at Nicky. He’s supposed to be making himself vulnerable, above all in this scene, but suddenly he can’t stand the way Nicky’s looking at him. “Pass me my hoodie.”

“Joe–”

“I can’t. I can’t keep doing this.” He kicks the sheets off and gets tangled trying to do it, grabs his hoodie when Nicky offers it, pulls it over his head in one fluid motion and gets out of there as soon as he can. Thankfully, there’s only Andy and Nile in the other room, Andy lying back on the couch with her feet up and Nile perched on the arm of it. They both look up at Joe as he enters, both look like they’re about to ask, and Joe can’t stand it, can’t be in here a second longer, can’t–

“We are done for the day, I think,” Nicky says behind him, startling Joe. He hadn’t realised Nicky was there.

Andy raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t argue. It’s already the second day of trying to shoot this scene: they’re running the risk of falling behind schedule. 

“We’ll find something else to do tomorrow,” Nicky says. “I’ll look over everything tonight. We will try this again on Monday.”

Andy and Nile look at each other. Nile shrugs. 

“Get some rest, Joe,” Nicky says. 

Joe shoves his hands in his pockets and doesn’t say a word.

–--------------------------------

He doesn’t get called in the next day at all, and he doesn’t interrogate it too closely. Takes the day off, pretty much, because they’ve only really got one scene left to film, and there’s not much more he can do for that. Nicky had wanted to leave it to the last, and Joe had agreed, at the time.

At about nine pm, someone knocks on his hotel room door, which is unusual on a day where they don’t have a night shoot to do. When he opens it, Nicky is on the other side. Joe lets him in without a word. 

“I wanted to apologise,” Nicky says, standing in the middle of the room and looking as uncomfortable as Joe’s ever seen him. “For last night. I was pushing you too hard, and I should not have done.”

Joe closes the door behind him. Nicky fidgets with the sleeve of his hoodie. 

“Sit down,” Joe says. 

Nicky does, settling himself on the edge of Joe’s bed, not quite looking him in the eye. Joe joins him, after a moment. 

“At the risk of sounding cliche,” Nicky says, “it’s not you, it’s me.”

Joe laughs, mostly because the phrase sounds so strange coming from Nicky and also because out of everything he’d thought Nicky might say, he hadn’t expected that. 

Nicky smiles slightly, too. Then he gets up and heads for the minibar. “Mind if I have a drink?”

Joe shakes his head. Nicky gets out a little bottle of wine, glances at the label, and takes a swig straight from the bottle without bothering to get a glass. 

“I can’t seem to get it right,” Nicky says. “You know I wrote almost fifteen different versions of that scene?”

The scene in the script itself is barely a page long. “No,” Joe says. 

Nicky nods. Rubs a hand over his face. “I wanted it to feel real. I thought if I could get it right, it would… help, somehow. I don’t know.”

It’s the exact same reason Joe said yes before he even read the script, when the whole thing was just an idea in Nicky’s head, when they were talking about it over drinks at Andy’s and Joe was in love with the idea almost immediately. He knew exactly why Nicky was writing it; he knows, now, exactly why it needs to be right. But at the same time – “I don’t know if that’s possible, Nicky.”

Nicky sighs. “I know.” He crosses back over to sit beside Joe again, takes another drink from the bottle. “But there is something missing, and I cannot seem to find it. And so it does not feel real. And I know this is not easy for you.”

“It’s not,” Joe says plainly. 

“But you know,” Nicky continues, “I could not have trusted anyone with this but you. If you had not said yes, I would not have done this.”

That, Joe didn’t know: he knows he’d been Nicky’s first choice, but he’d assumed that’s because they know each other well enough already. But it makes sense: the reason Nicky wrote the script is the same thing they’d bonded over. 

Even still, it’s a lot. “I don’t know if I can do it the way you want,” Joe says. 

Nicky looks up at him from where he’s been running his fingers over the label on the bottle absentmindedly. “If you want to stop, I can–”

“No,” Joe says quickly. “But I don’t think it’s ever going to be exactly the way you felt.”

Nicky looks away. “It is a lot to ask,” he says. “I know this.”

Joe doesn’t think; just reaches over and takes Nicky’s hand. “I know,” he says. “Trust me.”

Nicky takes a deep breath. Then he nods. "Okay."

[tired-demonspawn]

hey. so.

didnt plan on reading sonic the movie fanfiction of all things, right? right.

but alas the picture of outsider pov mean bean customer witnessing stone pining on main between movies 1 and 2 was so utterly VIVID in my mind i ended up looking some up.

because i mean. the setup is so obvious, it is practically begging to be written and then read by some fanatical idiot like myself. no way an author hasnt yet taken advantage of the premise.

ONLY TO FIND OUT NOBODY HAS

WHAT ARE YOU GUYS DOING?????

(left an essay in the tags, christ 💀)

[thedrotter]

this idea to me in a vision ... ive become a shrimp as a consequence from sitting at my chair but anythign for a yuu drawing🔥🔥

[girlmetalsonic]

something that is like the baseline of amys entire character to me is that shes lonely. shes clingy and physically affectionate in a way none of her friends really are, shes always getting pushed aside and left behind. yeah, she helps out people she doesnt know because shes a nice person, but also, she sees part of herself in them. she wont leave someone else behind because she knows the feeling —and more importantly, hates the feeling. if she doesnt have somebody to stand by her and be there for her, then shes going to be that person for everybody else. something something her obsession with sonic is really just like a manifestation of that desire for closeness with someone, and she thinks that romance is the only way to get that. idk... this hedgehog can have so many abandonment issues.

[userhangmanpage]

PLEASE 😭🫂💔

[animangalover-writes]

People who can't comprehend crack ships because "there's literally nothing there, what are you going crazy over???" have no whimsy in their lives. Yall. THATS PART OF THE FUN!!! MAKING UP RANDOM DYNAMICS!!! LOOKING AT THE POTENTIAL!!!!

People should enjoy crackships more tbh

[flamesignite]

//Time to rant I hate when I make a post about not sending me memes if we're not mutuals and being completely ignored so you get blocked this time.

[wackywatchdotcom]

i will say im not super invested in the idea of the show giving us too much information on c&a. like itll be super cool if we find out about it! and im sure itll be relevant information if we do but i think the information we get is going to be not super indepth, because im not sure itd match the tone of the show? its less about mystery and like The Lore and more about the characters and examining how different characters respond and have been responding to the environment set up by the show

(it WOULD be fun to learn more details about c&a and i AM curious i just dont think itd actually enhance much abt the show itself, and as such, i dont think its super important writing wise for the audience to learn about it either)

that SAID i do ascribe to the idea that ALL of the cast members worked for c&a before the ended up in the circus, no exceptions. i dont really know how say gangle or zooble wouldve ended up there, but i feel like they all ended up there one way or another. and i think most of the cast doesnt talk about their life in the real world bc its gone and theres no reason to dredge it up (or theyve forgotten it or most aspects of it), but it does make it fascinating that not even pomni, who has the least reason to avoid these topics at least early on, broached the subject of what in the WORLD is c&a UP to. it literally is never brought up ever as of ep 4. which makes me think the company was probably always super shady in some way to the pt that its employees were kinda desensitized to the idea that its c&as fault that horrible things happen

[suntails]

the book is done :D setting up a shop for it next week but i’ll start posting/open preorders in september!!

[sea-buns]

Holy fuck, man. What a trip Fearne has been on, huh?

You tell her how grateful you are to have her in your life, you flatter her, you tell her you need her, that you have to do this together. You have her make a promise that has this woman, born of chaos and fey, agreeing through shaking hands and a trembling voice.

You make her deceive your friends; you make her follow where they cannot know; you make her help you into this contraption; you make her feed this thing into you despite the fact that you both have been warned extensively of the risks. You make her watch you crumble and splinter and shatter and fracture and burst and implode. You make her watch you die, over and over and over and over, for a minute in agonizing bullet time.

You make her do all these things, because when she tries to back out, when she tries to not be the one who let you do this—how could you do this—

you tell her, "YOU PROMISED."

Because if there's one thing you know, it's that the fey do not break a promise.

[sasukeless]

back to complaining about translations but i just again came across an old post that basically was analyzing sasuke calling naruto his one and only and saying it was him being sarcastic/not truthful because he was throwing naruto’s previous words at him in this panel

and im just… this panel is wrong. the speech bubble and naruto’s thoughts are flipped. naruto did not call sasuke his one and only here, he was remembering sasuke calling Him his closest friend.

anyway it’s a tricky panel because it’s in many pages when you read the manga. like i’m not free of sin because i remember i have posted too when i couldn’t find one with the correct placement. (also i feel like naruto saying there’s no way he’d able to leave sasuke alone holds more meaning than i can’t let that happen but whatever Whatever details) but anyway this is also an scene you can watch the anime clip and see what is naruto saying. but my point is that One simple misplacement in the translation can literally lead to people misinterpreting something completely different and in this case denying sasuke’s feelings and characterization. and it’s just well. sad

[lordgeneralsix]

I can't remember who said this but there was this one dev who said that when making romanceable characters they have to be attractive in some way (personality, looks, not too morally fucked up etc). and since I read that, the statement hasn't left my mind and I'm very aware now of whenever outside influence and modern discourse get to me or other writers. like just yesterday I found myself rewriting a scene to be more "comfortable" to witness, even though the point was to be emotionally charged and face a difficult topic the character had been actively lying about. but some things can't be glossed over. sometimes it's good when media grabs you by the shoulders and makes you face horrible shit. it's good when media makes you uncomfortable even if it's coming from a ~romanceable companion~. that means it's working. if you remain comfortable forever you learn nothing.

I bring this up bc the veilguard companions are the perfect example and victims of the "romanceable characters need to be attractive" mindset. they don't have ugly sides, they don't fight with each other--and I mean really fight--they don't have controversial opinions or do problematic things. they don't ever question your authority over their lives and why you're the guy in charge. they are nice and perfect and their problems aren't really that serious and can be fixed by simply having a therapy session w rook (bc being possessed or gaining new magic isn't a big deal in a world where previously such events are Very distressing and hard to control). they are further proof that trying too hard to make something attractive has the complete opposite effect if your brain isn't the size of a pebble.

it's overall very frustrating that big game developers continue to be so spineless and I'm not giving anyone a pass for shallow writing, especially from a franchise that is known to have complex characters. none of this is impressive after the first three dragon age games, which were well loved and dissected and debated for years after their release. that isn't to say these games don't have kind characters, having that balance is why I personally like dark fantasy and liked what the dragon age games offered (whenever the writing was good..). it's not dark for the sake of being dark (see grimdark), there's a reason why these things are happening, and in this world no one is completely innocent even if they have good intentions. most people like when their characters aren't always kind or agreeable, bc it's extremely rewarding to finally find that middle ground (of course I have to bring up larian, who made bg3 and proved just how much people appreciate flawed characters, see astarion). conflict is the driving force of a story, no matter what it is. even the most sickeningly sweet cozy slice of life story will have some kind of conflict. it's unavoidable. that's life. taking that away is setting yourself up for failure and all that remains is a boring story full of boring people. no one cares about characters who have their lives together.

(the post is technically over but I wanted to put some final thoughts under the cut bc this got longer than I meant)

I want to go back to the statement real quick... like i do agree, it's true as writers we'll subconsciously (or consciously if you're insecure) try to make our characters appealing, but this is the common trap writers fall into by giving a shit about what others think and want from Their work (which btw I fully believe in writing what you want even if it's "bad" because something with genuine soul will never be as bad as soulless cashgrabs). romanceable characters can and should be as flawed as you'd make any other character, bc trust me there's an audience for everything. even a random npc with two lines will be attractive to someone.

the pressure of an imaginary audience is what pushes writers into a corner and prevents writers from writing and exploring what They want. it's the writer's story first, not the audience's. I think the romanceable companion trap can be easily avoided if writers just 1) grow a bit of a backbone and 2) ask themselves if this is even a necessary or insightful mechanic that will help develop a character further. ask themselves if this character even has the capacity to handle a romantic relationship bc everything else is subjective and it's impossible to appeal to everyone (which apparently this is a controversial take). I won't sit here and pretend that I don't appreciate a good romance, but sometimes all someone really needs is a friend.

obsidian is a good example of self aware devs. they tried to do romance for pillars of eternity 2 bc of fan demand, and it didn't work very well. now for avowed, they didn't explore romance bc they know it's not their strong suit and don't feel it's necessary for this story, instead that time and effort went to developing the characters in other meaningful ways. I have nothing but respect for such a decision bc they know what they want from their story instead of lying and trying to be everything at once. less is more as they say.

[dragon-age-sideblog]

regarding the whole choices thing. I've decided if bioware wants to pretend none of my other characters existed or their choices mattered in this new blank slate game. then I'm gonna just consider it two completely different canons. there's the one thats more important to me and I'll continue to build onto it on my own and incorporate my characters and decisions into it. and then there's veilguard. which I'm sure will still be fun but its gonna be set in its own canon world separate entirely from mine <3